Yes, in our poll of train users, Richmond station was nominated most ofeten as the worst in Melbourne.Other contenders included Ringwood, Dandenong, West Footscray, Yarraville, Huntingdale, South Kensington, Tottenham, Balaclava, East Richmond and Footscray.
Unsafe, unsightly, unaccessable - unacceptable in a modern tramsport system? What do you think?
5 comments:
Thanks for your work on the online surveys. I have participated in all of them.
Re: the recent 'Worst Train Station' survey: the issue of safety/security was very sobering. I travel on one of the 'safer' train lines - Glen Waverley - yet I have still experienced many dodgey incidents over the years, including totally uncontrolled behaviour by young drunk/drugged people. I have seen whole carriages 'held hostage', as it were.
I hope you can use your findings and the feedback to help lobby the Vic Government and the transport companies to improve things, starting with the most pressing areas your audience has identified.
Best wishes,
Craig.
Some of the comments in your user blog are a bit petty. This is normal for such volunteered feedback. Deficiencies need to be put into context so they can be prioritised for action.
The fault I find with organisations such as yours is that an over-focus on the negative obscures the many good things about Victoria's public transport and actually engenders fear and deters some people from using PT. I think it is important to always be balanced so that an accurate picture is presented and our system continues to flourish, as it has done over the past 10 years.
It is an odd contradiction that you (a group of councils) ask for more PT when saying the current system is so deficient. You should be saying that it is so good you want more!
Look at the investment so far-
the entire country rail system has been rebuilt. The RFR is a great system.
Southern Cross station is now much more open, safe, and usable than ever before.
Eastlink redeveloped 4 suburban stations.
New Smart Bus routes bringing hundreds of new services to Melbourne.
Buses that are not afraid of the dark and actually stay out late!
A revamp of bus services in regional cities and towns.
New trains on the way.
A huge maintenance catch-up on the suburban system- wood is being replaced by concrete as sleepers across the whole system.
The Westall upgrade has started.
The transport plan is underway.
Some of these things are long overdue- but they are happening.
Peter
PS, sorry for the soapbox but I love trains. Whenever I travel I always try out the local train system, and where I can, an entire city network.
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This is a repeat of m post for balaclava thread - it probably makes sense here too: I actually thought Balaclava station was fine (except for the frequency of delays and cancellations on the line), and I travelled to and from it (or Windsor station) at least 5 days a week for almost 2 years.
Richmond station I quite like as well - especially because of the quite often jovial and jockular people on the microphones (as mentioned).
South Kensington station does have a bit of a stark feel to it, but is still serviceable (I catch A LOT of public transport for my job, so have visited all three of these stations between 50 and many hundreds of times).
Camberwell station middle platform, and Footscray station platform to Williamstown and Werribee seem not to be level or even (which is bad when trying to get a pram (or just a young child) on and off the train - the gaps between the train and platform seem to get bigger, and the height also larger one end of the platform).
I personally do not like Flagstaff station, although have only used it less than a dozen times, so might have just had bad luck. It seems to smell like urine every time I am there, but again - I have only been there infrequently.
I know when travelling between appointments, I have seen some bad stations, but these are generally because of the surrounding neighbourhood, and can not think of any that are truly terrible. Funnily, my least favourite station would have to be the new North Melb station. I preferred how it worked before, something about the new overpass (and frequency of vlines/ freights causing delays) seem to stuff up my public transport flow... not really sure why, but most times I have been behind schedule, I have been stuck in Nth Melb.
I think Peter (above post) has a point. I quite like Melbourne’s public transport system (except for cancellations, delays and weekend frequency), and have been using it as my sole mode of non human powered transport for the last 15 years since joining the workforce.
I have also travelled a fair amount and think our system for the number of people in Melb (and who currently use it, and price) it is not too bad.
My travels include places that people always gush about PT like NY and Tokyo, as well as places that the PT is nearly nonexistent (like most of the rest of the US, a lot of HCMC/Saigon etc).
If we want a system like NY or Tokyo we need to STOP Melbourne from growing outwards, and concentrate our populated areas upwards (more living in smaller apartments, rather than large houses with big backyards in outer and new suburbs) , as well as increase the number of people using PT significantly to make it financially viable.
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