Night train to bus connections

With the very welcome revamp of the Night Bus network last year, I wondered how the train to bus connections are now that most bus routes are 24-hour versions of regular routes, rather than the previous arrangement of confusing special routes that virtually nobody used.

Here’s a quick look at a couple of my local routes, showing train arrivals between midnight and 6am on Saturday morning, and the connecting bus departures heading east.

Bus 630 – North Road

Bus 630 connects with the Sandringham train at Gardenvale, the Frankston train at Ormond, and the Cranbourne/Pakenham line at Huntingdale.

Like the overnight trains, the bus also runs hourly overnight, with a run time of just under 30 minutes each way.

Let’s be super generous and assume a connection time of 5 to 15 minutes is good. (This really is being super generous. You can drive a long way in 15 minutes at night.)

Outbound train arrives Gardenvale	Eastbound 630 bus departs Gardenvale	Interchange time (mins)		Outbound train arrives Ormond	Eastbound 630 bus departs Ormond	Interchange time (mins)		Outbound train arrives Huntingdale	Eastbound 630 bus* or 900+ departs Huntingdale	Interchange time (mins)
00:16	–	❌		00:18	–	❌		00:11 ➡️	00:12+	1❌
00:36 ➡️	00:41	5✅		00:38 ➡️	00:48	9✅		00:31 ➡️	00:57+ 00:59*	26❌ 28❌
00:56	–	❌		01:09	–	❌		00:59 01:22	–	❌
01:36 ➡️	01:41	5✅		01:39 ➡️	01:48	9✅		01:47 ➡️	01:59* 02:01+	12✅ 14✅
02:36 ➡️	02:41	5✅		02:39 ➡️	02:48	9✅		02:47 ➡️	02:59* 03:03+	12✅ 16❌
03:36 ➡️	03:41	5✅		03:39 ➡️	03:48	9✅		03:47 ➡️	03:59* 04:05+	12✅ 18❌
04:36 ➡️	04:41	5✅		04:39 ➡️	04:48	9✅		04:47 ➡️	04:59*✅ 05:07+	12✅ 20❌
05:36 ➡️	05:41	5✅		05:39 ➡️	05:48	9✅		05:47 ➡️	05:59*✅ 06:25+	12✅ 38❌

So the eastbound bus 630 has surprisingly good connections at both Gardenvale and Ormond, with connection times of between 5 and 10 minutes.

Not every train just after midnight is met by a bus, which is somewhat unsurprising given the trains run to a higher frequency until about 1am.

Huntingdale connections to the 630 are not too bad after 1:30am once that hourly pattern is established.

I’ve also shown the route 900 bus connections at Huntingdale, because it parallels the 630 east from here to Monash Uni (and then continues beyond). It mostly doesn’t connect well. The connections at Oakleigh are better, though that is counterintuitive for people heading east from Huntingdale. (The 900 doesn’t serve Caulfield overnight).

Bus 703 – Centre Road

Bus 703 connects with the Sandringham train at Middle Brighton, and the Frankston train at Bentleigh. (It goes on to connect to trains at Clayton, Syndal and Blackburn too.)

Train arrives Middle Brighton	703 bus departs Middle Brighton	Interchange time (mins)		Train arrives Bentleigh	703 bus departs Bentleigh	Interchange time (mins)
00:20 ➡️	00:30	10✅		00:22 ➡️	00:40	18❌
00:40		❌		00:42		❌
01:00		❌		01:13		❌
01:40 ➡️	01:45	5✅		01:43 ➡️	01:55	12✅
02:40 ➡️	02:50	10✅		02:43 ➡️	03:00	17❌
03:40 ➡️	03:55	15✅		03:43 ➡️	04:05	22❌
04:40 ➡️	05:00	20❌		04:43 ➡️	05:10	27❌

This is a mixed bag, thanks to the frequency of the bus not matching the train. The bus runs about every 65 minutes overnight, thanks to a run time of just over an hour from Blackburn to Brighton; just under for the opposite direction.

This means by 3am, the connection is more than 10 minutes at both stations – hardly ideal.

Could they modify the route to be a bit quicker? Yes – they could skip the big loop past North Brighton station. But that would mean a compromise on running the same route as daytime. (Maybe they should change daytime too? The route is a tad confusing; stops are lightly used, and many of them are served by other routes.)

Connection reliability?

What happens if your train is delayed? The PTV page notes:

Buses will wait up to 20 minutes at selected stations if the connecting train from the city is running late.

Presumably they’ve worked out the protocols to make this work operationally. At some stations, bus drivers can see a display with real-time train information. At others, they can’t, and possibly have to use a phone app like the rest of us. (For a 703 bus driver waiting at Middle Brighton, they can’t even see the station – it’s around the corner and down the street.)

And hopefully such delays are rare. If buses have to wait too much, it could mess up punctuality for the rest of the night.

Connections in all directions

Trains from the City to an eastbound bus is just one possible connection between two routes. Possibly for these locations it’s the best one to focus on.

But in all you have eight combinations at each interchange: two routes running in two directions, with each passenger able to change to the other route in two directions = 2 x 2 x 2.

If the outbound train to the eastbound bus is good, what about the other connections? Here’s all the combinations for the 630 at Ormond station overnight on Friday/Saturday when both services are hourly:

Arriving Ormond	Mins past hour	Departing Ormond	Mins past hour	Interchange time (mins)
Outbound train	39	Eastbound bus	48	9 ✅
Outbound train	39	Westbound bus	21	42❌
Citybound train	57	Eastbound bus	48	51❌
Citybound train	57	Westbound bus	21	24❌
Eastbound bus	48	Outbound train	39	51❌
Eastbound bus	48	Citybound train	57	9 ✅
Westbound bus	21	Outbound train	39	18❌
Westbound bus	21	Citybound train	57	36❌

For most combinations, it’s not great. And this is the problem with low-frequency services – even if they align with an hourly service, it’s impossible to serve many of the connection combinations well, so you have to prioritise.

One way around the problem of connecting low frequency services in all directions is to have them “pulse” at interchange points – this is common in rural Switzerland. The buses might arrive at the station 5 minutes before the train comes through, and leaves 5 minutes afterwards, preferably in both directions, allowing changes from bus to train and vice versa.

But this doesn’t work so well in a suburban setting. Three ten minute waits along route 630 – even if you could coordinate it properly with all three train lines – would double the running time, and introduce unacceptable delays to anybody travelling along the route.

A better solution is improving the frequency. There’s a strong argument for the trains in particular – the backbone of the PT network – to be at least half-hourly overnight, especially given the significant costs needed to keep the train system running at all.

I’ve focussed here on Night Network, and just in one area.

But of course, there’s a need for better frequencies and better connections right across the network and at most times of day. They all make for a better more usable public transport system that more people will use.