Re: Wonderful, Customer-Responsive GSR

[kestrel <kestrel@wr.com.au>]

Crookesp wrote:

> In article <69m1eh$l1a$1@news.mel.aone.net.au>, "Barry"
> <one@microsoft.com>
> writes:
>
> >Overnight trains for point to point travel are dead as a
> money making
> >venture in Australia. Not only that, they do not even
> perform a public
> >service as other modes of transport fill the gaps quite
> adequately and they
> >just take up track space that could be used by real (that
> is freight)
> >trains.
> >
> >
> >
>
> Not necessarily.
>
> I'll be travelling as a visitor in Australia in May. We'll
> arrive in Melbourne,
> make a visit to Bendigo, thence Sydney, Gosford, Taree,
> Brisbane and Cairns. We
> leave for USA / London / Berlin on May 31.
>
> I would very much like to use trains for most of this
> travel. I dislike
> driving. The driver never sees the scenery, only the road,
> which is boring.
>
> You ignore one enormous advantage of the overnight train
> for the visitor: that
> it avoids the cost of a hotel overnight stay and delivers
> the traveller
> painlessly, well-slept and refreshed, right into the heart
> of town, so also
> avoiding the traditionally expensive airport to downtown
> cost.
>
> For instance, we can go on the Melbourne Sydney overnight
> express with a
> sleeper leaving at midnight. That allows us to get back
> from Bendigo in the
> afternoon, find dinner and a show in Melbourne, join our
> train and ber
> delivered to Sydney overnight. No hotel, no boring
> driving, no sleazy bus
> station, no expensive trek out to the airport in taxis
> where the meter is
> worked by a foot-pedal,  no worries.
>
> Which other mode of transport offers that advantage?
>
> There is a market for long-haul passenger travel in
> Australia. It's not
> promoted here in Europe as well as it could be, which may
> account for lower
> revenue figures on the passenger side. But it's there...
>
> *Philip*

Having "enjoyed" the XPT to Brisbane last October, I must
admit as a Coach Class Passenger (no sleeping berths
available), it is not something that I would readily repeat.

ENJOY

Brian Alcock