Categories
Politics and activism

State election 2018

It’s state election day this Saturday, though many people have already voted: We’re up to 970,454 votes on Day 9 of early voting – 585,869 was the Day 9 early voting total in 2014. The number of postal votes received has risen to 177,572. Want to see how your District’s early voting tally compares to  ... [More]

Categories
Toxic Custard newsletter transport

Low bridges in Euroa

Family business took us to Euroa on Saturday. The station is on the western side of the town centre. The main street goes over the railway line to the south of the station — Wikipedia notes that the the road overpass was built in 1960 during the first round of standardisation. The second round, last  ... [More]

Categories
Going green Home life Toxic Custard newsletter

Decarbonising my home

While my most pressing home renovation need is the bathroom (planning to do this the next time my sons are away on a trip), I was also thinking: Governments should be doing a lot more on climate change, but what are the major emissions in my home, and how could I decarbonise? The car. I  ... [More]

Categories
transport

Melbourne’s station parking problem

Melbourne’s rail network already has some huge car parks, up to 1000 spaces at some stations, as many as a medium-sized shopping centre. There are more than 40,000 spaces across the Metro network, and thousands more on V/Line. Unlike in some cities, they’re all free. The common complaint is that all station car parks fill  ... [More]

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Photos from ten years ago Toxic Custard newsletter

Old photos from October 2008

My monthly post of ten year old photos… My day job had me working in Collins Street, and occasionally we’d get to go to the upper levels and check out the view. That’s Manchester Lane at the bottom left, and near the top left you can just see the Shrine. Newspaper House dates from a  ... [More]

Categories
The week in transport transport

More level crossing removals?

Things have been busy, so I’m a bit behind on blogging things. A few things in brief, then the big news. Wednesday night delays Last night saw major delays affecting the Mernda and Hurstbridge lines between about 4pm and 5:30pm, impacting peak hour. This was due to a track fault at Flinders Street, and it  ... [More]

Categories
transport

Rail plan leaked

Channel 9 and The Age got hold of a previously unpublished rail plan, or at least the summary maps from it. Age: Leaked rail plan shows few extra services for regional commuters Channel 9: I assume the headline-writer got a little carried away. Metro 2 isn’t really a secret. The stages The staging appears to  ... [More]

Categories
transport

Passenger Information Displays (PIDs) at stations are evolving

Just a quick post while I work on something more substantive. I want to talk about Passenger Information Displays (PIDs for short) at Metro stations. For a while, it looked like suburban stations would all be getting two line LED PIDs. They show the scheduled time, destination, minutes to departure, and a summary of the  ... [More]

Categories
transport

PT crowding increasing – but we can do better

The May 2018 Metro and Yarra Trams passenger load surveys were released last week. Media coverage: Herald Sun (paywall); The Age It’s worth noting that load surveys are measuring what happens when the service is running as planned. It’s not designed to look at crowding during disruptions, it’s designed to guide future investment. Trains Here’s  ... [More]

Categories
transport

Coalition pledges faster regional trains

On Wednesday the Coalition announced a pledge to upgrade all the main regional rail lines to 200 km/h, cutting travel times. ABC report: Coalition promises 32-minute trips from Geelong to Melbourne under regional rail upgrade Melbourne is bursting, we must take control of population growth by decentralising growth. The Liberal Nationals 200kmh high speed rail  ... [More]

Categories
Photos from ten years ago

Old photos from September 2008

How can it be October already? It’s still September in some timezones, so here’s my regular post of photos from ten years ago, covering September 2008.   At Richmond station, I was probably trying to take a photo to help publicise the PTUA’s discount yearly tickets – but couldn’t get the ticket itself quite into  ... [More]

Categories
transport

Ride the highline… if you can

The other day I had cause to catch a train from Gardenvale to Balaclava. It’s interesting to compare these two stations. They are both elevated over main roads. Both have shopping centres that have built up around them. Both have connecting street-based public transport. Gardenvale station opened in 1906 as an additional station on the  ... [More]