Five ways to slash living costs through public transport

Imagine if all Victorian state government departments were requested to make cost of living relief central to their budget bids, along the lines of the hypothetical memo below. 

 

What could be done in the public transport portfolio? Let's run through some options and consider their merit. 

1. Indiscriminate fare cuts

The reflex reaction for unimaginative politicians seems to be big fare cuts, ostensibly to reduce living costs. 

The Liberals in Victoria (2022) and Labor in Queensland (2024) tried that but both parties didn't win, with the latter losing office. Although the victorious Qld LNP matched Labor and made their 50c fare permanent. And re-elected Victorian Labor in 2022 had their own counter-offer, capping regional fares. 

These sorts of measures are 'race to the bottom' policies. They make public transport cheap rather than good. With some exceptions (more on those later) public transport's main problem is not its cost to users but that existing services don't work for the majority of trips most people take due to the network's continued CBD/weekday peak focus. Accessibility and safety at night are other barriers. Hence most trips are driven, despite the higher costs of car ownership and use. 

The most expensive trips are those that cannot be reasonably be made by existing public transport services due to a lack of coverage, operating hours, frequency or route directness. The expenses are magnified if they are the sorts of trips people make often, such as (but not only) the commute to work.

Costs rise even more if the lack of public transport forces a household into buying another car it would not otherwise need. The chance of this is greatest in outer suburbs or where the jobs that people have or want are at hours or in locations without service. 

Thus indiscriminate fare cuts without service reform are regressive; favouring the better off minority in well-serviced suburbs or travelling at times when service is good. That is especially so in Melbourne and Brisbane, the Australian capitals worst at providing disadvantaged areas with good public transport according to a Climate Council study last year. Those with no or little useful service are unlikely to start using it if the fare falls or vanishes. 

If you want to cut living costs there's better options, especially if you want to help those with the biggest cost of living challenges the most. Also there's no related efficiency dividends. D.

2. Fairer family fares

Unlike the above this is a more nuanced approach based on what is and is not value for money with the current fare structure.

Through their pursuit of (almost) flat fares everywhere, governments (both sides) have arguably made  fares for long distances trips too cheap while fares for many short trips are too expensive. It doesn't pass the 'pub test' and is costing the network patronage.

Weakened perceptions of value can cause some to rationalise their own fare evasion. For example when you've got cases where a short three hour errand in Zone 1 can cost $11 in fares, the same as a day trip to Warrnambool or Sale. More honest people might either refrain from travelling or drive instead.

People working from home two days a week has made myki pass weekly and monthly fares (that effectively made weekend and other incidental travel free) less an option. That exacerbates the above issues with expensive short trips such that Uber looks better value, especially for urban millennial and zoomer inner suburban working couples or even higher income singles. Both are politically important demographics that Labor competes with Greens for votes. 

Reform options here could include extending the 2 hour valid ticket period to 3 hours or some form of short distance fare (harder to implement). 3 hour fares permit more short return trips to be done on the one fare but the latter would be cheaper for those just travelling one way. The former is probably easier to implement with less revenue foregone.  

Suburban families with kids also get a raw deal if travelling together on public transport. Almost all have at least one (and usually two) cars. Driving and parking is no dearer with 5 people than it is with 1. Whereas public transport costs increases with the number of people carried. The current fare structure might be mostly tolerable for singles but it discourages families who will be induced to drive everywhere unless traffic is terrible (eg inner city major events). 

Some relief to this existed when more people had weekly or longer ticketing products that made weekends effectively free. Or for those that didn't the $2.50 Sunday (or later weekend) Saver. However the full fare weekend cap now stands at $7.60, an increase that has exceeded CPI. Thus, like with singles and couples, PT's value for metropolitan family trips has fallen. This contrasts to past fare structures that incentivised weekend family travel (example below).  

Making the fare structure more progressive to restore the differences between short and long trips and thus improve value for money is worth considering. Allowing up to two children per full fare paying parent to travel free on weekends would provide cost of living relief for working families. A more expansive version could extend this to school holidays and/or children of parents paying concession fares. 

Since weekend PT ridership amongst families is currently low, the foregone revenue of Families Travelling Together weekend fare cuts would likely be small. There may even be higher revenue overall from more parents travelling on weekends. 

Fare reform that makes short, especially off-peak, travel cheaper could be funded by making some longer trips dearer, or if that is not politically acceptable, scrapping the regressive CBD Free Tram Zone (that places unnecessary pressure on our trams with consequences including for accessible access).  And like with families some of the costs may be offset by higher revenue from higher patronage.  

Selective fare reform that targets cases where public transport is particularly poor value for money could be worth considering as part of a living cost relief policy. Opportunities may exist for it to be done in a way that maximises patronage growth opportunities but minimises revenue foregone. Extending two hour fares to three hours and/or permitting free weekend travel for children with parents could be examples along these lines. B.

3. A job-ready PT network

Cutting living costs is one part of balancing household budgets. Maximising income is equally important for those in the workforce. 

Transport can help by making more jobs reasonably accessible from peoples' homes. Especially homes in suburbs with the highest cost of living stress, and for people with the lowest pay.

Another gain is that people can take on shifts that they previously couldn't or didn't pay due to improved and affordable transport options (see Uber Tax below). 

The starting point for all this is understanding the strengths and weaknesses of the current public transport service offering. It generally suits those whose jobs are weekdays 9-5 in the CBD as demonstrated by its high modal share. However that's a minority of the workforce given the number of jobs that are either suburban and/or have working hours outside of when public transport operates frequently or even at all. 

If you want more people to have to have the opportunity to be in better jobs with better pay then public transport needs to become an enabler, not a barrier. This means overcoming the class bias in current PT service provision by introducing more frequent 7 day timetables that better reflect the seven day demands of retail, hospitality and care sector jobs. 

There also needs to be improved connections to underserved employment areas, with the proposed Tarneit - Laverton Route 154 bus an excellent example of which there should be more. 

I discussed making our network more job ready here. This is basically a targeted service upgrade package to improve service frequencies, operating hours and network coverage to better suit more jobs. 

Implementation costs are kept low by (in many cases) working our existing train, tram and bus fleet harder to provide reasonably frequent service all week, not just for a few hours each day of it. There is also likely to be partly offsetting fare revenue gains as services targeted for upgrade (eg Craigieburn line, bus routes in Wyndham, weekend buses serving major shopping centres like Highpoint, Northland and Chadstone) already have above average patronage productivity and great catchment demographics. 

The biggest winners from this would be workers and their families in diverse western, northern and south-eastern suburbs that swung greatly against Labor in 2022 and again in the 2025 Werribee by-election. A job ready network would also assist employers with a bigger labour pool and support major events which rely on huge temporary workforces, mostly not on high incomes. 

Of all initiatives here, a job ready public transport network is the best targeted at not only cutting living costs but also boosting incomes and ensuring that people keep more of what they earn. It also stacks up politically as it delivers gains for people who have historically been overlooked but which are now more willing to change their vote. A. 

4. Growth area bus coverage

Even if your nearest industrial area gets a bus it is no good if there is still no bus from your home. GAIC has funded some bus upgrades but there's still suburbs, such as Mt Atkinson, that have yet to gain a regular bus service. Also, unlike direct budget funding, GAIC funding is limited term and conditional such that new routes are often placed over existing unreformed routes. 

New coverage almost certainly does require new buses. As do higher frequencies in growing areas like Pakenham that have had no significant improvements to their hourly buses for years. 

There are however suburbs quite near GAIC areas, such as Narre Warren South, that have a plethora of complex, overlapping but usually infrequent bus routes. Scope may exist for cost-effective bus network reforms in such areas to deliver benefits for growth and nearby established areas alike. 

Peoples' habits are often set when they do something big in their lives, eg a house move. If people move into a suburb with no public transport households need to buy more cars than what they might need or want if a public transport service existed. Then when they own cars they are likely to use them, contributing to local traffic woes (such as famously along Donnybrook Road in Kalkallo).

A car is also an expensive and depreciating asset that people sometimes borrow money for, typically second only to their home. They cost around $13000 per year to operate, with an EV only $2500 cheaper. If 10% of households in a growth suburb are able to defer a car purchase for a year due to it having public transport then that is a big cost of living saving for many people, including the opportunity to build a financial buffer for peace of mind or a life goal. 

It's indisputable. Having public transport in growth suburbs as soon as people move in is a huge benefit, including for peoples' financial security. A. 

5. Buses for Battlers: Service uplifts in high needs areas 

There is a band of established middle to outer suburbs that always seem to miss out on important services. Their populations may have high needs but for many years were taken for granted by major political parties. Either because they can hold seats without much effort, or the seats are unwinnable.

They are often diverse, have low educational outcomes and many not in paid work and on benefits. Many were home to industrial workers after WWII but were pummelled by 1970s - 1990s tariff cuts and deindustrialisation, causing these suburbs to degentrify. Them not having a growing population has caused them to be skipped over in favour of suburbs further out with regards to government investment. 

You'll find Melbourne examples around Laverton, St Albans, Broadmeadows, Campbellfield, West Heidelberg, Dandenong and Frankston. Some have got public transport upgrades but others have been passed over. This is even though the services that do run might have higher than average boardings productivity. Partly as a significant demographic (especially migrant women) do not drive or own cars.

As well as its other benefits seven day public transport can assist people to access urgent medical services or flee violence at home. Plus there are its social inclusion and participation benefits, along with connecting people to healthier, fresher or cheaper food options. 

To be fair the majority of these areas do have bus service. But it is often limited days and hours. Some high-needs areas like around St Albans, Glenroy, Campbellfield, Dandenong North and Doveton did not get a fair go from the (otherwise) wide-ranging Meeting our Transport Challenges 7 day bus upgrades from 2006. Brimbank (St Albans) gained significantly in 2014 with its new network while parts of Greater Dandenong gained from the Route 800 upgrade in 2024.

The usage success of the Route 800 upgrade demonstrates that people in high needs areas do use public transport if the service exists. Seven day upgrades like these also make the network more job-ready, so they further two objectives at once. 

A 'Buses for Battlers' package for high needs areas like Laverton, Brooklyn, St Albans, Glenroy, Campbellfield and Greater Dandenong might start with something like this: 

* New 7 day service on the following: 414, 431, 531, 536, 538, 802, 804, 814, 844 
* Extend following to 9pm: 423 424
* Boost weekend and evening service frequency on: 406, 408, 813, 828

Costs would be confined to drivers, fuel and maintenance as the buses needed to operate these upgraded services already exist. There may also be scope to find service hours by adjusting timetables on lesser used routes serving areas with lower social needs for an overall benefit.  

Research by people like Prof John Stanley has established high social benefits from upgraded bus services in low SIEFA areas like the above. A $5-10m pa package could deliver substantial gains in areas that need it most. A. 

Conclusion

More useful and better value for money public transport can be a worthwhile way to cut living costs and even improve household income. Five approaches to this have been discussed above. 

Paying for these 'higher good' gains may require offsetting savings to be found through attention to costs. The culture around that perhaps hasn't been as strong lately as it was thirty years ago. Examples may include control of project costs, fare evasion, payments to franchisees per service kilometre, addressing network overservicing and route duplication, staffing reviews and more. I discussed some of these management issues here and here.  

UN 197: Better transport to our next lot of housing activity centres

Last month the premier announced more activity centres earmarked for higher housing density. These were generally near train stations. The announcement follows a similar one last year identifying 25 sites for more intensive housing. At the time I discussed what was required to get their transport infrastructure and service levels ready for the proposed housing growth.  

Today I'll do the same for this latest lot of housing growth areas. Again most have been selected to be near stations. However there is still a need for train service increases as well as improved buses and trams to other nearby destinations. 

Some potential service priorities for each centre are listed below. A high proportion do not involve additional train or bus purchases; instead it's just a matter of working existing trains, trams and buses harder. They would be especially cost-effective where the same initiative can benefit multiple centres.  

Sandringham line

Prahran, Windsor, Elsternwick

* Boost Sunday am rail frequency from 40 to 20 min on the Sandringham line

* Implement 10 min 7 day rail frequency upgrade as proposed in 2016 Metro Tunnel Business Case

* Boost Route 246 bus frequency to every 10 min or better 7 days

* Bus network reform in Elwood area involving major upgrade for Route 606 and 600/922/923 rationalisation

* New Nepean Hwy bus route from Elsternwick to Southland via Moorabbin
* Upgrade Route 78 tram with improved accessibility, speed and frequency
* Boost other tram frequencies to 10 min or better for long hours

Frankston line 

South Yarra, Caulfield, Glen Huntly, Ormond, Bentleigh, Mentone 

* Boost Frankston line frequency to operate every 10 min or better between at least 7am and 10pm 7 days

* Stop all Dandenong line trains at Malvern to provide a direct Metro Tunnel connection and relieve stress on Caulfield as an interchange point until this is made fit for purpose as a major interchange

* 7 day tram frequency boosts for routes 3, 5, 6, 16, 58, 64 & 72 with maximum 6 - 10 min waits off-peak during the day and every 10-15 min at night and Sunday mornings 

* Tram network reform and shorter/more legible interchanges at stations to make north-south travel easier plus priority and accessibility improvements

* Operate Route 623 via Caulfield Station and consolidate with part of Route 624 to provide 7 day service every 15-20 min over longer hours.

* Extend Route 734 to Caulfield Station and boost frequency to every 20 min or better 7 days

* Replace Route 624 with at least one and potentially two north-south bus routes operating via the Auburn/Camberwell area to La Trobe University
* Upgrade Route 900 to every 10 minutes or better 7 days
* Upgrade bus route 630 to operate every 10-15 minutes 7 days with longer operating hours
* Upgrade bus route 703 to operate every 10-15 minutes 7 days with longer operating hours
* A package of bus upgrades for Mentone including Route 903 7 day frequency upgrade to every 10 minutes, 811/812 simplification and frequency upgrade and 708 frequency upgrade (especially weekends).  
* Extend tram route 3 to East Malvern or Chadstone

* A new northern entrance for South Yarra Station to improve access directness

* Major upgrade for Caulfield station to facilitate accessibility and interchange between services
* Investigate a potential southern entrance for Mentone station to increase station catchment and measures to bring buses closer to trains (undoing the LXRP error that moved the station further away). 

Pakenham/Cranbourne line

Springvale, Noble Park, Yarraman, Dandenong

* Ensure Metro Tunnel trains operate every 5 min or better all day between 7am and 10pm between at least Sunshine and Dandenong 7 days
* Major 901 and 902 bus boosts including service every 5 min peaks, 10 min off-peak 7 days

* Major boosts to routes 800, 811, 813, 828 and 850 to operate every 15 min peak and 20 min off-peak with earlier starts and service until midnight

* Improved connections to jobs in Dandenong South from surrounding areas
* Route 816 extended north from Noble Park station to Waverley Gardens via Noble Park North with frequency improved to every 20 or 30 minutes

* 7 day service on all routes to the 9pm minimum service standard (including 802, 804, 814, 844, 857 and 885 or their replacements in any reformed network) 

Glen Waverley line

East Malvern, Holmesglen 

* Upgrade trains to operate every 10 min or better 7 days on the Glen Waverley line
* Boost Route 903 to every 5 min peak, 10 min off-peak with longer hours
* Boost frequency and hours for bus routes 623 and 767 
* Extend Tram Route 3 to East Malvern Station (or Chadstone) and boost service to 10 min or better

Alamein line

Riversdale/Willison, Ashburton 

* Upgrade Alamein line to every 20 min or better at all times
* Extend Route 734 to Caulfield Station and boost frequency to every 20 min or better 7 days
* Boost evening tram frequencies on Route 70 and reduce maximum waits to 10 min
* Reform station locations to create better train/tram interchanges
* Extend Tram Route 70 to proposed Burwood SRL station
* Consider rail extension to Oakleigh to provide an inner east suburban rail loop

Upfield line

Brunswick, Coburg 

* Boost Sunday am rail frequency from 40 to 20 min on the Upfield line
* Implement 10 min 7 day rail frequency upgrade as proposed in 2016 Metro Tunnel Business Case
* Upgrade Routes 503, 506, 512 and 526 buses to operate 7 days
* Rationalise bus routes on Bell St with the main orbital route operating every 5 min peak/10 min off-peak over longer hours
* Upgrade bus route 508 to operate every 10 min or better seven days with longer hours
* Frequency, speed and accessibility upgrades for local trams with maximum 10 min waits

Hurstbridge line

Heidelberg 

* Boost Sunday am rail frequency from 40 to 20 min on the Hurstbridge line

* Implement 10 min 7 day rail frequency upgrade to at least Greensborough on the Hurstbridge line

* Split 903 orbital route at Heidelberg. Operate eastern portion to La Trobe University every 10 min or better. Operate western portion of Route 904 with service every 10 min or better 7 days over longer hours

* Merge Routes 513 and 514 into a single route operating every 15 min or better weekdays and 20 min or better weekends over longer hours

Tram corridors

High St, Thornbury (tram corridor)
St Georges Rd (tram corridor)
Kew Junction (tram corridor)

* Upgrade the above tram routes with improved accessibility, speed and no more than 10 minute waits. 

* Improved more frequent east-west buses on routes such as 506, 508 and 510

* New north-south Chandler Hwy bus route in Kew between La Trobe and Swinburne Universities

Inner city

Inner City (City of Melbourne)
Inner City (Yarra)

* New tram links eg Victoria St, Spencer St and Park St to make system less radial and connect key stations such as North Melbourne and Arden

* Upgrade inner area bus routes 246 and 406 to run every 10 min or better 7 days over longer hours

* New frequent orbital bus connections joining inner areas operating 7 days such as North Melbourne - Victoria Park (401 + 202), Burnley St and Southbank to Port Melbourne

Conclusion

Described are transport service and infrastructure upgrades for the proposed remainder of the government's housing activity centres. Improvements along these lines are necessary to maximise the location and accessibility benefits for residents moving in. These are only 'top of the head' lists and there are no doubt other upgrades that would be equally beneficial. If you know of any please mention them in the comments below.  

See more Building Melbourne's Useful Network items here

TT 200: From FlexiRide to Frequency - How Greensborough's FlexiRide bus flopped

Do we praise the state government for arriving at a good conclusion on bus changes in Melbourne's north-east? 

Or lambast them for taking four years and spending thousands to reach a reasonably foreseeable position, thus denying the community an improved service that could have started two years ago?  

If you, like the premier who commissioned the Silver review, want a sharp cost-effective state government focused on delivering good services then the answer must be both.  

Especially when it is demonstrated that labyrinthine internal processes slow the rate of needed bus service reform to just one-ninth per capita of current Australian best practice. 

Keep reading for the fascinating fable of how a fortuitously funded fad fostered a fools errand that flummoxed functionaries before finding a fair finish.

Evolution of Greensborough (and Melbourne) bus reform

Momentum for reform builds

My 2019 item Buses for people not paddocks around Greensborough identified many complex and infrequent bus routes in Melbourne's outer north east. Compared to other areas the north-east had a lot of poorly used or overlapping bus routes with significant scope for reform.

In 2020 the Victorian Transport Action Group produced Networking The North - an agenda for bus reform in Melbourne's northern suburbs. There was significant local government interest in the potential for bus reform to improve services. 

Victoria's Bus Plan came out in 2021. While short on specifics bus network reform was stated as a major priority. There was to be a Bus Reform Implementation Plan and presumably local network reviews.   

Greensborough FlexiRide wins funding

The 2022 Victorian state budget's Service Delivery paper included the line:  "network changes to deliver Flexiride services in Greensborough and St Helena".  My warning at the time was: 

Greensborough and St Helena have some poorly used local routes so attention in this area is welcome. However the proposed FlexiRide needs to be done in conjunction with regular route reform if it is not to be horrendously inefficient. 

However the then minister and MPs were more upbeat about FlexiRide as per this release.  

I looked at Greensborough buses in more detail in July 2022 (two months after the May budget). I presented a network planning framework, checked patronage productivity by route and listed some network reform possibilities. I also firmed my position on FlexiRide, saying it was an expensive last resort, to be done only after other options had been exhausted. My words below:   

The Department of Transport is slowly getting better. It is now less likely to introduce a FlexiRide bus without reforms to fixed routes than it did when Rowville's started. It still has a way to go in that frequent and local buses should be reviewed and reformed first. A flexible route (with its high cost per passenger) should only be introduced after other options are proved unsuitable. That is if you want to maximise benefit per dollar spent (which should be an important DoT and public policy aim).

For the Department though it was still FlexiRide first as per the budget funding. And the state election was just months away so it was important for the government to display evidence of activity. So DoT set up a FlexiRide Greensborough website and started public consultation on 27 September 2022. This included market research (which would have been outsourced to consultants, costing $$$). 

Bus reviews announced

Slightly preceding the Greensborough FlexiRide consultation was the announcement of major bus network reviews for Melbourne's north, north-east and Mildura on 14 September 2022. It drew on the Bus Plan, with expectations raised of a higher frequency and better connected bus network. There was significant expenditure on public consultation, presumably with the hope that this would gauge and even manufacture consent for wider spaced but more frequent, direct (and hopefully more productive) bus routes. 

At this time DoT/DTP were playing leap-frog with Infrastructure Victoria, which was also working on bus reform (with $250k spent on modelling alone). Except for some IV silliness over disintegrated bus fares (which their latest work creditably de-emphasises), their bus reform agendas are mostly consistent. It's just that IV is bolder, more specific, does more media but is less listened to by government. Whereas DoT is meeker, vaguer, only does reactive media from anonymous spokespeople but is more likely to be heeded by government. Although it is still a sort of 'B-team' relative to the more glamorous 'A-team' comprising the delivery agencies for favoured major infrastructure projects. 

FlexiRide competes for attention 

About the only new and flashy thing DoT had was FlexiRide. Arguably a lazy way out, it was faster than fixed routes to implement as it bypassed (rather than improved) the current constipated processes for making timetables, entering data and sticking up bus stop poles. FlexiRide was also consistent with the 'Mobility As A Service' dogma then titillating the transport-technocrat class. Wiser minds (including some in the department) knew all along that MAAS was just techbros making apps to extract fare revenue without running a single service. 

Still all momentum was with the FlexiRide fiends, with Tarneit's starting in October 2022. Unable to meet a growth area's demand, it maxed out within two months, forcing long walks, long waits and missed connections. And, whereas a maxed out regular bus route demonstrates that many are finding it useful, with the solution being to add more trips, this wasn't the case with FlexiRide, which maxed out at a low productivity (and thus high cost per passenger). Thus, even as the Department was collating survey responses from Greensborough, the emerging evidence from Tarneit was of FlexiRide being a meretricious money-sapping miscarriage. 

Bus reform stalls 

Pre-election hubris gave way to a post-election slump as the state's public finances took a turn for the worse due to rising interest payments and infrastructure build cost blowouts. The 2022 result returned the Labor government with more seats despite sharp primary vote falls in diverse working class areas, often with poor bus services.

Then DTP Secretary Paul Younis was unable to win funding for Bus Plan service reform in either the post-election 2023 or 2024 state budgets. That effectively stalled the Bus Reform Implementation Plan and promised bus reviews, with the Secretary using unsound counting methods to claim high activity on bus reform to PAEC.

Evidence drives FlexiRide rethink 

There was still money earmarked for Greensborough FlexiRide (from the 2022 budget) but in that time FlexiRide's standing had declined from diamond to dud. The less bus planning expertise someone had the more likely they were to recommend FlexiRide. For a time the (then) minister's office was heeding advice from the wrong people, with this increasingly obvious in Tarneit and Melton (which also now had a FlexiRide). 

The weight of evidence (rightly) shifted the agenda from expanding FlexiRide to replacing it with new or upgraded fixed routes. DTP succeeded in winning GAIC funding for growth area bus upgrades, including the replacement of Tarneit North FlexiRide with more reliable and higher capacity fixed routes.  

Today's 'official line' now approximates my July 2022 quote above. Though it's more fairly a reversion than a conversion. Experienced parts of the Department knew that FlexiRide like services were doomed to fail years if not decades earlier; passing fads in techbro-captured consultancies or ministerial offices cannot over-ride efficient geometry. It's just that for a while the government stopped listening to parts of the department with the most expertise, with the backgrounds of the then Secretary and his deputy secretaries not helping, 

Bus reform back, but a bridge too far? 

If FlexiRide was one pole of the coverage-capacity continuum, what about the other? The most recent official vision for buses appeared in Plan for Victoria, released in February 2025. It proposed a bus coverage standard of 800 metres which for a hypothetical grid network means routes 1600 metres apart.

The opposite extreme to FlexiRide, this concept is nearly as fanciful. As warned last month, such a sparse network will fail politically, could sabotage future attempts at bus network reform and may even kill the minister's political career (as infamously happened in South Australia in 2020).  

A blanket application of the 800 metre rule without mitigations, such as retaining coverage-style fixed routes in catchments that need them, would represent overshoot in the opposite direction to FlexiRide.  But it risks giving the same results, ie much time spent but little gained (unless you are a market research consultant). 

Thinking big but moving slowly?

To summarise, there's been a lot of messing around with bus reform policy, including wasted effort on what doesn't work or is too extreme to fly politically. Fixed route reform, as alluded to (without detail) in the Bus Plan got overtaken by the FlexiRide fad. Value for money took a back seat with the least productive approach to carrying passengers having the highest chance of getting funding.

The penny on that has not only dropped but also apparently now disappeared. The (highly productive) 800 bus upgrade was almost alone in getting budget funding in 2024. Greensborough luckily had its bus upgrade budgeted in 2022 so survived. 

Its main penalty was the years of service foregone while, having established that FlexiRide was a lemon, DTP was working out how else to spend the money. How long was this delay? From the May 2022 budget to late 2025 implementation is 3.5 years or 42 months. That becomes 4 to 4.5 years if you include the department's pre-budget Business Case work. Level crossing removals including major capital works and station rebuilds have been done in much less time. As have other bus upgrades, including the Route 800 boost, which was up and running only 7 months after being budgeted.  

What will be upgraded?

The March 2025 media release says that we'll get improvements on Routes 513, 514 and 517. The first two will get better weekend service while the 517 will get better weekday service from late 2025. Better coordination with trains is also proposed. 

What is likely to change from the clues given above?

Routes 513 and 514 each operate only every 80 minutes on weekends, putting them below minimum service standards on their unique portions (east of Rosanna). A 'quick and dirty' upgrade would get them up to the 60 minutes minimum service standard, enabling a combined 30 minute weekend frequency on the overlap. While an improvement over the current 40 minutes combined, it does not mesh well with trains (typically every 20 or 40 minutes on weekend days). 

A dearer option would get them up to every 40 minutes each, similar to the weekday service. This would provide for a good (by Melbourne standards) 20 minute weekend frequency on Bell St, a major road.  Harmonisation with trains would also be possible, though, because so many train lines are crossed and these operate at either 20 or 40 minutes on weekend days, exact connections can't be guaranteed.

Both Route 513/514 options have legibility and cost-effectiveness implications that, as discussed later, cannot be resolved without network reform. 

Route 517 is one of many routes in the Epping - Reservoir - Greensborough area that operate about every 24 minutes on weekdays, thus failing to evenly connect with trains every 20 minutes. This route is slated for a weekday upgrade, in which case an improvement from every 25 to 20 minutes would seem sensible. That upgrade would add Route 517 to the weekday 'Useful Network' with a clockface timetable that meshes evenly with trains. There will also be longer operating hours. 

Timetables will improve but are any route changes planned? The media release says this: 

Feedback through consultation on the proposed FlexRide Greensborough identified a strong community preference instead for improving existing fixed route services in and around Greensborough, St Helena and Eltham North.

That seems to rule out route changes. Anticipating the introduction of FlexiRide, the consultation didn't test various network reform ideas for fixed routes. But it did ask about the usage of existing routes 343, 381, 385, 518, 580, 901 or 902. 517 was the most common response.  

Opportunity costs

Upgrading timetables without reforming routes is safer politically but means that less overall benefit is possible for a given budget. 

This is particularly in areas like Greensborough/Eltham/Hurstbridge where many routes either:
(a) inefficiently overlap one another and/or
(b) have low patronage productivity. 

The latter is due to a tendency to layer new routes over unchanged older routes without fixing problems like large coverage gaps (eg Bolton St), weak termini (517 & 518), complex unidirectional loops (again 517 & 518), poor directness (eg 582) or timetables that don't harmonise with trains (eg 580).

Examples of routes that got layered on the existing network without significant reform in the last 15 years include the 343 and the 901 and 902 SmartBuses. These have 15 to 20 minute weekday frequencies so are relatively service intensive. The 381 and 385 are also relatively new and have low productivity.

Not reforming routes like these can mean that network issues can remain unfixed for decades. At least some of them could have been resolved by now if consultation and planning had been appropriately directed rather than relying on a doomed FlexiRide to fix everything. And, given the choice of the north and north-east for the first Bus Plan reviews, substantial planning work should already have been done. 

It would thus might be a good idea to consider the 513, 514 and 517 timetable upgrades as just a Stage One, with route reforms to follow to efficiently reap even bigger benefits. I discussed how Perth approaches this here.  

Network reform possibilities

Eight possibilities for network reform were discussed here. Some have significant interactions between routes. That is if you change one route then others might need reform to avoid coverage gaps or duplication. 

Simpler options might involve splitting Route 517 at Greensborough so that the portion to Northland operates every 20 minutes but portions north of Greensborough are every 40 minutes with coordination with every second train. That may also permit simpler two-way operation such that streets don't necessarily lose buses even if frequency is reduced. If a single seat ride to Northland is still required it may be possible to have a through-routing arrangement where an arriving route consistently forms a departing 517. 

Bell Street deserves the sort of legibility that can only come from reverting to a consolidated route such as operated before half the Route 513 trips became 514. The rationale for that was due to branching in the quieter eastern part of the route. However routing all trips to Greensborough and having other  routes for Eltham (noting significant overlaps) may enable this without recreating the confusion of the old 513. 

Thought also needs to be given to the distribution of service when considering reform. Areas like Thomastown, Lalor and Greensborough have better demographics for all week frequent service than the likes of St Helena, Diamond Creek or Hurstbridge. It should also be noted that the 517 isn't the only route in the area with unharmonised timetables; the 566 and 580 stand out due to that and their convoluted routes that need reform. 

Conclusions

The government has been wise to dump Greensborough's FlexiRide given its failure elsewhere. 

Channelling the resources earmarked for it into frequency upgrades on regular routes next month is also welcome. 

However the years of time and effort that it has wasted to reach this point must be remembered as a salutary lesson for the future. All because a bad concept was embraced and then stuck to for too long.

Also, if the government wants to maximise community benefit of its investment in Greensborough area  buses it must commence route reform to affordably fix the area's large number of duplicative poorly used routes, weak termini, indirect service and coverage gaps where there should be service but isn't. 

See other Timetable Tuesday items here