Category: Campaigns

Finally, almost a year after Smartbus routes started serving Lonsdale Street, the automated departure displays have started being switched-on at outbound CBD stops. This is good news, but it’s exposed other problems with the displays: this one for example, at the busy stop between Queen and Elizabeth Streets. The sign is too far from the…

As the rail network gets busier, it’s important that stations be designed to assist the efficient flow of people. The current design of some railway station exits, and the placement of Myki readers simply doesn’t make sense. 1. Armadale station — this reader is well out of the way, a long distance from where passengers…

One genuinely worthwhile upgrade in recent years has been the Metlink provision of stop-specific timetables at every train, tram and bus stop across Melbourne. But Nightrider stops missed out. Instead, stops display times from the start of the route, and ask you to “use the route map to calculate approximate time” — as if timetables…

Long queues to exit city stations are becoming more common in peak hours. This picture was taken at Flagstaff, and is a little more orderly than South Yarra. At both these locations and others, fare gates present a bottleneck, and it’s obvious more needs to be done to help passengers exit the stations quickly. Help…

Since the May timetable changes, some trains have been given too much slack in the timetable, and regularly either depart early or wait for up to two minutes at stations. It could be argued that some extra time was needed to make the timetables more reliable, but if the same train is consistently waiting for…

While it may make sense for public transport operators to use advertising to earn more money (which, hopefully, funds extra services), buses and trams often have this type of all-over advertising, which limits visibility. Even with some sections left unblocked, passengers find that, particularly at night, it becomes difficult to see where they are and…

Realtime information is important, particularly at busy stations such as those in the CBD. It’s also very important at major interchanges, where people need to know which platform to change to, and whether they’re getting on the right service. Last week may have brought good news with Metro improving punctuality, but there were also repeated…

It’s not just a lack of traffic priority that slows down trams. Poor track conditions like here on St Kilda Road result in speed restrictions. While cars are able to whizz by at 60 km/h, trams are meant to slow to a mere 15 km/h. This affects some 7 tram routes, and thousands of passengers…

It should hardly be a surprise that anybody with a choice gets to Fountain Gate Shopping Centre by car. The centre has some of the most infrequent buses in Melbourne, and to cap it off, some passengers have to wait for buses in delightful spots such as this — with no seating and no rain…

Passengers on the Sydenham, Ballarat and Bendigo lines can breathe a sigh of relief: the two-week shutdown is over, and their trains are back. All things considered it seems to have gone fairly smoothly, with plenty of staff on the ground, plenty of buses, and strong efforts made to get them through the traffic without…

Lonsdale Street’s Smartbus services have been running for nine months now, and it’s not just the automated signs that aren’t complete. Many tram stops around the CBD have these handy multimodal maps… but they haven’t been updated with the new bus routes. So don’t go to Lonsdale Street hoping to catch a 301, 304, 307,…