Feeling train strain
THE numbers tell the story of Geelong’s boom.
Trips taken on Geelong line V/Lines hovered around three or four million a year for seven years.
Then in financial year 20152016 it spiked and there were millions more — a total of 6.74 million. And it has just kept increasing — 7.72 million trips the next year and 8.77 million trips last financial year.
That figure is not too far off being triple what the line was carrying a decade ago.
Some won’t like the implications of this — will think that many commuters between Geelong and Melbourne will make our bayside city a dormitory town, make Geelong lose its distinctive character.
But this isn’t as simple as Geelong getting lumped with Melbourne’s problems, population, transport or otherwise.
This isn’t a matter of Geelong being dependent on Melbourne and its job market for our future.
It is actually a matter of Melbourne being dependent on Geelong, and Victoria more generally being dependent on regional cities including Bendigo, Ballarat and others to relieve the pressure in Melbourne.
Without this decentralisation, the Victorian capital, its roads and rail are in danger of becoming as dysfunctional as Sydney.
There are major works going on around the state now. But they come after years of inaction — or tiny tweaks — while the population swelled.
For a long time it has just been assumed that when it comes to our cities the population should keep increasing — that big is beautiful. But infrastructure not keeping up is a reason left and right are now talking about population rates.
Since June 2015 V/Line has failed its punctuality target of 92 per cent in all but two months. That’s about 300 trains a month running more than six minutes late.
In today’s report V/Line has said it will refocus on our line with a devoted team looking at these rampant lateness issues.
This is welcome. But given the Geelong population boom, and the millions more trips putting a strain on our rail line, we wonder if it will be enough — or will it be just a Band-Aid solution?