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Re: Metcard Implementation



Daniel Bowen wrote:
> 
> 
> Oh, with the brochure... also notice the glossy photo with all the "typical Met
> users" in it. Funny, it doesn't seem to include any of those scary looking loud
> teenagers you find on the trains at night... And not one of the kids shown
> carries a skateboard! How about some truth in advertising??
> 
I haven't read the brochure yet, although we had one delivered.  Does it
show the huge queues to buy tickets?  I caught a train at Heatherdale at
about 7.40 this morning.  The queue was at least 50 metres long, but I
was fortunate in that I had coins and required only a 2 hour zone 2
ticket.  There was a customer relations person standing next to the
coins-only machine, giving people change (coins for notes) and showing
them how to use the machine.  Most people who wanted dailies or 2 hour
tickets used this machine, once they reached a position near the front
of the queue, and found out that it was available.  The customer
relations person was advising people to buy their ticket for the next
day on the way home, and to validate it just before travelling.
The trouble was that many people wanted weeklies or monthlies, as it was
their first day back at work this year.
At Mitcham, the queue seemed to be about twice as long as at
Heatherdale, and at Nunawading it was not much shorter.  I got off at
Blackburn, and there was practically no queue, presumably because many
people who use Blackburn arrive by bus, and would already have a ticket.
I got on the bus at Blackburn, but did not validate my ticket on the
bus, because it was waiting at the bus stop with its engine stopeed, and
the driver nowhere in sight (common practice).  When the driver
appeared, no passengers who were already on the bus validated their
tickets.
If the whole Metcard scheme is so that the government will know who to
subsidise when the system is privatised, it doesn't look as if it going
to work too well.  

-- 
Mrs Judy Gordon				
School of Biological & Chemical Sciences		 
Deakin University (Rusden Campus)