To:australiantransportnews@... australiantransportnews@...>
Sent: Thursday, 30 September 2021, 08:48:35 pm AEST
Subject: Wed.30.6.21 daily digest

IEV80/100 down through Surrey Hills 12.45.

Roderick

No 20-29.6 HS back issues; down for a week, and seems to be permanent.

210625-Melbourne'HeraldSun'-BourkeSt-explosion-delays-trams.jpg Almost unreadable.  The final paragraph: There were peak-hour delays across the cbd tram network.

"210630W-Melbourne'HeraldSun'-SeafordXtrapolis-ss.jpg" 

 "210630W-Melbourne'Age'-NSW-carpark-ss.jpg" 

Wed.30.6.21 Metro Twitter
Aircraft: No ramp access to platforms until late 2021 (pedestrian-underpass works).
Flinders St: still with a lane closed for tunnel works.
12.43 Pakenham/Cranbourne lines: Major delays clearing after a trespasser near Westall.
Buses replace trains Moorabbin - Frankston from 19.45 until the last train (maintenance works).
- Mordialloc: Replacement buses in both directions will pick up and set down at the citybound stop in Albert Street (roadworks).
Buses replace trains Ringwood - Lilydale from 22.30 until the last train (level-crossing works).

Rebecca DiNuzzo August 27, 2020. 1 comments
Police are hoping these two men may be able to help with their investigation into an assault on a city bound tram from Coburg on July 30. Picture: Supplied
A man has been left with permanent injuries to his neck and spine after he was viciously attacked on a city-bound tram.
The 43-year-old boarded the tram about 7pm on July 30 at stop 33 on Sydney Rd in Coburg where he noticed two men, one wearing a skull mask, playing loud music from a portable speaker.
The victim shook his head and moved to the exit, but when he attempted to disembark a short time later one of the men became aggressive and allegedly shoved him through the open door.
The man fell onto Sydney Rd and his attacker followed him and allegedly pushed him to the ground again before he and his friend ran off.
The victim tried to walk to safety before phoning police for help, but while he was on the phone the two men returned and confronted him again.
The same attacker grabbed the victim’s phone and threw it across the road before forcing the man to the ground where he allegedly kicked him to the upper body.
Both men fled, leaving their victim with serious head injuries and permanent damage to his neck and spine.
Police are now looking for help from the public to track down two men they believe may be able to help with their inquiries.
One man is described as caucasian, about 183cm, aged between 27 to 35 years old and was wearing a skeleton mask.
The other man is also described as caucasian, about 170-180cm, of slim build and aged between 30 to 35 years old.
He was wearing a brown scarf covering the bottom half of his face.
Anyone who may have been on the tram at the time of the incident or who recognise the two men are encouraged to get in touch with investigators.
Phone Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000. rebecca.dinuzzo@...
MORE NEWS:
SYNAGOGUES UNDER THREAT FROM CORONAVIRUS CRISIS
MAN ‘STRESSED’ BY VIRUS VEERS CAR INTO PSOS IN WILLIAMSTOWN
CRIM’S OUTRAGEOUS FALSE CHILD ABUSE CLAIMS
<www.heraldsun.com.au/leader/north/man-left-with-permanent-spine-injury-following-attack-on-coburg-tram/news-story/1209bdf54c0319c29e550647613e34fd>
* Yep face masks are the best thing ever to evade identification. How is it possible that you can wear a full balaclava and not be worried now

Morrison funded 27 car parks just one day before he called the election David Crowe June 30, 2021 232 comments
Federal officials raced to spend $389 million on commuter car parks the day before Prime Minister Scott Morrison called the last federal election in a move slammed by the Auditor-General for failing to safeguard taxpayer funds.
Mr Morrison decided the 27 projects despite an “inadequate assessment” of whether they were eligible for cash under a controversial program that helped Liberal candidates campaign in marginal seats.
Prime Scott Morrison visits the Mulgoa Road Corridor with Foreign Affairs Minister Marise Payne and candidate for Lindsay Melissa McIntosh on April 12, 2019.CREDIT:DOMINIC LORRIMER
Labor damned the program as a “rort” and vowed to use Parliament to investigate how the money was spent after the Auditor-General found 77 per cent of the projects were in Coalition electorates.
While the overall program cost $660 million, more than half the total was allocated in a single day amid widespread speculation Mr Morrison was about to call the 2019 election.
Federal officials confirmed Mr Morrison decided the funding for the 27 commuter car parks on April 10, one day before he visited the Governor-General in Canberra and announced the election would be held on May 18.
“These projects were subsequently publicly committed to during the election campaign,” officials from the Department of Infrastructure told the Australian National Audit Office.
“These are election commitments and the department is implementing them in the same way as all election commitments and as it would for any government.”
But ANAO rejected those claims and said the 27 projects deserved to be treated as formal decisions by Mr Morrison and his ministers, given the money was allocated before the government went into caretaker mode.
The department’s view is also at odds with comments from government candidates during the election campaign, with Liberal MP Lucy Wicks announcing a car park in her electorate of Robertson with the claim that the move was not an election commitment because the money was included in the budget.
The key decisions on the program were made in the months leading up to the election when advisers working for the Minister for Urban Infrastructure, Alan Tudge, shared spreadsheets with the Prime Minister’s staff to rank dozens of potential car parks to be built near city train stations.
Rather than calling for applications, the government designed the scheme so Mr Tudge would identify projects after engaging with others, including members of Parliament.
“The department did not put in place a process for engaging with states and councils on the identification of candidate projects,” the audit report said, adding that consultation only began after federal ministers named the sites.
Labor likened the program to the “sports rorts” scheme that put federal money into local sporting facilities and ignited a political fight that forced the resignation of former sports minister Bridget McKenzie in February last year.
Senator McKenzie was restored to cabinet as Minister for Regionalisation in a reshuffle of Nationals’ positions announced on Sunday.
Labor described the car park scheme as “sports rorts on steroids” because it was larger than the $100 million sports program but also used a series of spreadsheets in ministerial offices to decide where money was spent.
“That’s why, frankly, we see the incompetence that has characterised this program’s delivery with only two projects completed and six abandoned, showing they never should have been proposed in the first place,” said Labor urban infrastructure spokesman Andrew Giles.
“And that’s why we see such an uneven distribution of these projects.
“We will be taking every step to get to the bottom of this rotten scandal and to expose the warts at the core.”
Urban Infrastructure Minister Paul Fletcher, who took over from Mr Tudge in December 2020, rejected the Labor claims and said Mr Giles was trying to score a “political hit” over the program.
“The Auditor-General report makes it clear there’s authority for these ministerial decisions under the Land Transport Act,” Mr Fletcher said on ABC TV on Tuesday morning.
“There’s no suggestion that decisions made by ministers were outside of authority.”
The audit found that none of the project sites were proposed by the department, 64 per cent were located in Melbourne and 77 per cent in Coalition electorates.
While 23 per cent of the projects were in Labor seats, the government announced car parks in areas it later won at the election, with three car parks promised in the electorate of Lindsay surrounding Penrith in western Sydney.
“Not a single one in Melbourne’s western suburbs, despite it including some of the fastest-growing parts of the country,” Mr Giles said of the scheme.
“Only one in suburban Perth, none in Adelaide, twice as many in Melbourne than in Sydney, it just doesn’t add up if it was allocated on any basis other than political decision making.”
RELATED ARTICLE Just two of the 47 commuter car parks meant to be built at rail stations have been completed. Multibillion-dollar federal fund didn’t award money on merit, audit finds
RELATED ARTICLE Scott Morrison is tipped to promote Alan Tudge to Cabinet. 'Congestion busting' billions referred to federal Auditor-General
<www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/morrison-funded-27-car-parks-just-one-day-before-he-called-the-election-20210629-p585c2.html>

NSW car park promised in federal fund now slated at $200,000 per space Tom Rabe June 30, 2021
Two commuter car parks promised to key marginal electorates in NSW ahead of the 2019 federal election are slated to cost more than four times the recommended benchmark, with the government system used to distribute the cash facing allegations of rorting.
A car park planned to be built in Woy Woy on the NSW Central Coast will cost more than $210,000 per space, which is 430 per cent above the benchmark figure, according to an Australian National Audit Office report. The audit found the Urban Congestion Fund was used to bankroll commuter car parks in mostly Liberal-held or marginal seats across the country.
A car park planned for Woy Woy will cost more than $210,000 per space, which is 430 per cent above the benchmark figure.CREDIT:GOOGLE MAPS
The report found inappropriate and opaque methods were used by the federal government’s Infrastructure Department to select projects, and record keeping was not compliant with government policies.
While the distribution of projects in NSW was split evenly between Labor and Coalition electorates, the report identified costs in two Liberal-held seats far beyond the benchmark value set.
The Woy Woy project was announced in March 2019 in the Liberal-held seat of Robertson, which was then sitting on a 1.1 per cent margin and extended to 4.2 per cent after the May election.
Another project in Panania, in Sydney’s south-west, was found to have a cost per space of $166,000, more than 520 per cent above the benchmark. The Liberal-held seat of Banks was then sitting on a 1.4 per cent margin, which was extended to 6.3 per cent after the polls.
The report said assessments for both projects had not been addressed. Each are still listed in the “scoping” phase, according to the report.
“With one exception, the department had not used the results of the benchmarking work to inform ministerial consideration of whether Australian government funding should be awarded to either scope or deliver car park projects,” the audit said.
“The department’s approach to identifying and selecting commuter car park projects for funding commitment was not appropriate. It was not designed to be open or transparent.”
Based off the figure provided in the report, a single car space in a car park promised to woo Woy Woy voters at the 2019 election would be worth 15 times the value of a local house by square metre.
More than 75 per cent of the commuter car park sites selected were in Coalition-held electorates, with more than 60 per cent of all projects given to Victoria.
The report pointed out that more than double the number of projects flowed to Victoria than NSW, despite Infrastructure Australia finding the majority of the most congested roads in Australia were in Sydney.
NSW Transport Minister Andrew Constance said while it was up to the federal government to decide how to spend its money, he added that “a lot more consultation into the future would be the best way to go”.
Opposition transport spokeswoman Jo Haylen said Sydney had been “grossly under-represented” in the program in a letter to the NSW Auditor-General.
The report also said it was not evident at which point in time a car park for Gosford – which is also in the Robertson electorate – was authorised, given records were incomplete.
Federal Infrastructure Minister Paul Fletcher said he acknowledged the report and the Infrastructure Department would agree to all recommendations set out within it.
Federal Minister for Communications, Urban Infrastructure, Cities and the Arts Paul Fletcher.CREDIT:ALEX ELLINGHAUSEN
Mr Fletcher said he had instructed his department to undertake a review of all Urban Congestion Fund projects when he was appointed to the portfolio in late 2020.
Mr Fletcher also said the per space costs of the Panania and Woy Woy projects were not finalised, as planning activities were still under way.
A statement from federal Labor leader in the Senate Kristina Keneally described the fund as “sports rorts on an industrial scale”.
Mr Fletcher’s office was contacted with specific questions relating to the Woy Woy and Panania projects, but had not responded before deadline.
<www.theage.com.au/national/nsw/nsw-car-park-promised-in-federal-fund-now-slated-at-200-000-per-space-20210629-p585cp.html>
* Of course carparks are going to be in Liberal electorates. "Poor people don't drive cars."
* Sheer Government rorting and waste to get re-elected. What needy programs were these millions of taxpayer funded dollars taken from? The Scott Morrison Coalition Government has no shame and neither does the Gladys Berejiklian Coalition Government caught out misusing millions in taxpayer’s funds for Coalition Electorates even to the extent of bushfire relief funding. Disgusting behaviour showing all Australians aren’t treated equally and fairly.
* The PM and Uncle Scrooge have nothing in common.
* "Mr Fletcher’s office was contacted with specific questions relating to the Woy Woy and Panania projects, but had not responded before deadline." Do don't let it end there.
* Is Bridget McKenzie in charge of car parks now?
* Can't run a quarantine system, can't manage a vaccination program, can't even manage car parking. How much more hopeless can this mob get?
* Take a look at the Victorian car park promises. Some weren't possible to be constructed as the land had already been allocated for projects, including car parks paid for by the state government.
* 60% of the Projects but what % of the dollars?
* Just astonishing and they believe it's fair game to do this. None of these people will really be held to account either.
* "Based off the figure provided in the report, a single car space in a car park promised to woo Woy Woy voters at the 2019 election would be worth 15 times the value of a local house by square metre." Breathtaking !!!!

Tom Minear: Liberal’s car park pledge is shameless pork-barrelling. Tom Minear June 30, 2021
The Morrison government’s $660m commuter parking fund has long been a slow-motion car crash since and now we can see it for what it truly is: pork-barrelling.
The Morrison government’s $660m commuter parking fund has been a slow-motion car crash since before it was even announced in the lead-up to the 2019 election.
Treasury boffins pulling the nation’s purse strings wanted a competitive process to pick projects that would cut the most congestion at the least cost.
Under Alan Tudge, the urban infrastructure minister, the government did the opposite. MPs put forward railway stations where they thought parking was needed. No one spoke to the councils or state governments required to deliver them.
The Infrastructure Department told Tudge it had no information on station parking and provided advice on sites that ignored “project feasibility, costs, risks or value for money”.
Instead of this ringing alarm bells, the government proudly announced 47 stations to receive new parking. Of those, 30 were in Melbourne, including 25 in Liberal-held seats and none in the growing western suburbs.
A scathing Auditor-General’s report, released this week, was too focused on this shambolic process to answer the critical question: why? According to those involved, there is a simple explanation. The program was an easy way to curry favour with voters in seats the government wanted to protect. Shameless pork-barrelling.
The Morrison government’s election promise to build car parks at suburban train stations is in tatters.
Is this wrong? Labor thinks so, describing it as “industrial-scale rorting”. Anyone who reads the report will see taxpayers have indeed been taken for a ride. But the question of whether this is wrong, per se, is not as clear-cut as it seems.
Consider the Andrews government’s Suburban Rail Loop. Announced before the 2018 state election, it was incredibly popular with voters, especially in the eastern suburbs where Labor was trying to win seats and where the first loop section was planned. What a coincidence.
Daniel Andrews didn’t put a price tag on the project. Might be $50bn, might be more. Nearly three years on, we still don’t know, nor do we have a business case.
Victoria’s Transport Department hadn’t even heard of the Suburban Rail Loop until moments before the Premier announced it on Facebook. It was drawn up in secret by Development Victoria and approved over other long-planned projects such as the second Metro Tunnel. And it’s not even a loop. If it’s ever finished, it will instead be a series of disjointed rail lines.
Is this wrong? The government clearly hasn’t demonstrated the kind of rigour and transparency that should accompany the most expensive project the state has ever seen.
The issue at the heart of this question, however, is what we expect of our politicians. They are elected to lead, not to be led by public servants. One minister explained this week that while they carefully followed departmental advice on implementing policy, they were more likely to ignore it when creating policy.
“You never get in trouble for making bad decisions providing the process is right, and that’s really perverse. It should be judged on outcomes,” the minister said.
“Why have elections if we have this view that departmental officials are the final arbiters?”
Daniel Andrews has put a price tag on the Suburban Rail Loop.
Last month, Community Safety Minister Jason Wood was accused by Labor of “rorting” the Safer Communities Fund.
His department recommended 80 applications for support. Wood approved them all but trimmed their funding by 10 per cent to back extra projects the department deemed unsuitable or ineligible, mostly security upgrades of temples and churches that experienced vandalism, theft, trespassing and abuse.
Opposition spokesman Pat Conroy accused the government of treating “taxpayers’ money like it’s their money to be used for political gain”. In fact, Wood did exactly what he was supposed to do under federal grant rules. He investigated why the projects needed funding and recorded his reasons for approving them.
Some in Labor were decidedly uncomfortable with their party’s effort to turn the matter into a scandal. They didn’t see a rort, but a minister appropriately exercising his discretion.
ThroughouT the pandemic, following the health advice has been the mantra of state and federal leaders. This has saved thousands of lives and served the country well. But as we continue trying to navigate life with Covid-19, this adherence to the views of unelected bureaucrats — experts as they are — places both politicians and their constituents in a bind.
Health chiefs want to preserve the (mostly) Covid-free lifestyle they have created.
While their motive is pure, their advice is blind to the effect of the restrictions they propose. It is to our detriment that politicians are not more willing to challenge these recommendations and make decisions based on a universal view of risks and rewards.
Of course, governments cannot function without good advice. The end result of the car park fund — projects that are over-budget, running late or impossible to build — is evidence of that.
If Scott Morrison wants to build station parking, it is incumbent upon him to work with his experts — who must determine whether that is an effective use of public money — and then explain his rationale to voters. The same goes for Andrews and his rail loop.
At least the leaders are listening to the Covid-19 advice.
But they also need to be interrogating, reviewing and balancing those recommendations against their broader priorities and responsibilities. It’s a democracy, not a bureaucracy.
<www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/tom-minear-liberals-car-park-pledge-is-shameless-porkbarrelling/news-story/62f0cb6b95f660b5abfdcced8ac814fc>
* Heatherdale they purchased Hungry Jack's land and near finished. The huge Multi Story one at Croydon well under way and looking good,  Both within 5K from home. Check out which areas have the most travellers to the CBD?  The Eastern Suburbs were seriously neglected in this need because of the length of Labors Heartland getting priority on many projects. East West Link!!  Alan
* You want to see Pork Barrelling ? Come to the Victorian ALP pig farm. Andrews is the biggest pig farmer in the country.
* To think Mick Young lost his portfolio for not declaring a Teddy Bear. All political parties have no standards. Shame is dead in politics and we the voters are poorer for it.
* Never built the station parking they promised us.
* Have a look at funding in Education; Labor has done the same. Time for Politicians to have credibility and insist on Cyclic maintenance and priority on needs base So much money is wasted
* Both parties have been doing this for years. Years ago, a few weeks before an election, multiple sporting clubs were promised new clubrooms if Labor won the election. They won, and many sporting clubs received upgrades.
* Of course most station car parks are in Liberal electorates. They actually have a job and need to get to work.
* Both sides do it. Do not forget the school grants Nothing will change n who is in government
* The big mouth liberal supporters gone missing again.
* you can’t criticise Labor when the Liberals do the same thing but Michael still does that is the trouble with Australia
* Labor have turned government by unelected bureaucrats into an art form. They've mastered the art of creating someone to blame for things going wrong while taking credit for things we like. It's typical of the Left's way of doing things. The Right believe in personal responsibility and it shows in their MP's taking charge and actually making decisions.
* Any parking at train stations should incur a charge similar to hospitals and shopping centres, concessions could apply for disabled and first three hours could be free. These spaces are very high cost to provide and maintain, taxpayers should not pay for these facilities and it is worth noting that bus services connecting to trains are included in the train fare. We don't need extra cars on the roads and taking up valuable land in car parks.
* Entry and exit should be controlled via Myki.  Apart from signs, mostly ignored, saying that parking is for commuters there is no real enforcement.
* the aim is to reduce cars in the city. Think of the savings in road maintenance, time saved by those that have to drive in the city and the cost saved by people not parking in the city. If you had to pay for parking at the station, why bother using it? 
* No worse than the level crossing removal project.
* You like being routinely held up in a line of traffic then. 
* most people say they love 'em because they can still drive and not think about the Public Transport. Yes they make that Public Transport look less attractive.
* not when it's state government and all level crossings are going to go
* Isn't it good that 47 level crossings have been removed ..fantastic for motorists    well done Dan   still another 27 to do  
[Most of them have been engineered for private motorists, with no benefit for train travellers, and no futureproofing.  The elevated sections above suburban back fences are a blight, but no bureaucrat lives in them.]
* Clearly you don't drive near level crossings during peak hours. Good for you.
* If the Liberal areas hadn't been ignored by the Labor State Government for the last 10 years, your article may have some relevance. 
* Surely these car parks are where they are needed.  Don't Labor and Greens voters ride bikes and/or public transport
* What do you call it when the Andrews government gave away $1 billion tax payers dollars on the east west link. What do you call it when the Andrews government makes the south east pay for a tunnel for the west by extending tolls on the Monash to pay for it. What do you call it when the Mornington Peninsula is locked down with restrictions despite having zero cases but the Geelong region was allowed to stay open despite having cases. Labor attacking liberal seats whilst looking after labor seats
* The Vic LNP Link was going to cost over twice that, and was deemed a failure. Andrews just saved Vic $1.5 billion by cancelling the deal. It was going to be a disaster and the LNP were doing it for industry mates
* More spin there than Andrews.
* Like the West Gate tunnel is going so well, and will not solve the traffic problem.
* No wonder this state is a shambles when you have lemmings trying (embarrassingly) to be part of the Andrews spin and propaganda machine.
* you do know it was it Denis Napthine that caused the $1 billion compensation for East West Link ...remember ,....Denis Napthine signed a $5.4 billion deal with the East West consortium just 3 weeks before the 2014 election ...how dumb ...while the State was in election mode ,,,Napthine signed the deal knowing Andrews had promised NO East West Link ....we all went to the election knowing that..... .you knew that ...Andrews kept his promise...no East West 
* Andrews just pandering to the inner city greens, which the ALP will do.
* To be honest I think Denis Napthine had every right to sign the contract. He'd tried to get the much needed East West Link up and running for such a long time and he had to deal with a multitude of contrived and ridiculous delays. Despite his promise to 'tear up the contract' because it 'wasn't worth the paper it was written on', I think many people would've preferred Daniel Andrews to continue with the EWL once they knew the cost, rather than wasting so much money.
* It wasn't just the Contract to build, but more importantly, the side letter that promised compensation if the deal did not continue.  Nothing more than a cheap booby trap.
* It was in fact O'Brien, the then Treasurer, who signed the agreement with the developers which guaranteed that they, the developers would receive full payment for the road even if it were not built, and even if the agreement between the government and the developers was found not to be legally binding. And now, O'Brien wants to be Premier.
* And who signed the go ahead when the Govt was in caretaker mode and the election was supposed to be a ‘referendum’ on the EastWest proposal. Andrews had said he would stop it, and if he hadn’t you’d have been claiming ‘ broken promises’
* The Liberal gov was in power and had every right to sign a contract for a road that was and still is needed.
* Tried driving past the Zoo these days? It was a promise to attract the Green preferences!!   Nothing else.  Alan
* That's right I still remember former PM Tony Abbott days before the election in 2014  saying the election will be like a referendum for Victoria to see if the want EW Link...Victoria just wanted the Libs out 
* While the carpark funding allocation is bad enough it pales into insignificance compared to the allocation of over 90% of South Australia's $1billion share of infrastructure to the Liberal seat of Boothby which is under enormous threat of being lost at the next election.
* Where’s the Victorian state government criticism? Billions and billions of dollars of cost blowouts? Doesn’t suit the agenda ?
* When it is wrong, it is wrong no matter who or what political party is involved. Interesting, that while this article suggests the Scott Morrison Liberal Party railway car park stunt was indeed wrong, it goes on to suggest the Labour Party is not innocent in these types of things! Does this make either OK? So why include it when the article is about the station car parks?
* Tudge Say no more Will struggle to hold his seat in Eastern suburbs Vic
* To whom, the greens? Will they get an injecting room too?
* thats shocking because the labor party have never done any pork barreling ever they just stick to branch stacking and tax rises