Category: PT Problem of the Day

Bus drivers have real difficulty manoeuvring their buses down side streets, between parked cars. Apart from slow trips, it also means journeys for passengers are along indirect routes and that services are confusing for first-time users. A PTUA study last year found that on average, Melbourne bus routes were 70% longer than the most direct…

The Sunbury, Ballarat and Bendigo lines have just had a two week closure for Regional Rail Link works. While reports suggest the replacement services ran pretty smoothly, there were two issues of note that we’re highlighting: Low-floor buses: PTV made a pledge that Ninety per cent of replacement buses will be Disability Discrimination Act (DDA)…

As of Saturday, there is no way to buy or top-up a ticket on a tram, and at present not on buses either (although it will be eventually). And on the entire Melbourne public transport network, there is no single or short term ticket available at all. This is already causing confusion for occasional users…

Flinders Street is Melbourne’s busiest station, and its clocks are not just historic icons, but also informative. Unlike modern screens such as those that replaced the clocks at Elizabeth Street, they can be seen from a distance, such as from across the street. But their usefulness is limited because they are out of date: the…

Over the weekend, car parks at major shopping centres such as Southland, were packed with Christmas shoppers. The long search for a car spot resulted in some resorting to illegal parking, such as on grass verges. It’s a reminder that there is still no funding and no announced start date for construction of Southland station.…

Most people would agree that preventing fare evasion is a matter of carrot and stick. The carrot is easy purchase of tickets; the stick is more consistent and regular ticket checks. Instead we’ve gone backwards — particularly on trams. When there were tram conductors, it was almost certain your ticket would be checked, and you…

The new Myki-only gates installed at stations are certainly more informative for Myki users than the old hybrid Metcard gates. But they don’t seem any faster, and worse, they appear to suffer from reliability problems. We’ve had many sightings of individual gates going out of service, and recently some cases of entire banks of gates…

It’s all too common to see cars parked in bus stops, which means buses to have to stop in traffic — a potential safety risk for passengers, particularly those with limited mobility, and a cause of added traffic congestion. The motorists pictured above might be oblivious to the law: if there are no Bus Zone…

This must be one of the more perverse outcomes of the privatisation of Southern Cross Station: they are advertising early-bird parking (eg aimed at CBD workers). This ad appeared in MX (yes, the newspaper targetted at public transport users) several times last week. Should their campaign be successful (and we have our doubts, given the…

Quite apart from their abysmal and impossible to remember timetable with trains every 22 minutes, Williamstown and Altona Loop/Laverton passengers aren’t too happy about evening peak confusion at Flinders Street. It’s not hard to see why — departures are from four different platforms, and passengers say these are often changed at the last minute. This…