So, a new train timetable starts in June, shaking up the Frankston line in particular, but also the Dandenong line and minor tweaks on some of the other lines. Updated 10pm with a pic of a Comeng train in the new Metro colours About a year ago I remarked that the Frankston line was using ... [More]
Category: transport
All forms of transport, including gunzelly
Backpacks aren’t actually people
From Canada’s National Post (they have a few others too, but I liked this one the best). Related: 19/1/2004: MX’s guide to PT etiquette
It’s time for a cleanout of links and half-written/baked posts. Fascinating for MSM watchers A former Fairfax staffer is starting his own free magazine in collaboration with real estate agents and is expected to win millions in advertising revenue away from Fairfax. Webber’s nanny state During the recent furore over Mark Webber’s claims Victoria was ... [More]
How about some wider footpaths?
There are around 70,000 parking spaces in Melbourne’s CBD [source], and cars are a minority access mode. So don’t you think they could forfeit a few street parking spaces in the “Little” streets so some narrow footpaths could be widened? (Little Lonsdale Street looking towards William Street. The truck was legally parked.) For instance, Little ... [More]
From time to time people suggest that train lines should be built in the middle of all new freeways. The problem with building train lines along freeways is you’d be in danger of them all ending up like Jacana or Kannanook. Because freeways take up so much space, make so much noise, and generate so ... [More]
Monash transport FAIL
Monash students going back decades will tell you of the poor connection from Huntingdale Station (the closest for people coming from the city direction) to the Clayton campus. Even after they added an extra bus route in 2006, most connections aren’t timed well outside peak hours, and during peak hours you get delays from long ... [More]
Traffic light cleaner
Here’s a job I never knew existed: traffic light cleaner. (Seen on William St yesterday)
Another Myki stuffup
I know I’m not the first person to find this happening, but here’s an example of why you should be particularly wary about the Myki web site. The actual Pass expiry date, which is correctly recorded on the card and displayed on the scanners, is Friday the 14th of May (or to be precise, 3am ... [More]
Which is cheapest?
If you buy daily tickets (currently available as Metcard only), the per weekday cost is Zone 1 $6.80, Zone 2 $4.80, Zone 1+2 $10.60. Obviously there’s no reason to do this on a regular basis, since you can save a substantial amount of money by using the bulk fare options. But which one? That is, if you usually travel by ... [More]
The Age: Melbourne trains fail world ‘metro’ test Based on this study: PTUA: Melbourne Metro by name, but not by nature, which looks at the biggest thirty cities in the developed world by population, and which of them have a metro — that is, a high capacity, high frequency (every 10 minutes all day, every ... [More]
Why aren’t there more Smartbuses?
Why aren’t there more Smartbuses? Smartbuses work. Smartbus is a fancy marketing name for buses that run more frequently than most other routes, have some bus priority and realtime electronic signs at major stops. The figures in this government press release show the upgrades of routes to Smartbus result in strong patronage growth. I’ve excluded ... [More]
Myki transaction update
Sometime in the last 24 hours, my Myki online topups finally got resolved, some 24 days after they got stuck. Last week I used the web site feedback form to point out that the topup from 2/3/2010 had got stuck, and the one from 4/3/2010 was stuck behind it. They unjammed it somehow, and by ... [More]