Etiquette and crankiness
MISCONDUCT IN FRANKSTON TRAIN
Although there have been many convictions for rowdy conduct in the trains to Frankston at weekends, offences of this kind constantly occur. At the Malvern Court on Monday, before Mr. Cohen, P.M. and Messrs. Patterson, Hattam, and Carroll, J.P.’s, the Railway Department proceeded against Bernand Molloy, 214 George street, Fitzroy, and George Spence, 399 Drummond street, Carlton, on a charge of having interfered with the comfort of other passsengers in the half past 7 down train to Frankston on December 30. Inspector P. Roy represented the department, but the defendants did not appear.
The evidence of Detective O’sullivan, who was in company with Detective Wilson on the occasion, showed that three men, including the two defendants, entered a first class compartment at Flinders street. They had bottles of beer with them. Molloy, sat with his legs dangling out of the Tait carriage, and was guilty of indecent conduct. The three were jostling and pulling one another about, and used filthy language. There were several passengers, including ladies, in the carriage. One of the men jumped from the train into the pit at Malvern and escaped; the others were taken out at Caulfield, and gave wrong names and addresses.
Mr. Cohen said that this sort of thing was becoming very frequent, and he was glad that the department was taking action. He travelled on that line, and there never seemed to be any officers about. Defendants would be fined £10 each, with 5/ costs.
That was ninety years ago. So a lack of consideration for fellow passengers from some has always been a problem.
Witness the two young males with their feet on the seats all the way from Bentleigh to Parliament on Monday morning. One apparently fast asleep and possibly oblivious to the fact that the carriage filled to the brim, the other trying to look like he was asleep, but not actually in the land of nod.
I’m hoping they got a little surprise at Parliament, as a group of inspectors got on further down the carriage, and were encouraged by a passenger (grin) to go give these blokes a wake-up call.
On Tuesday the Frankston line was suffering from signalling faults. Track 3 was out of action, so trains from the city went onto track 2, with trains to the city (both express and stoppers) squeezing onto track 1. The result was predictable overcrowding, and though my trip was made in good time, it was uncomfortable, and at some of the MATHS stations, people couldn’t squeeze on.
I could hear a couple of people getting cranky when (a) asking people to move down into the carriage (that was the first thing I’d done when I boarded) and (b) trying to get out and having another person closer to the door refuse to momentarily step out to let them through.
You’d always hope people would be more considerate of others. Sadly it’s not always the case.
See also 19/1/2004: PT etiquette guide
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Bad planning
Recently they’ve done some work on the streetscape in my local shopping centre, Centre Road in Bentleigh.
Now, I may not know much about road design, but I think this, at the taxi rank next to the station, is a bad layout.
Why? Because when the front taxi gets a fare, the others in the queue move up to the front. But they have to pull out into traffic to do so.
I’m all for planting trees and other objects in the road to break it up a bit, but this just seems silly. I suppose it’s possible it was a clumsy attempt at traffic calming, but I suspect it’s just sloppy planning.
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MATHS stations
The stations between Malvern and South Yarra are colloquially known as the MATHS stations.
Malvern
Armadale
Toorak
Hawksburn
South Yarra
The first four of them (that would be MATH) also match architecturally. I’m assuming they were all built around 1915 when the line was quadruplicated.
I can’t think of any other station group names of this type around the place, apart from more official terms such as the City Loop.
(This is one of those times when I feel like briefly writing about something which I suspect is widely known, but doesn’t appear to be definitively online anywhere. And I’m going to link back to it in a later post.)
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The Astra
I’m getting used to the “new” car. You know how it is when you switch, especially between manual cars, and you have to learn the feel of the accelerator and clutch for the new vehicle? Otherwise you either take off too fast, or stall it.
Things I’ve noticed about the Astra which are different from the old Magna:
The gear stick is at a different angle. The Magna’s seems almost vertical next to the Astra’s.
Despite the Astra being a smaller car, it seems reasonably roomy. The ceiling seems higher. Leg room is reduced, but I’m already used to it. I’ve considered reflecting this by getting the customised licence plate “TARDIS”, but given the $395 cost — I don’t think so. Just can’t justify it. (Interestingly, according to the VPlates web site, “DALEK”, and “DRWHO” are already taken. But amazingly perhaps, “DANIEL” is available.)
Not just roomy, also zoomy. It accelerates much faster than the old beast. On the first day, a couple of times I took off so fast from the lights I nearly pranged into the people in front. I must confess I tried to see how fast it takes off compared to other cars on Wellington Road. The only one I’ve noticed get to the speed limit faster was a Jeep Wrangler, which apparently burns about 50% more fuel.
Maybe it’s the silver paint instead of black, or maybe it’s just a better design, but it doesn’t seem hot when left in the (winter) sun like the Magna gets. Will be interested to see how it goes over summer, and how good the aircon is.
I’m already noticing it’s using less petrol. The theoretical fuel consumption is 20% less, but I suspect it may be even lower. (Apparently alloy wheels alone can save 10+Kg off the weight of a car; and the Magna may have been burning more than advertised.)
The Astra is not without its faults. The left side of the driver’s seat squeaks when changing gears (eg when pressing down the clutch). As does the windscreen wiper; it may need a new set of blades. That’s what you get in a $10K car, I guess.
The turning circle seems much smaller, although it’s just 10.3 metres instead of 11.0.
I may get to the stage where I don’t understand how I ever survived without remote keyless entry.
Love the cruise control, for those occasional jaunts on the motorway.
I’m getting used to the indicator and windscreen wipers being on opposite sides. Though once or twice I have wiped the windows accidentally.
I do need to get used to the electric windows — specifically, closing them before stopping the engine, though you can do that thing where you lock the door with the key and the windows will close.
And finally… both Midtown Madness 2 and Midtown Madness 3 have an Opel Astra modelled in them (the former is a download). It’s only a 3-door model, but it means I can zoom around in a virtual London, SF, Paris or Washington, driving like a maniac. Woo hoo!
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Ghost trams
Not for the first time, a blog post of mine has been adapted into a newspaper story.
Today’s Sunday Age reports on “ghost trams”: On our tramway’s secret service.
Interestingly, Yarra Trams uses the term “ghost tram” for something else already — a tram that’s out of radio contact.
Last year The Age did a story on “ghost trains”.
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So much for that
So much for Weekly/Monthly/Yearly tickets being valid in any zone on weekends. From January this benefit will be removed.
You’d think they’d be trying not to discourage people from using these tickets, since they help cut down queues and encourage PT loyalty… but it looks like it’s a simplification of the rules to make implementation of Myki easier.
UPDATE. This got reversed. The zone benefit still applies in 2009.
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Messy web sites
Leader Newspapers have joined ABC Local Radio in redesigning their web site into a hideous, difficult to navigate mess.
For instance, the Caulfield Leader, at www.caulfieldgleneiraleader.com.au, with a page showing the same news stories as the printed version of the paper, plus a few other links, apparently wasn’t good enough.
So now it’s the rather less memorable caulfield-glen-eira-leader.whereilive.com.au, with just a few news stories highlighted on the front page, and all the others hidden away behind a “News” (not to be confused with “Your News”) link — that’s if you can find it amongst the adverts, real estate tools, event calendars, “Local links” (more adverts), photo galleries and blogs.
And it’s got silly things, like a caption for an online poll being positioned so it looks like a photo caption. And lots of wasted whitespace in the middle, while other parts of the page are cramped.
The ABC Local Radio web site is a mess after its revamp a few months ago. Unlike on the old site, almost anything to do with the programmes; eg the stuff you usually want to find; is hidden away.
They must know this, as an advert I heard on 774 the other day for one of Red Symons’ videos told you to go to the site, then click Radio Guide (which is not very prominent), then click Breakfast, then… click on… ummm… I can’t remember now.
The old ABC and Leader web sites were so much easier to navigate, with easy-to-find links along the side of the page. And in the ABC’s case, the old one was definitely easier on the eyes.
What about just putting on a web site the things people actually want to look at? Make them easy to find, don’t put irrelevant stuff all over the place, and use colours that are easy on the eyes. Was that too simple?
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Humming along
I thought the police were having issues with high petrol bills. Apparently not, as they’re going to patrol nightspots in Hummers.
Maybe instead they should have gone for Police Priuses. They’d be distinctive.
Did you know that a Prius actually has more legroom than a Hummer H3? Seriously, inspired by a comment from Tony H, I checked. In shoulder and headroom it’s about the same, but in the rear seats, the Prius has 90mm more legroom.
Yet the Prius burns about a third the amount of fuel of an H3.
Amazing.
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