Re: V/Line Pass Worst Service in Australia

["WhaleOilBeefHooked" <daproc@sd5.mailbank.com>]

tony bailey wrote in message <37912e29.0@pink.one.net.au>...

>And where do you think most the most of the Murwillumbah  bound passengers
>go - Tweed Heads?
>
>The Murwillumbah service is as much a train to Qld as is the Brisbane
>service - count the coaches and think about it!

It is still not a Queensland service.

>The North Coast services are FULL for a large part of the year - no matter
>what a lot of contributors to this newsgroup think. Try making a last
minute
>booking at some time and see if it is easier to catch an XPT or a coach!
You
>might get a surprise

It is easy to fill a train when you operate is at less than capacity. XPT's
are 6-cars outside of school holidays now. They did this to make the load
factors look better.

Having worked for coach lines, I am fully aware of what the coachlines do -
they open up 46 seats on a service - as soon as there are 40 or so people
booked, they make it 92 - when it gets to about 85, they make it 138. And so
on and so on. THAT is why it is always easy to get a seat on a caoch.

Let's look at the SYD-BNE service. Greyhound operate 5 services per day -
one via the New England Highway. Two of them are double deck coaches
(capacity 56) the other three are standard coaches (46 seats). Total
Greyhound capacity (before they start boosting services) is 250 seats per
day.

Then we have McCaffertys. They operate three services per day (plus a
seasonal service) - most of them are operated by strecthed coaches -
capacity 54 - McCafferty's capacity - 162 seats per day.

Then we have Pioneer Motor Services (who purchased Kirklands) - they have
two coaches per day - double deck coaches at 56 seats - total 112 seats.

So far, we are up to 524 seats - far in excess of the capacity of a six-car
XPT (six cars is now the standard, outside of school holidays).

Given that the railways provide so little capacity to start with, and are
not as efficient as the coach lines in terms of using a seat more than once
per journey (it does happen on trains, but the coaches are better - one of
the advantages of not allocating seats until departure time) is it any
wonder that rail fills up first?

DaveP