Re: Ararat BG connections

[mauried@commslab.gov.au (Maurie Daly)]

In article <36df306c.0@nap-ns1> "Grahame Ferguson" <grahamef@users.mcmedia.com.au> writes:
>From: "Grahame Ferguson" <grahamef@users.mcmedia.com.au>
>Subject: Re: Ararat BG connections
>Date: Fri, 5 Mar 1999 12:27:47 +1100

>Why spend all that money just to connect one town.  Ararat is connected for
>freight purposes, and to connect it for a few passengers is ludicrous.
>Rather the money would be better spent on improving Newport-Nth Geelong-
>Maroona to increase capacity and transit times.  Could the money spent on
>the ASW research development and establishment have been better spent
>installing CTC in the first place, or put in straight train-orders and spent
>the money on the track.
>We seem to be going backwards.
>It would be better for VLF to spend money on standardising the Mildura line
>and thereby have two wheat export outlets for Mildura line wheat at Portland
>and Geelong, or even Port Adelaide, Freemantle and Sydney for that matter.
>In Victoria is seems  to be 'Back to the Future'!


Yes I tend to agree entirely.
If Ararat needs a pass service , then so do other towns  Bairnsdale and 
Mildura ,and Horsham and Stawell.
ie a daily pass service , not one in the middle of the night.
Your comments re ASW are spot on , an amazing amount of money wasted on a 
safeworking system that went no-where,and never was likely to go anywhere.
Unfortunately,and this doesnt just go for Victoria,all the Railway systems in 
Australia seem to think that re-inventing the wheel is a great idea,and as a 
result we end up with more incompatible sets of rules & regs than ever.
It would be cheaper if its absolutely deemed necessary to provide Ararat with 
a pass service on SG, simply by converting one N set and maybe one or 2 Ps to 
SG and running a daily service.
You could run it as far as Horsham & return .
Of course the old problem of track access charges rears its ugly head here,in 
that ARTC would no doubt want to charge the pass operator for running trains 
on its track,something which the private operator may not want to 
do,especially if the cost effectiveness of the corridor is marginal.
Here we get back to the old problem of whether public transport should be 
required to make a profit,or whether its a service that needs to be provided
irrespective of profitability.
I tend to think that passenger trains which service country towns within a 
state should be classed in exactly the same way as the suburban rail service ,
ie its a service that should be provided irrespective of whether it makes any 
money or not.
In this case , where a private operator provides a country passenger service 
where profitability is low , or non existant then Govt charges (including 
Track Access charges) should be waived, ie a sort of community service 
obligation,much the same as Telecom carriers have to provide.

Track access charges are really taxes , in that they dont in any way reflect 
the true cost to the track owner of the incremental costs of running extra 
trains ,unless the track capacity is near maximum.

cheers
MD
 

On the 
issue of running pass trains , it would also make sense to do this