Shoudl I snip the stuff below?... nah....
> In article <353F2D76.8B9BC01@ozemail.com.au> David Johnson <trainman@ozemail.com.au> writes:
> >Date: Thu, 23 Apr 1998 22:00:54 +1000
> >From: David Johnson <trainman@ozemail.com.au>
> >Subject: Re: My trip to Adelaide (was The overland - input wanted)
>
> >Maurie Daly wrote:
>
> >> The number of passengers requiring to travel on a daily basis between melb and
> >> Adelaide is a function of the size of the two population centres, it has very
> >> little to do with how fast the trains travel.
I can't agree with this statement. A certain percetage of passengers are
time sensitive. At my work a number of us travel to Sydney and Canberra
for conferences, meetings etc. my colleagues would not consider using
the train because of the time of the journey. With the plane they can be
there and back in the same day.
Likewise people going to the footy interstate - they can be there and
back in the same day.
When rail can offer this standard of service ie airline standard with
good service & meals and a 3-4 hour trip each way then it will pick up a
sigificant number of passengers.
> >> As an example , back in the 1970s we had 3 trains per day in both directions
> >> between Melb and Sydney and two trains per day between Sydney and Brisbane.
3? I only recall the Southern Aurora and the Spirit of Progress. I dont
recall which was the day one and which the night but I don't recall a
third train. Mind you I was only young then. What was the third train?
> >>
> >> Now both lines run XPTs , which run the services many hours faster than their
> >> predessors but in both cases we have less trains per day , not more.
>
> >This is due to the lack of availabilty of trains, not due to a lack of passenger
> >demand.
I'd argue that airline deregulation might have had an effect.
>
> Only from the perspective of Countrylink.
> There no reason why any other operator cannot run more passenger trains
> between Melb - Sydney and Brisbane in competition to Countrylink if they so
> choose to.
> Even GSR or WCR or the PTC could run passenger trains if they wanted to, they
> just dont want to , simply because it isnt economic to do so.
>
> cheers
> MD
Bring on Virgin railways!
cheers Peter