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From: Roderick Smith [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Monday, 10 July 2017 12:21 PM
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170710M - Melbourne 'Age':
- B2.2109, sunrise, moon.
- Metro satisfaction.

Roderick.

July 9 2017 How you rate Melbourne trains depends on which side of the tracks you live on .
Are you happy when you ride on Melbourne's trains?
Your answer might have a lot to do with which line you use, leaked Metro data shows.
More videos Metro warns of capacity crunch.
Melbourne's trains threaten to become a squeeze as a report leaked to Fairfax Media reveals Metro's anxiety about the city's population growth and movement.
Live in the city's leafy east , and there is a good chance you rate your commute OK on most days.
But in the city's west, north and south-east, where population growth is at its strongest, train passengers rate their daily commute a little less kindly.
Jesse Heazlewood, 22, who travels on the Pakenham line to work on the weekend, says he wakes up an hour earlier than he used to to make sure he gets into the city on time. Photo: Luis Ascui Metro's breakdown of "customer satisfaction" levels on Melbourne's 16 rail lines reveals commuters on the Cranbourne and Pakenham lines are the least satisfied, due in no small part to the fact they are lumbered with the city's least reliable rail service.
Satisfaction levels on the two lines recently hit 68.7 per cent. Metro has blamed poor on-time running for the low rating.
The lines, which share the Dandenong corridor currently being elevated into a "sky rail" to remove nine level crossings, have the worst punctuality performance in Melbourne.
They are the only two with an on-time running record over the past 12 months that sits below the 88 per cent performance threshold set by the state government, below which Metro is financially penalised and passengers with a monthly or yearly ticket are compensated with one free day of travel.
Commuters at Southern Cross Station. Photo: Vince Caligiuri .
Commuter Jesse Heazlewood, who travels on the Pakenham line to get to and from work in the city from Hallam on weekends, said the line "always seems to have something wrong with it".
"There's been a few times where I've arrived late to work because of delayed trains or because a bus was replacing trains, or the service was inefficient," he said.
Cartoon: Matt Golding
Cartoon: Matt Golding
"It makes it a bit of a pain waking up. I now wake up an hour earlier just to make sure I get in on time," Mr Heazlewood said.
It's the opposite story for commuters on the Belgrave, Lilydale, Glen Waverley and Alamein lines that service the leafy eastern suburbs.
They are the happiest in Melbourne, the survey reveals, in part due to superior punctuality.
On the Glen Waverley line, for example, 96.6 per cent of trains were on time in the past year, the best result in Melbourne.
Satisfaction on those lines is at 73.5 per cent.
But Metro's satisfaction ratings, contained in a 2016 strategic plan leaked to Fairfax Media, reveal that reliability is just one factor that influences how people feel about the level of service on trains.
graphic
According to the survey, passengers have marked Melbourne's railways down due to a perceived lack of safety, space and comfort on trains, poor station facilities and ticketing.
Metro has proposed a series of initiatives to improve satisfaction – and its own image in the public eye – although many would require government approval and funding.
The strategic plan reveals the company has set a target of 85 per cent "customer satisfaction" by 2026, a big jump on its score for 2015 of 72 per cent.
To hit this mark it aims to:
•Run 95 per cent of trains on time.
•Work with the government to run more off-peak services.
•Make it easier to get to and from stations by encouraging use of shuttle buses, car sharing, bike cages, and building multi-level station car parks.
•Provide real-time information at stations about connecting trams and buses.
•Rebuild stations to improve passenger flow and give more seating and shelter.
It also wants more staff on the network.
Metro intends to "reinvigorate the pivotal and revered role of station masters and associated station staff", the plan says.
To improve public perceptions of safety, Metro has proposed giving police and authorised officers a more visible presence.
It has also suggested developing an app passengers can use to "request assistance discreetly" when police or authorised officers are not on the scene.
Public Transport Users Association president Tony Morton said good station facilities were important, but the "deal breaker" for passengers was unreliable trains.
Passengers also placed a premium on getting a seat, Dr Morton said. He cautioned Metro and the government not to go too far in removing seats to add capacity.
"You take that too far and your trains start to look and feel like cattle trains, and that's not a positive experience for passengers."
It's likely Metro will need to make significant improvements to Melbourne's railways to hit its 85 per cent target.
Metro's satisfaction score for 2015 was derived from a government survey of 850 people.
Metro must achieve a customer satisfaction rating of just 70 per cent under the terms of its current franchise agreement with the state, which is due to expire in November.
The government and Metro are negotiating a potential seven-year extension of the agreement, but with significantly tougher performance targets and less latitude for time-saving tactics that inconvenience passengers, such as station-skipping.
<www.theage.com.au/victoria/how-you-rate-melbourne-trains-depends-on-which-side-of-the-tracks-you-live-on-20170705-gx5beu.html>
* "Passengers also placed a premium on getting a seat, Dr Morton said." - a premium, yes, but most mornings I count my lucky stars just to get on the train 4 stations out from the city on the Craigeburn line. It's these disconnected-from-reality ideals that result in "too little, too late" action. I'll stand on my head if it means I can predictably get to work on time!
* And why wouldn't they want a seat? Who really wants to stand in an overcrowded sweaty train for over an hour. Horrible way to start and end a work day.
* Interesting that V/Line our longer distance train entity that moves many thousands of daily commuters from far flung localities as Bendigo, Ballarat, Geelong and Traralgon didn't get a mention in this story...yet its passengers travel far more kilometers each day that any METRO passengers do.
* I travel 160Km each day in relatively high speed comfort and the comparison between V/Line longer distance VLocity trains and Melbourne's METRO trains is like comparing Japans Shinkansen's or the French TGV's to a third world railway of crowded, slow and uncomfortable trains.
* Why should VLine get a mention? You seem pretty happy, so why are you inserting yourself into this story? Having lived through years of disruption to my services and amenity to help upgrade your travelling experience I'd rather see maybe some solidarity from country people for a change.
If we got anything like the investment in our trains that you've had we might be happier too.
* Often seems as though every second weekend on the Lilydale line we have buses replacing trains due to maintenance. So much for catching public transport so you don't have to worry about being under 0.05
* So the government surveyed 850 people. i.e not even 1 full train to come to these conclusions?
* Don't believe the satisfaction rating for the Glen Waverley line. Too few services at peak times and weekends compared to Frankston/Pakenham/Lilydale/Belgrave lines. Also upline GW trains are no longer routed through the loop during weekday mornings, forcing passengers to detrain at Richmond and wait for connecting trains. No votes in providing better services for Labo(u)r and the Liberals don't give a toss because of safe seats. Disgrace!!
* If Glen Waverley is worse than Frankston, it must be truly dreadful. Every day the Frankston line suffers cancellations, breakdowns or bus replacements.
* What about the promised city loop train at 5.10 that just got cancelled.
I had tickets to a show at Ethiad, I checked the time table, twice and a third time about an hour before travelling, got to Darling station just to be told my train was cancelled, half hour wait/change in the city, missed 20 minutes of the show FURIOUS!
* More Belgrave / Lilydale trains during peak times than Glen Waverley??? Must've been a day I was sick at home.
* I use the Sandringham line regularly and other lines from time to time. Since Metro took over, in my experience, there has been a great improvement in reliability and overall service. The survey did not provide the opportunity to register my main concern which the lack of authority on trains.
This is evident by the number of people with feet on chairs, eating, leaving rubbish behind etc. Passenger behaviour will only improve if patrons adopt better manners (a social engineering job beyond Metro's brief) or are penalised (fined and removed from the train).
Commuters boarding in clean clothes have the right to arrive at their destinations in the same condition.
* What do you most dislike about Melbourne's train system? It's pretty simple - we have to drive six hours to use it, or catch a bus for 8 hours or more. Could fly in but with a family of five that's a thousand dollars or more. Mildura has a train station but no passenger train. Would love to have all the 'problems' of Melbourne commuters but getting a train to take to Melbourne would be a help first. It's been gone since 1993. We do live in Victoria but just get ignored.
* Melbourne's train network is old and neglected. A booming city had been built around a network designed for the 1800's. Successive state & federal governments have failed the people of victoria with petty squabling & their lack of vision and investment in infrastructure. It is now too late for governments to buy up land - the expense of this would be crippling.
* I think you'll find the network designed in the 1800s was far more comprehensive and forward thinking than the one we have now!
I think the worst thing that's happened to Melbourne is the irrational emotional addiction to trams. So much wasted money on an antiquated light rail that causes traffic chaos.
If we took every cent that was spent on the tram network and poured it into the re-creation of a proper metro rail system we'd be ten times better off..
A comprehensive underground and free flowing traffic. That's a reality in many cities in Europe, but an impossibility here. We don't have the vision or the politicians capable of making it happen. We don't have the politicians because we are largely too left leaning and addicted to populism..... Victorians will never be prepared to make the hard decisions necessary to create a better future.
* Poor quality tracks. Sick of being thrown around because they can't lay tracks straight.
Timings/timetable. Sick of waiting outside Fliinders St for... what? Sick of the extremely slow travel from City to Clifton Hill for.. what?
* What about trains that don't come or stop at half way points forcing you out onto platforms or changing platforms to catch another service.
What about trains that get changed from one platform to another giving you 90 seconds to run to another platform I've stood at Camberwell and watched my train go slowly by without stopping I use this rotten service about once a month . I am retired and have reduced mobility and are sick to death of being shunted I'm saving for Taxies now when I go to the fotty or into the CBD
* We have a good core train network, it needs significant investment to make it work better and to meet demand. Investment needs to be priortised towards fixing and extending the network, such as:
1. Signalling
2. Track duplication / removal of network bottlenecks 3. Improve track quality to avoid issues in hot or cold weather 4. More trains 5. Improved frequency and reliability on the back of the network improvements 6. Better station facilities including parking decks and better bus connections between the train network spokes.
Unfortunately, we have seen successive state governments spend billions on nice to haves such as Southern Cross station and Myki, I suspect these more visible projects are aimed at votes.
The lack of $ and a desire to maintain a balanced budget also results in lop-sided infrastructure on the back of PPPs and toll roads... tha party trick is to do a PPP toll road whilst keeping the budget in balance. This leads to very expensive roads and hardly any investment in core public transport infrastructure.
* It's not the trains that are the problem..... it's the over-populating of a city that simply doesn't have the resources to cope!
How do we break the cycle of lazy politicians who become dependent on immigration, yet will not and can not ever afford to fund the infrastructure needed to support the new people that they plan to stuff into our already overcrowded city?
* "On the Glen Waverley line, for example, 96.6 per cent of trains were on time in the past year, the best result in Melbourne."
This result is a shock to no-one who has to wait for a packed Belgrave/Lilydale train to arrive while watching multiple half-empty Glen Waverley trains leave first. More trains, less passengers, fewer stops. What's not to like??
(Don't even get me started on "footy specials" from Richmond either)
* The survey missed infrequent trains: 30 min gaps are useless. Not just waiting at night after city events, but connecting from one route to another. Every route can accommodate 20 min headways, and that should be the worst at any time anywhere, with lots of places on 10 min for much of the day. DoI/DoT/PTV have been phobically against buying double-deck trains, and have fossilised Melbourne on inadequate capacity. Had the last two fleets been double deck, capacity on every route could have been greater by now, for less work and money than the overhyped tunnel requires to help only two routes.. Signalling improvement and duplication would have given more benefit to more places more of the time. Now the level-crossing project is locking out the prospect of extra tracks in future.

Blame your power bill spike on politicians’ global warming con. with tdu.
Herald Sun July 9, 2017.
<www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt/blame-your-power-bill-spike-on-politicians-global-warming-con/news-story/f90f2bac8ff689a3fe1cb25678333257> 174 comments.

Record migration to Melbourne is changing the face of our city.
Herald Sun July 10, 2017.
MIGRANTS now comprise up to 80 per cent of residents in some Melbourne suburbs as the city continues to be transformed by a record intake of arrivals mainly from Asia, census figures show.
Foreign-born concentrations are growing in some outer areas with cheaper housing, while overseas students living in apartments have changed the demographic landscape of certain inner suburbs.
According to the 2016 census, the suburb of Melbourne, which includes the CBD and parts of St Kilda Rd, was the state’s migrant capital with 80 per cent of residents born abroad.
Asian immigration has transformed suburbs like Box Hill. Picture: Wayne Taylor Melbourne has a high number of foreign students who were counted in the census, and about a third of the suburb identified as having Chinese ancestry.
The next biggest migrant suburb was Clayton with 75 per cent of residents born overseas, the main groups hailing from China, India and Malaysia.
CENSUS REVEALS HOW HIGH MIGRATION IS TRANSFORMING MELBOURNE Dandenong had a foreign-born population of 72 per cent, with Afghanis, Indians and Sri Lankans the biggest communities.
Greater Melbourne itself is 40 per cent migrant, similar to Sydney and Toronto in Canada, but much higher than the foreign-born populations of big cities in the US.
Dr Bob Birrell, from the Australian Population Research Institute, said that about 55 per cent of the new housing stock needed for Melbourne was due to migrants, and the less well-off were attracted to cheaper areas like Springvale and Dandenong.
Box Hill is the top suburb for Chinese residents. Picture: Wayne Taylor “We’re getting significant concentrations resulting from that underlying structural problem,” he said.
Dr Birrell said that the high proportion of Chinese in places like Melbourne CBD and Carlton reflected huge number of overseas students and others on temporary visas living in small units in towers.
Victorian Multicultural Commission chair Helen Kapalos said the city’s growing diversity was positive and the state had an enviable reputation of settling migrants.
“We need to think about all of those aspects that help our new arrivals integrate because it’s for all of us,” she said.
Fewer Australians identify with religion.
The census data show that the top suburbs for Chinese residents are Box Hill (35.4 per cent Chinese ancestry and 27.6 per cent China-born), Melbourne (32.6 per cent and 21.5 per cent), Clayton (32.2 per cent and 22.6 per cent) and Carlton (30.8 per cent and 22.6 per cent).
The census revealed that one-in-five Glen Huntly residents were born in India; Turkish migrants comprised 11 per cent of people in Dallas and Meadow Heights; while one-in-five residents of Springvale and Springvale South were born in Vietnam.
Mt Eliza had the biggest concentration of British migrants (18 per cent); for Iraqis it was Meadow Heights (9.3 per cent); and Clarinda (6.1 per cent) for the Greek-born.
<www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/record-migration-to-melbourne-is-changing-the-face-of-our-city/news-story/7a08c8570aa5bf5759a8c94ca981b111> 30 comments, mainly anti migration.