The much-hyped new train timetables running in Victoria were heralded by the government, V/Line, and Metro Trains Melbourne as a breakthrough for passengers getting around more efficiently.
We were promised by V/Line that “these changes follow several months of work with Metro and feedback from our customers”. Oh really? Customers asked for slower trains?
Obviously, I can’t speak for every single service scheduled into the timetable, but lets look at a couple of the most important ones – peak services when the majority of people travel. These are the particular services I catch most days.
Lets start with the morning peak, and service 8210. I travel from North Geelong through to Southern Cross. On the old timetable below, it left North Geelong at 7:04am, with a scheduled arrival at 7:51am, for a trip time of 47 minutes.
That would have been great if that’s what actually happened. I start work at 8am, and my office is only a three or four minute walk from Southern Cross. Problem was, it invariably ran around 6 minutes late, arriving at 7:57 quite often. Not really a problem for getting to the office on time or near enough – fortunately my employer is not a clock watcher.
I’m sure not every employer is the same.
Overall, this meant the journey time was regularly about 53 minutes. Lets look at the 8210 service on the new timetable.
It now leaves North Geelong at 6:55am – nine minutes earlier – and is scheduled to arrive at 7:46am, for a journey time of 51 minutes. The new timetable allows for four extra minutes to cover the distance.
Given under the old timetable it was quite often around six minutes late, you’d think that allowing another four minutes on the timetable, it shouldn’t arrive much later than 7:48am most of the time – only two minutes late.
On paper this looks great – although it runs to time a little more often than it used to – (which was admittedly almost never) – it still often ends up arriving at about 7:53am, for a journey time of 58 minutes.
Wait a second – didn’t it usually take around 53 minutes under the old timetable? Some improvement!
However, that’s not such a big deal to me. I still get to work on time, and although I’m still getting used to getting up 10 minutes earlier than I used to, it’s not too bad.
But an improvement? No.
Why don’t we look at the evening timetable on the way home, shall we? Namely, service 8229 out of Southern Cross.
As you can see, it used to leave at 4:40pm, and arrive back at North Geelong – (by the timetable at least) – at 5:22pm. Invariably, it would find itself arriving at around 5:25pm – this I know because day after day after normal day, I would be in my car in the car park at 5:27pm.
Almost like clockwork with a journey time of 45 minutes – unless of course struck by one of V/Line’s famous delays.
What do we get now?
The same service leaves Southern Cross at 4:37pm – three minutes earlier. It is scheduled to hit North Geelong at 5:23pm, just one minute after the previous scheduled time. Just like the morning service, allowing an extra four minutes on the timetable.
However, what has those four minutes done? Now I regularly arrive in the front seat of my car at 5:38pm after getting off the train at 5:36pm. Nine minutes later than I used to, on a train that leaves three minutes earlier. It now regularly takes 59 minutes, instead of 45 minutes.
Sounds well thought out, this new timetable, doesn’t it?
To realise why 14 minutes of our lives have been stolen from us every afternoon, what we have to do is to look at the train BEFORE the 8229, namely the 8227.
It used to leave Southern Cross at 4:13, but now leaves at 4:19 – six minutes later. The 8229 used to leave at 4:40pm, and now leaves at 4:37pm – three minutes earlier.
They are NINE minutes closer together on the timetable. The 8227 is also a stopping all stations service, while the 8229 remains “express” all the way to North Geelong.
Almost every single day the 8229 has to slow down and crawl along behind the 8227 as it approaches Geelong. This slow down usual begins before reaching Lara. This almost never happened under the old timetable – only when the 8227 was delayed somewhere en-route.
Bringing these trains nine minutes closer together on the timetable has “penalised” the later train by about 10 to 15 minutes, almost every night. Fourteen minutes over 230 working days a year for most people is almost 54 days a year less at home – more than two days.
Remember that “these changes follow several months of work with Metro and feedback from our (V/Line) customers”.
Yeah right. I bet we really asked for this!