All forms of transport, including gunzelly
On Thursday the state government announced two more level crossings in their first term batch of 20: Scoresby Rd and Mountain Hwy, either side of Bayswater station. This provides some interesting challenges due to the adjacent train maintenance facility, which presumably can’t be moved. The press release notes: They [the crossings] will be removed through ... [More]
In quiet Railway Place, North Melbourne, just south of the station, there’s long been a viewing platform for rail enthusiasts to gaze upon the glory of the tracks between Southern Cross and North Melbourne. It must have at least pseudo-official status as it’s marked in the Melway (map 2E, reference F1). Google Maps doesn’t show ... [More]
Labor’s “Homesafe” has been rebranded “Night Network“. The 12 month trial starts in January, with hourly suburban trains on all routes, half-hourly trams on 6 routes. Full timetables aren’t out yet, but some reasonably good new maps are… note the symbolism of the Pakenham and Sunbury lines, diagonal straight through the middle — as it ... [More]
A number of things hamper Skybus’s reliability and speed. The most obvious ones are a lack of priority lanes, and even a lack of enforcement of the “Express” (taxi and bus) lanes on Citylink. But when you use Skybus, another thing stands out — the long slow access road that stretches from the terminal to ... [More]
One of the funniest pieces of rail-related humour I’ve seen was this — the Rail Replacement Bus Set, devised by Tim Dunn. Rail replacement buses can either be bearable or miserable, depending on how well they’re organised. This weekend is the first major shutdown on the Frankston line for the North-Mckinnon-Centre Road grade separations, though ... [More]
The major point of differentiation between the government and the Coalition (and the Greens) on the metro rail tunnel is whether or not it should have platforms at South Yarra. The current thinking, which is in line with PTV plans going back to at least 2013, is for Dandenong line trains to run in from ... [More]
As I’ve touched upon in previous posts, there are numerous technical hurdles with the Bentleigh area level crossing removals. Via the stakeholder group I’m learning that a lot of the cost with any removal where the railway line is dropped down under the road is related to carefully moving all the services that are buried ... [More]
A quick update on my local grade separations at North Road (Ormond), Mckinnon Road (Mckinnon) and Centre Road (Bentleigh). In most respects, what I wrote on the detail of the project in this post from July still applies, so read up on that if you haven’t already — or check out the official web site.) ... [More]
It’s taken a while, but it looks like full mobile coverage in the City Loop is imminent. It’s been available in the stations since about 2000, but the signal generally cuts out as the trains enter the tunnels. There are four separate Loop tunnels. For months people have reported the signal being available in one ... [More]
I’d love to post an awe-inspiring blog post this morning, but I haven’t got one. (There are some in the works). Instead I’ll just note some quick things: I’m speaking, with some others, at Idea Bombing Melbourne this Thursday night, the topic being: “Tapestry of a City”. Facebook event / EventBrite — it’s free, but ... [More]
In today’s Age, former National Party leader and Deputy PM Tim Fischer is quoted as saying the new Regional Rail Link should have had a flyover where the Geelong and Ballarat lines converge. And due to congestion, trains sometime have to wait for five minutes for the track to be clear, he said. “Nobody builds ... [More]
This is an update of a 2010 post where I quickly compared the different types of trains then in service. Since then the Hitachi trains have been taken out of service, and I also thought I’d briefly describe where the names come from. (The Hitachi trains got their name because the design was by Hitachi, ... [More]