Another major AFL game for round 11 on the weekend at Kadinia Park one of the most updated stadiums in Victoria. Over the weekend the Western Bulldogs and Geelong played to a sellout crowd at the stadium in Geelong.
Kadinia Park is a short walk from South Geelong Railway Station not dissimilar from Richmond Railway Station to the MCG. A crowd of 32,641 attended the match with many coming from Melbourne being supporters of the Western Bulldogs.
Over $1b was previously invested in the rail network between South Geelong and Waurn Ponds to create a double track system for more services south of Geelong. Those who ride the network at those locations will atest the double track still has a single line section with only two level crossings removed and others left in place. The lines between South Geelong and Waurn Ponds are signalled into sections.
There has been much discussion and thought over how V/Line might service 10,000’s of passengers arriving to the station from the ground and leaving South Geelong for home especially in the evening at a late night game.
The changes to the network around South Geelong made a series of changes that V/Line clearly did not think through and usually doesn’t with many changes in other locations.
The works allowed V/line removed the holding sidings on the what became the down line from South Geelong and did not create a further siding from the down line to hold trains near South Geelong a very stupid decision and again not in the best interests of passengers. It is now not possible to hold multiple trains near the station and quickly make them available to the surging passengers from the ground once the game has finished.
The effect of this siding being removed is longer wait times and less services available for matches at Kadinia Park. These photos show what happens when poor planning once again is delivered for services to take supporters of a Melbourne side playing at Kadinia Park back home.
10:40pm scenes leaving #KardiniaPark after #AFLCatsDogs (crowd of 32,641) Barely made 10:42pm #VLine #GeelongLine train back to Melbourne, express Tarneit-Southern Cross Fans for #WesternBulldogs #Footscray heartland had to catch 11:01pm train, so some empty seats in rear set. @craig_halsall
The poor planning meant serious overcrowding and wait times of 20 minutes between trains which is quite unacceptable.
Add to this the bypassing of stations forcing some passengers to ride into Southern Cross only to have to catch trains back out west on their arrival into SCS.
I also believe the works on this section now delivered have killed any chance of a promised rail connection to Armstrong Creek as the line is now above the ground height making it near impossible to service one of the fastest growing regions in the state.
Need a minimum of 2 footy specials after every game in Geelong. But there’s always the big risk of missing the last connection from SCS. If your travelling further out from Melbourne to the North- East & East / South.
After departing #SouthGeelong 8 mins late at 10:50pm (due to radio issues) we arrived #SouthernCross 11:59pm
Mere minutes for last connections on most lines – several people made mad dash for last #PakenhamLine at 12:02am
This seemed to caused via decision making parties who insist making decisions from seemly shonky modelling data from advisors who despise public transport and never ride it and prefer a tax funded car to get around behind a desk!!!
Only time they ride it is PR stunts in very controlled settings!!!
It would have been difficult to understand trains for the football matches are key to getting people in and out of the ground and back to their home base. Section lengths on the new partially duplicated lines are long, in fact kms long therefore not able to queue trains as was the case previously. The reason why the siding was there was for just that the ability to queue trains close to the point where they are needed.
Am I right you guys are saying they have just built billions dollar sidings it’s single track anyways?
My point is the line has been partially duplicated with long sections or block points meaning the previous opportunity to hold trains at the siding for quick release is no longer available and this should have been considered in the change.
So it was not done properly and trains just sit on the second line and wait?