MMTB and NTS: Old and new manhole covers
Ah, the fascinating world of manhole covers.
For you youngsters, the MMTB (Melbourne and Metropolitan Tramways Board) ran the tram system from 1919 to 1983 when it was merged into “The Met”.
NTS (New Ticketing System) was the working name for Myki. It still shows up in internal literature, and in things like URLs on the web site (eg the Myki logon takes you to “https://www.mymyki.com.au/NTSWebPortal/Login.aspx”)
Marino Bros: Not iconic video game characters
Tags: Mario Bros, Video games
1 comment
My red, swollen eye
I’m sure (more than usual) people were staring at me on the train today.
And you should see the amount of gunk that was in it this morning.
The doctor’s given me some eyedrops for it.
Tags: eyes, Health
12 comments
Renovating the roof
Got an attic ladder put in a while back. The bloke did a lot of chopping and cutting, and an electrician moved one of the lights to make way for it. The result is very pleasing, and it makes a real difference to getting up into the roof space.
Stage 2 was getting some of the crap cleared out of there, including an old water tank.
Yesterday some insulation removal people came to take out the old loose insulation. It goes everywhere, is not as effective as batts, and is a potential fire risk, so my aim is to replace it with batts. I wonder how hard they are to install oneself?
I need to get the carpenter bloke to take a look at the cornice in the livingroom at the very front of the house. Something’s causing it to bow.
Also up there will be replacement of the current halogen kitchen downlights, perhaps with LEDs — these StarLux LEDs look pretty good, though it’ll cost 6 x $44.95 = $270. Will shop around. Eventually the longer life of the LEDs plus the much lower power (almost 90% less) would help reduce the overall cost. Doing that would allow me to get rid of an extraneous light in the kitchen, as well.
Wondering as well about getting the heating serviced. It’s apparent that there are some holes in some of the ducts that could do with patching, and I wonder how old the heater is (a Brivis “VR800A 1160″).
Anyway, once the roof is sorted out, storage space will be available up there to clear out the back room and turn it into a (smallish) bedroom for Jeremy. Which was the plan all along. Hopefully now it’s actually starting to happen.
PS. Here’s the truck they use to suck out the old loose insulation. Basically a big vacuum cleaner.
Tags: Attic Ladders, home
19 comments
Southern Cross Station as viewed from above
Before last week I’d never seen this view of Southern Cross Station. It looks quite unworldly. CL was giving me a quick tour of Media House — as he commented, it looks like something from Dune.
What you can’t see from the photos (not even zoomed-in) is that some sections closest to the edge, and between the lumpy bits, are actually inflatable plastic. Presumably it’s some essential part of the design.
Here’s a more conventional angle. Anubis and Chrome are still in residence.
Sometimes it feels like you might be waiting until doomsday for the bus
Pic taken this morning, if you wondered.
Disclaimer: actually bus 223 is pretty frequent, because it’s a former tram route.
(Spotted by J.)
Update: BBC News: ‘Rapture’: Believers perplexed after prediction fails
Tags: buses, Footscray, rapture
6 comments
Awesome gigantic pic of my stepfather outside the Immigration Museum
This is officially awesome. My stepfather Peter features on one of the banners at the Immigration Museum, promoting the new Identity — yours mine ours exhibition.
I’ve suggested to him that he ask them if he can keep the banner when they’re finished with it.
Tags: Immigration museum, Peter, Photos
4 comments
Yesterday’s morning commute. Not good.
8:17 or so, boarded train train at Mckinnon. Not my usual station. Long irrelevant story. Happily got a seat.
8:36. Train stops at Hawksburn. Driver on PA tells us that the train will be delayed at least ten minutes due to signal failures near Richmond. He advises us to go to platform 3.
8:37. Most (perhaps 80%) of passengers on the train get out and switch. Large numbers of people means it takes a few minutes for everybody to change over. Some wait behind in the train.
8:47. After waiting a few minutes on platform 3, the train on platform 1… departs.
This is the sort of thing that really makes people angry. It’s not the driver’s fault, but if train control had been able to tell him the problem was there in the first place, they could have got a message onto the PA to say it was cleared, with time for many people to get back onto the train. Or they could have told him to tell people to stay put on the train in the first place.
Some remote PA announcements are made. They are telling people at Malvern, Armadale, Toorak and Hawksburn that city trains will be on platform 3, but also (if I heard it right) telling South Yarra people it’s platform 1. This causes confusion, as some miss the “South Yarra” bit.
8:50. A lone Metro staffer says to me “you’re seeing us at our worst”. Yeah. I ask why the original train took off without anybody being told first. He doesn’t know. (I’m not even sure why he was there, since Hawksburn is neither a Host nor Premium station, but there were whiteboard A-frames and timetable booklets out on display, so he wasn’t just passing.)
He apologises to people, he hasn’t got any information other than what’s on the automated departure board. People aren’t angry at him personally, but certainly are at the situation.
A passenger says to me “it’s always like this at Hawksburn.”
The board says there’s another train on platform 3 in 3 minutes. Most of us wander down there.
8:51. A train pulls into platform 3. It’s already pretty packed. A small number of people squeeze aboard, but most can’t. One couple risk jumping on and riding between the carriages. Stupid thing to do.
A train arrives on platform 1, picks up a few passengers, and leaves again. It wasn’t on the board. Perhaps they’d told it not to display platform 1 departures earlier when there was a disruption on that track. Marvellous.
8:55. Another train comes through. Despite space on board, and the fact that another train is in front of it which will cause it to be delayed anyway, it doesn’t stop.
A V/Line train comes through, doesn’t stop of course. Fair enough.
8:59. After a few more minutes, another train arrives. Some of us manage to squeeze on board, but many are left behind.
Penultimate insult: a few minutes later I can see a train on the parallel (formerly disrupted) track. It has loads of space on it, of course.
9:15, just a tad under half an hour late. Final insult: Flagstaff station. Busy escalators, queues to get through the gates. The Myki reader is almost slow enough for me to give up, but eventually responds. A line of Authorised Officers is checking tickets. Nothing against them personally, but they might have been more helpful elsewhere providing customer service.
All in all, not a good morning trip, and surely there can be some improvement at how disruptions are handled. In the grand scheme of things it wasn’t a hugely long delay like that suffered on the Werribee/Geelong line the night before, but it was very, very frustrating.
I thought long and hard about the video, and eventually decided to pixellate part of it. All sorts read this blog, and I wouldn’t want officialdom studying it to try and apprehend those people for doing something stupid — they should be spending their time identifying and fixing what went wrong here.
Tags: Metro, public transport, trains
25 comments
