Re: Victoria...it begins!

[John Cleverdon <johnc@cdi.com.au>]

Rod wrote:

<snip>

>     A little bit about our Railway, as described by Marinus:
> V/Line is a Class 3 Railroad, by US standards, and if anything they consider
> it over maintained.

"Over-maintained"? Did they take a look at the Geringhap-Maroona section prior
to the current work? At least the "Class 3" is understandable, thanks to the
road-biased governments, its like 1st class roads and 3rd class railways.

> Our Railway will be maintained to 80 kph, those tracks that have Pass
> Services will be maintained to 115 kph standards with the help of a 25
> million assist from the Government.

Lets see now... Speed limit for the railway = 80 kph. Speed limit for truckies =
100 kph (when they bother with legal limits :-).
So how is rail meant to compete with road if the trucks can go 25% faster?
When it is seen that road is faster than rail, and the rail company has little
interest in improving this, guess where all the traffic is going to go? (but
then, is this really anything new.....neither Labor nor Liberal would bother
doing much better anyway).

The same applies for passenger services - the faster the railways can get from A
to B, the better chance they will have competing against road traffic. I have
been in a Sprinter doing 140, so slowing this to 115 isn't going to help.


John (asbestos suit on, just in case..)
--
John Cleverdon, B.App.Sc. (Cartography)
Amateur astronomer & Railway enthusiast | Essendon - 1999 AFL premiers
Dromana, Victoria, Australia | Phone: 03 5987 1535 (H)
E-mail:  johnc@cdi.com.au  ** New address **
The Locomotive Page: http://www.railpage.org.au/loco
Astronomical Society of Frankston: http://www.peninsula.starway.net.au/~aggro