----- Forwarded Message -----
  To: Tdu Transportdownunder transportdownunder@...>
Sent: Saturday, 5 January 2019, 21:41
Subject: Fri.4.1.18 daily digest

Still no pictures.
Roderick.

190103Th-12Sa Toorak Rd work.  (YT),
Fri.4.1.19 Metro Twitter
Frankston line: Buses replace trains Flinders St (Arts Centre) - Moorabbin until the last train of Sun 13 Jan while 'upgrades' take place.
Buses replace trains Frankston - Stony Point until the last train of Sun 13 Jan while 'upgrades' take place.
Sandringham line: Buses replace trains Parliament - Elsternwick until 4am, Sun 6 Jan while 'upgrades' take place.
Pakenham/Cranbourne lines: Buses replace trains Flinders St (Federation Square) - Westall until the last train of  Sun 13 Jan while 'upgrades' take place.
- Can you please advise if there are any special arrangements for passengers with mobility difficulties. Noble Park to the city.
- There are staff on site at Westall and at Flinders Street to assist special-needs passengers with other transport options if required.
- What kind of work does this “construction blitz” entail?  More signalling issue fixing again or something else?  All the information provided is quite vague.
- If you want an update of the works involved, use this link.
- Can you please advise what service interruptions there will be to Pakenham/Cranbourne line after 13th Jan?  It's very annoying trying to schedule travel when you drip feed info.  Give us the entire schedule for the next few months!
- Your contractors are not wearing hats or supplying their own water today who are helping passengers on buses (from DNA recruitment) and working in the direct sun, pretty sure the OHS laws would require this.  No eye protection either (ie sunnies).
- Have you known these clowns to be anything but vague? If I sucked this bad at my job, I'd be sacked and unemployed. These muppets get rewarded for failure.
With severe heat forecast for Melbourne and Victoria, take care travelling on the network and allow extra time for your journey.  Check for any service changes before you go on our app or on our website.
- Maybe more than a minuscule amount of shade provided at Westall station where there’s heaps of people waiting for replacement buses (which are nowhere in sight) might be a good idea if it’s going to be a hot one?
- We are monitoring the system & heat speed restrictions are possible. Check for any service changes on our app or on our website.
- I miss the old Hitachi hotboxes on the Broadmeadows line.
- Typical Metro, not much has changed in the last 10 years. Wind lbows in a different direction and there is problem with signal.  Man can go to the moon but Metro struggles to get commuters from Narre Warren to Flinders Street. Another day of excuses.
- We are not aware of any current issues (apart from the planned works between Westall & Flinders Street).
- It is not just the heat.  Heat+changing to buses parked all the way over+queuing+waiting+signal issues+other delays+cancellations+having to listen to your annoying customer service staff's unnecessarily chirpy announcements.
- You have hit the nail on the head. Spot on, could not agree with you more..
- Still earning big money even without providing below the average service.
- You can’t even run trains on time, so many delays.
10.00 Major Delays between Westall & Pakenham (police).
- 10.24 How long till they start moving again?
- 10.29 Just got the ok to run.
10.35 Clearing after police stopped trains for a short time in the Hallam area.
13.00 If you’re catching a rail replacement bus today, there will be extra shaded areas and cold, bottled water available at selected locations. First aid officers will also be stationed around the network. Please take care and allow extra time for your journey.
- 14.19 But NO security on any buses; disgusting. Just been abused and harassed all the way on the bus by a drug-crazed woman.  And the poor bus driver was trying to stop her doing all this and pouring water over an old man and touching the small children on the bus whilst he was also trying to drive. Where’s the security?  Is it too hot for them to be working today?
- Replacement buses because your train system is incompetent because of heat?
- These replacement buses are in relation to our current planned works between Flinders Street and Westall/Moorabbin/Elsternwick.
- Why plan the works for the hottest time of the year? Can't bear to think of how the elderly will deal with this.
- Because its also the quietest time of the year and will cause the least inconvenience.
- I think that they are wonderful giving people water when it’s hot..
- Why aren’t customer service wearing shorts - they are suffering heat - rubbish.
- I hope that your staff are also keeping cool? maybe shorts and hats?
- All replacements buses should have airconditioning and low floors. None of this ancient depot bus crap.
- The complaints to this tweet are typically Aussie. Everyone calm down!
15.15 Because of extreme weather conditions, speed restrictions have now been imposed over the entire Metropolitan Network. We anticipate delays of up to 15 minutes.  Please allow extra travel time and listen for announcements as some services may be altered at short notice.
- 17.58 Restrictions have been removed.
- If you go faster the wind will cool everyone. Science.
-  The main impact of the heat is on the rails. The trains go slower in case of possible rail faults caused by heat.
- When do the restrictions cease ? are you mindful that CBD might be 25C at 5pm, but outer northern and eastern suburbs will still be 40 deg.
-  Our train controllers and infrastructure teams are constantly monitoring conditions across the network. Restrictions will be lifted once it is considered safe to do so.  [The magic answer-anything excuse].
-  Metro should change their name to the ‘Orchid’. If the conditions aren’t perfect it dies.
-  Cancellations and delays on top of bus replacements...still waiting for a train at Westall...first aid should have been given to the trains.
16.11 Craigieburn line: Buses to replace trains North Melbourne - Essendon (a track fault at Essendon). Buses have been ordered and are enroute; consider alternative transport.
- 16.32 Buses are replacing trains between North Melbourne & Essendon.
- 16.42 Just when the day couldn't get more exciting, bus driver thinks he's an F1 driver. Just went over a speed hump at least 50 km/h with a bus load of standing passengers.
- 16.43 13 buses are currently in operation with more enroute.
- 16.48 In the 21st century, you'd think North Melbourne station would have devised a civil way of queuing for buses. But no, it's a $h!t fight. Everyone for themselves. Poor elderly people.
- Stuck on red though. Dangerous.
- 16.48 VicTraffic Boom gates are stuck down in Moonee Ponds at the Puckle Street/Holmes Road level crossing. Services have also been suspended on the Craigieburn line. Never drive through downed boom gates. [management copout].
- I reckon we are in for a push for another level crossing removal, involving redeveloping that entire area... modernisation and convenience and all that jazz.
- Glad to have so many buses running; how inopportune to happen in peak hour!
- Frustrating but staff doing their best to keep up morale while we wait for the buses to return.
- Noone mentioned that the 16.50 from Craigieburn was also not running.
- 20 minute wait for a train at Glenroy because the 17.04 & 17.14 were cancelled, despite an announcer saying that the 17.10 had left Craigieburn.
- 17.11 20 buses are in operation.
- You cannot only post here,  you should tell us on platforms. Terrible and worst service, and even your staff have no idea of this replacement.  You wasted me one hour,  shame on you.
- PA announcements are being made at all stations along the line and at our CBD stations. Which station were you at?
- So only a couple more train lines and buses will be replacing trains everywhere.
- The train system in Melb is a joke. 40 degrees for 5 hours and the world comes to an end.
- Great, now we can follow suit with 3/4 of the eastern suburbs.
- That's why I was stuck at Moonee Ponds in boiling hot weather in a train without airconditioning I love working infrastructure!
- Thankfully I have an alternative via Footscray.
- Standing out in the sun waiting for buses.
- You’re fucking useless.
- 20.15 2+ hours to your travel time as they are running only one train past Essendon.
- 20.36 Trains are resuming; delays are clearing.
- Craigieburn line: Buses will replace trains North Melbourne - Broadmeadows after 23.00 (track work near Essendon).
16.52 Major delays citybound Hurstbridge - Eltham (a track fault at Diamond Creek).
- 18.21 clearing.
- “Because of a track fault” = Victorian-speak for “because of years of underinvestment in first-world public transport infrastructure”.
19.51 We've still got icecream at Oakleigh.
- Great initiative.
- Look at the bigger picture, cancellations on other lines and craigieburn line bus replacements causing chaos today.
Others have had more varieties but 50 years ago, the Victorian Railways (in its staff Newsletter of April 1969) catalogued the 31 different varieties of electrical power it used at that time.
<www.metrotrains.com.au/customer-feedback>.
<www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/metro-trains-yarra-trams-awarded-millions-in-bonuses-despite-late-services-20190103-p50pd7.html>

'It’s making Melbourne resilient': Purpose-built security upgrades planned for Southern Cross Station 4 January 2019.
Artist's impression of Princes Bridge bollards.Credit:State government
Southern Cross Station, overlooking the city’s busiest intersection, will get its own purpose-built security bollards and barriers to withstand car attacks.
The state government also on Friday announced that Flinders Street Station will overlook an eight-metre-long reinforced fence and more than 100 bollards will be installed there and around Princes Bridge.
The anti-terror security upgrades are being designed specifically for Southern Cross as part of measures to improve safety in the city in the event of a terrorist attack or other serious incident.
Minister for Police and Emergency Services Lisa Neville on Friday said that design plans for upgrades involving Southern Cross were already under way.
“It’s another really high pedestrian area. The engineering designs are going on right now. It will be specifically designed for that area to cater for large pedestrian crossings from the train station across a number of different sites,” she said.
The works are the next stage of the $50million security upgrades planned for six busy Melbourne sites in 2019. The other four sites include Southbank, the Olympic and Melbourne park area, the State Library and Queen Victoria Market.
The security upgrades will replace the temporary concrete bollards currently at some of the sites.
“It’s all about making our city of Melbourne, our state of Victoria, more resilient, more able to withstand risk of terrorism,” Ms Neville said.
Under the plans, 20 bollards will be installed around Flinders Street Station.
An eight-metre-long concrete barrier, which will have railings up to a metre high above it, will run along the Flinders Street on the side of the station.
Artist's impression of new Flinders Street Station barrier. Credit:State government
There are also plans for 88 more reinforced concrete blocks, which will be placed along both sides of Princes Bridge, replacing the current water-filled barriers.
The plans also involve a 130-square-metre expansion of the Flinders Street Station forecourt.
Installation of the fence and bollards will start on Monday, January 14 and will take up to six weeks.
Artist's impression of Flinders Street Station forecourt expansion.Credit:State government
<www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/it-s-making-melbourne-resilient-purpose-built-security-upgrades-planned-for-southern-cross-station-20190104-p50plx.html>Tigerair pilots start industrial action over pay deadlock 4 January 2019.
Pilots at the Tigerair have started industrial action which they say has the potential to disrupt flights during the busy January holiday period, as their unions and the budget airline remain at loggerheads over a new pay deal.
Starting Friday, union members at Tigerair will decline to be called into duty during rostered days off, annual leave or other days they are not rostered to fly.
Tigerair pilots commenced industrial action on Friday. Credit:Photo: James Morgan
"Most Tigerair pilots regularly work on their scheduled days off, meaning the company has come to rely on it as a normal business practice," said Australian Federation of Air Pilots industrial officer James Lauchland.
"This action simply involves pilots working to rule and refusing to offer this discretionary effort.
“If the company can’t find another way to crew these flights, we are likely to see a large impact on Tigerair flights during the busy January holiday period.”
Fellow union VIPA is also taking part of the action, which will cover about 90 per cent of Tigerair's 200 or so pilots.
Tigerair is already the most disruption-prone airline in Australia, with 40 per cent of its flights arriving late and 6 per cent of flights being cancelled in November, according to statistics from the Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics.
The work-to-rule provisions will run to January 17, except for on January 10 when the union and the airline will be at the Fair Work Commission for conciliation.
Mr Lauchland said it was not the pilots' preference to take action that could disrupt flights, but there was "no alternative left" after more than two years negotiation over a new enterprise bargaining agreement.
A spokeswoman for Tigerair, which is owned by Virgin Australia, said the airline was negotiating in good faith with the pilots and it looked forward to "reaching a mutually beneficial outcome as soon as possible".
AFAP had original threatened to implementing a number of potentially more disruptive measures before Christmas, but the Fair Work Commission ordered it to call that off because it had not notified the airline properly that it was taking that action.
AFAP says it is seeking a deal that recognised pilots had not had a pay increase for over two years.
Related Article These are the worst flights in Australia for delays and cancellations.
<www.theage.com.au/business/companies/tigerair-pilots-start-industrial-action-over-pay-deadlock-20190104-p50pmn.html>

Political reporter, staffer and train lover Joshua Murphy farewelled 4 January 2019.
As a boy, Joshua Murphy wanted to be a train conductor, even wearing a makeshift uniform of stifling woollen clothes and a train badge.
So it was fitting that after a career in journalism, including as Network 10's state political editor, Mr Murphy wound up as the chief advisor to the transport minister, making decisions about rail.
Mr Murphy, 36, died from brain cancer last week and was farewelled on Friday in a service at St Mary's Cathedral, not far from the corridors of Parliament.
Joshua Murphy, who passed away last week.Credit:Facebook
His boss, Transport Minister Andrew Constance, delivered a eulogy for his friend, “a shining light” to his mother Cheryl, a man who had “the best laugh” and a constant message: you have to smile.
“Not only did he live his life to the fullest, he encouraged the best in all of us,” Mr Constance said.
Transport Minister Andrew Constance attending the funeral of his former staffer Josh Murphy. Credit:Steven Siewert
As a deputy chief of staff, Mr Murphy had pushed for new Waratah trains and helped settle a fight over the colour of the future Sydney Metro trains.
Electric blue? Or aqua?
Aqua, and Mr Murphy, won out.
Premier Gladys Berejiklian was in St Mary’s sandstone arcade to pay tribute, as was former premier Mike Baird, Roads Minister Melinda Pavey, Sports Minister Stuart Ayres, Education Minister Rob Stokes, Arts and Energy Minister Don Harwin, and former police minister Mike Gallagher.
Premier Gladys Berejiklian attending the service at St Mary's. Credit:Steven Siewert
They were joined by Greater Sydney commissioner Lucy Turnbull, broadcaster Alan Jones, and journalists, many of them with experience in the NSW press gallery.
Mr Murphy was brilliant as a reporter, said Jaimie Abbott, a housemate while they were at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst and later a colleague at Prime TV.
She remembered the “Josh Murphy magic” she had once thought was her own secret.
Joshua Murphy as a child.
The first time they met, Mr Murphy ordered a Midori and milk, a daring mix Ms Abbott said she would order at the wake.
Then his friend Kimberley Ramplin read out a message from Mr Murphy from “the other side”.
“I don’t like the word funeral much,” Mr Murphy said in his note, preferring “life celebration” while acknowledging that was probably just his inner spin doctor coming out.
If it was to be a funeral, it should at least be a “fun-eral”, he said, following up with more word play, movie quotes and a poem. “The real reason I wanted to make you laugh today is there’s no time for anything else,” he said.
There was a reading from the Book of Joshua, a favourite passage of Mr Murphy's in which the Lord commands “be strong and of good courage”. The smell of incense hung in the air as Faure’s In Paradisum played.
Outside, on the cathedral steps, mourners hugged and kissed in the hot sun, across the park from the future Pitt Street Metro station where aqua trains will glide.
<www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/political-reporter-staffer-and-train-lover-joshua-murphy-farewelled-20190104-p50pmz.html>

Two men arrested on Queen Street following train station stabbing 4 January 2019.
Two men have been arrested in Brisbane's CBD after a man was stabbed at a suburban railway station.
Paramedics were called to Honour Avenue just before 11am on Friday to treat a 24-year-old man, following a wounding incident at Graceville.
The pair was arrested on Queen Street.Credit:Jono Searle/AAP
He was taken to the Princess Alexandra Hospital in a serious condition with two stab wounds to his abdomen and chest.
A critical care paramedic was on board at the time.
A crime scene was established at the Graceville train station while police officers tracked the two men down in Brisbane city.
They were taken into custody about midday on Queen Street.
Investigations are continuing.
<www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/two-men-arrested-on-queen-street-following-train-station-stabbing-20190104-p50pm2.html>

Man punches two Brisbane bus passengers in unprovoked attacks 4 January 2019.
<www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/man-punches-two-brisbane-bus-passengers-in-unprovoked-attacks-20190104-p50pnj.html>

CityCat crashes into pontoon, leaving passengers bruised and stranded 4 January 2019.
<www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/citycat-crashes-into-pontoon-leaving-passengers-bruised-and-stranded-20190104-p50pm9.html>