* The glacial slowness with which public sector supervised projects usually move. This is partly due to the bureaucratic way of doing things; the main priority is following "correct proceedure", which to them is more important  than the whole team working together for an efficient and speedy outcome. It's also partly due to inflexibility,  such as if the kid who opens the mail goes on holiday, no one else can do that work because it's not in their job description.

* Public sector red tape, blue tape and green tape. Even the simplest project has to jump through elaborate bureaucratic, union and environmental hoops that a private project could either avoid or at least do more easily. For example the four metre wide strip of land required for the extra track that adjoins rail tracks that have been used since 1859, will still need a slow, elaborate and insanely expensive environmental assessment to check that the weeds growing on the wasteland are not native weeds. Then the report will need to be published and a series of public meetings scheduled where NIMBYs and the more extreme variety of enviro-mental can object, claiming that a common (albeit native) weevil may be slightly inconvenienced and thus further prolong the process, which also costs a lot of extra money.
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This Is all so true, If only these Public sector workers did a more proactive job (other than working hard every day trying to justify the existence of their role) we could have so much more Infrastructure built (for the same funding) generating greater benefits for everyone.

Have seen the best and worst of it in both public and private sector. My favourite phrase is 'don't tell me how hard you are peddling, tell me what you have achieved'. Yes it does afflict the public sector, but the private sector is not immune.  It's about being results driven, rather than process driven

Don't get me wrong, I am not advocating the "third line" solution, I was just picking up on Nightfire's point from early in this old thread for a point of reference.

Having said that something needs to be done, the current situation is ridiculous.

BG

Watergardens station has been reconfigured so up/down Bendigo's, Swan Hill's etc can 'run-through' slower sparks on express tracks through that station. I believe with the April timetable the new tracks will come into service.

Mike.

Have seen the best and worst of it in both public and private sector. My favourite phrase is 'don't tell me how hard you are peddling, tell me what you have achieved'. Yes it does afflict the public sector, but the private sector is not immune.  It's about being results driven, rather than process driven

Agreed. A private company will only work hard if there's incentive to finish. I worked on one large project where the head contractor was being paid cost + 15%. Boy did things drag on that job...

Rick

Watergardens station has been reconfigured so up/down Bendigo's, Swan Hill's etc can 'run-through' slower sparks on express tracks through that station. I believe with the April timetable the new tracks will come into service.

Mike.

Up trains have been running-through sparks at Watergardens for as long as I've been a regular commuter on the Bendigo Line for the past 2 years. On the down, there's little value to a V/Line train running through Watergardens really as any time saved is minimal, especially as most that run express through Watergardens stopping at Sunbury anyway. Half of the Metro Services terminate at Watergardens anyway, so for the most part there is a clear run Watergardens - Sunbury

The problem lies at Sunshine and in illogical prioritising of trains. A V/Line train should be given priority every time, as it will clear sections faster than a stopping all stations metro train. A metro can generally run in the path behind another metro and keep to the timetable. A V/Line train can not.

I've sat on the RRL tracks at Sunshine for a full 5 minutes waiting for a metro train to pass us so we could continue to Bendigo. Whether we were at Sunshine early doesn't matter, a waiting V/Line train should be cleared first. It would be better to hold a Suburban Train at Sunshine station than a V/Line service at several points along the line.

The ones they run thru at watergardens are all Up Watergardens trains waiting for their departure time they do not hold electric services from Sunbury for a vline to overtake

Problem theres that so many of the metro trains out there r comengs which are the vip train on the system so they cant hold 1 for another train cos its a comeng solution send those comengs to glen waverley and have westies have smeg trains that they can overtake

Problem theres that so many of the metro trains out there r comengs which are the vip train on the system so they cant hold 1 for another train cos its a comeng solution send those comengs to glen waverley and have westies have smeg trains that they can overtake

Keh????

@Chidda Bang they do. On a number of occasions when my train was running late, the following metro train has been held at Sunbury for my train to pass through.

@Chidda Bang they do. On a number of occasions when my train was running late, the following metro train has been held at Sunbury for my train to pass through.

Ummmmmm read my post so ur saying they held a suburban train from sunbury at watergardens for ur vline to overtake in tha middle of its run i highly doubt they wld hold a comeng at the 2nd stop on its trip

Chidda Bang, your comments regarding Comeng trains prove you are either an incredibly immature child, or a complete tool.

As for Sunbury trains being held at Watergardens, I believe Vinelander's comments suggested that the track has been altered at Watergardens, and Bendigo trains will be getting priority from April when the new track arrangements are commisioned. If this is the case, why can't V/Line trains get prioroty out of Sunshine? It wouldn't have an adverse affect on the stopping all stations train to follow the express Vlocity. Another case of making too much sense for these fools.

@Chidda Bang whoops sorry misread although I did hear of an occasion where a down Sunbury was held there for a Bendigo train to pass.

why can't V/Line trains get prioroty out of Sunshine? It wouldn't have an adverse affect on the stopping all stations train to follow the express Vlocity. Another case of making too much sense for these fools.

On Christmas Eve I was on the 18:20 down Swan Hill.

As we travelled through Sunshine on the RRL a Sunbury was stationary on Platform 2 at Sunshine awaiting the signal. As it should be, the Swan Hill went ahead of the Sunbury out of Sunshine.

Mike.

This week being a bit quiet at work I decided to close and head up to Maldon for a bit of work on the VGR. This gave me a chance to take the 16.57 Bendigo Train out of SC or "The Castlemaine Flyer" as it should be known as it runs express Footscray to the Maine and provides the quickest run on the timetable. It was not full as would be expected at this time of year and I got a seat in the front car with a bunch of regular travellers who all knew each other and were having a great time catching up on all things Summer Holidays. They obviously caught this service regularly from work in the city to home in the Goldfields.

There was plenty to see with 2 grain trains moving though Tottenham yard and we made good time for the first part of the trip on the RRL. I didn't see what happened next but the regular travellers in my carriage did - a couple were straining to look as far forward as they could and caught the tell tail silver and blue flash take the path in front of us. As soon as we crossed over from the RRL to the Sunbury line proper we came to a stop at the first signal. A stopping-all/most-stations Sunbury Spark had got the jump on us.

Same train this week, similar result. Took the 16.57 Bendigo out of SC on Tuesday. As soon as we crossed over from the RRL to the Sunbury line we slowed and then stopped parralel with the next station (Albion?). There was a Spark stopped to our right still with it's doors open. We stayed put while the Metro train pulled away and took our path.

We crawled along for a while however unlike last week when we arrived at WaterGardens we overtook the spark which was stopped and then we raced off making up all the time and some arriving in the Maine a couple of minutes early.

Despite this success I still cannot comprehend a rail system that gives priority to a stopping suburban passenger service over a flagship regional express. It defies all logic and common sense (although to be fair these are not high priorities for governments or Metro!}

BG

Don't want to sound like a broken record but I caught the 1.36pm out of SC on Saturday afternoon with some friends who were coming up to Maldon for a holiday with their kids. We arrived around 17 mins late into Sunbury after we were stuck behind yet another spark for most of the trip from the RRL to Diggers Rest and beyond.

I have caught the train from Southern Cross to the Maine 3 times in the last 2 weeks and each service was min 10 mins late due to sparks. Regional Fast Rail? What a joke. Then again, I suppose it is fast once it gets into the regions!

BG

You must be having a streak of bad luck. I hardly ever get stuck behind a spark.

You must be having a streak of bad luck. I hardly ever get stuck behind a spark.

On the up it is normally fine (although this morning my bad luck continued as we got stuck at Sunbury due to a police operation at St Albans) but down services are a nightmare. These examples I have given are just the most recent in a string of incidents of trains that I have caught that have been stuck behind sparks.

Before the RRL was opened out to Sunshine we had problems mainly on the way into town, getting slowed when we caught up to Sunbury services but this has mainly been resolved by the new track pair.

I don't remember it being this bad on the down before the RRL but this may be due to the fact that the up situation was worse!

I only catch 2-4 services a week, I pity the fools who do it daily. They should re-start Yes Minister - you could get a whole season worth of episodes out of the Bendigo line on it's own!

BG

Brenton, I get the impression (from experience and also what you're saying) that V/line are given priority at peak times of the day, but Metro get the jump during off-peak and weekends.  I have seen Metro trains held at Sunshine for a minute or two to allow a Down V/line train to get the green...

That said, even if the V/line train gets the green, it usually has to slow down behind the earlier Metro train anywhere between Ginifer and Sunbury, such is the narrow margin in the timetable at present during much of the day.

Cut back how often tha metro trains run out there the criminals who catch the line can wait another 10 minutes now vline go fast & problem solved

That said, even if the V/line train gets the green, it usually has to slow down behind the earlier Metro train anywhere between Ginifer and Sunbury, such is the narrow margin in the timetable at present during much of the day.

If that is the case (and I have no reason to doubt that is is) then the question becomes was this eventuality foreseen during the years of RRL planning and implementation? If not, why not, if yes then why wasn't anything done to prevent it (passing loops etc)?

Because what we have now is a joke. It will be interesting to see what happens when the new timetables come out.

BG

Cut back how often tha metro trains run out there the criminals who catch the line can wait another 10 minutes now vline go fast & problem solved

What are you attempting to say

As posted several times before  -   The current VLP tt using RRL to Sunshine is best fit of the old VLP tt with the existing Metro tt so some VLP paths out to  Sunbury are not optimal .

The new RRL timetable effective late April, 2015  for VLP plus a whole new timetable for the Metro Northern Group should be a much better timetable overall .  (Deer Park West  -  Tarneit - Wyndamvale - Manor  North  section opens from same date.)

The trouble with the Bendigo v. Metro on the  Sunbury route is that even with optimal timetabling on a 20 minute frequency a VLP is always going to catch up with the preceding spark .  What is really needed is a third track from Sunshine out as far as Ginifer so VLP can run through Metro .  If the track layouts at  Sunshine and Watergardens are used properly in the new tt then many VLP run throughs are possible in both directions with good timetabling at Sunshine and Watergardens .

As posted several times before  -   The current VLP tt using RRL to Sunshine is best fit of the old VLP tt with the existing Metro tt so some VLP paths out to  Sunbury are not optimal .

The new RRL timetable effective late April, 2015  for VLP plus a whole new timetable for the Metro Northern Group should be a much better timetable overall .  (Deer Park West  -  Tarneit - Wyndamvale - Manor  North  section opens from same date.)

The trouble with the Bendigo v. Metro on the  Sunbury route is that even with optimal timetabling on a 20 minute frequency a VLP is always going to catch up with the preceding spark .  What is really needed is a third track from Sunshine out as far as Ginifer so VLP can run through Metro .  If the track layouts at  Sunshine and Watergardens are used properly in the new tt then many VLP run throughs are possible in both directions with good timetabling at Sunshine and Watergardens .

Yep, here's hoping but as I said earlier shouldn't this have been foreseen and dealt with at the same time as the RRL works?

Yep, here's hoping but as I said earlier shouldn't this have been foreseen and dealt with at the same time as the RRL works?

Yes but remember  Mulder & Napthine cut back the scope of RRL severely with at grade junctions at  Sunshine and Deer Park West .
The only junction done to its original  design properly is at Manor North Junction .

40kmh turnouts at Sunshine on RRL are ridiculous and 65kmh at Deer Park West is also pathetic for new construction .

Honestly Kuldalai they LOST the election, your side WON, so you can stop trolling and slagging them off now!