Timetable Tuesday #70: Sucking in the Seniors? Thomastown's once huge bingo bus network

Imagine you were an age or disability pensioner. Distant family. Living alone. Saving on power. Possibly without a car. Down to your last ninety dollars in savings as the Grattan Institute says is not unusual. Imagine if there was a free bus that would take you places where there is warmth, company and cheap meals. You'd jump at it wouldn't you? It would give you a small pleasure to look forward to each week and add structure to your life. Only now, due to COVID-19 shut-in rules, do the middle-class get a taste of living like a home-bound pensioner (albeit with brighter lighting, better heating and more rooms).

Now imagine you were an opportunity-seeking entrepreneur. You wanted a business you could establish in a low-rent suburban industrial area. Your idea involves a target market that is low income, less mobile but loyal, large in number but under-serviced. You could whisk them from their home suburb, give them warmth and ply them with cheap food. They could be attracted to return by entertainments that give them the hope of winning big, though even a drink voucher for next time would excite them for a week. Because you're busing them far from home to your industrial area premises they can't easily return by their own steam. Instead you generously ferry them, pockets emptier but stomachs fuller, back on your private bus at an after-dark time of your choosing. 

These are two sides of the same coin. Today's post will describe not the one public bus route it usually does but a once-massive network that drew pensioners from across the state to possibly its biggest bingo hall at Thomastown. 

The story starts in December 2012. The Thomastown Bingo Centre on Settlement Road had just opened. There was level access and ample car parking. The new 902 orbital SmartBus out the front allowed direct access from places including Greensborough, Bundoora, Broadmeadows and Airport West. The hall was also quite near a significant older lower income population cohort in suburbs like Reservoir and Lalor.  They initially offered Friday, Saturday and Sunday evening sessions. 

None of this would have interested this blog. However within two years operating days had extended to at least Wednesday - Sunday and a significant private bus service had started up. On Wednesdays a bus ran from Hoppers Crossing to Thomastown via Laverton Station, arriving just after 6pm. While the route alignment in between would have been different, the Hoppers to Thomastown connection would have also been available had the green orbital 902 SmartBus been completed (plans were for it to commence at Werribee but the western portion was abandoned, with it only operating from Airport West to Chelsea). 

Thursdays and Fridays had a longer version of the Hoppers Crossing route. It started from Bacchus Marsh then Melton then to Hoppers. It was somewhat indirect with a 90 minute travel time from Bacchus Marsh. Less known was that Tuesday was for X-rated shows with no buses advertised.  

Weekend evenings were different. Two buses ran on Saturdays while three ran on Sundays. The Hoppers Crossing/Laverton route started at Corio Village instead of Bacchus Marsh. Bacchus instead had its own bus that served Melton and Watergardens. This reduced Bacchus Marsh - Thomastown travel time to 75 minutes.  Sunday's third bus came from the north, serving Seymour, Broadford, Kilmore, Wallan and Craigieburn. Only times for buses to the bingo are given, not those from it. Hence the unwritten contract that in return for your free bus ride you are at their mercy. 

A January 2015 forum discussion thread about these services is on Bus Australia. Below is a very rough map of the network overlaid on a SIEFA map. You can see that the bingo bus routes tended to favour areas with more low income earners (north and west) than high income areas (south and east). 

Buses ran from well outside Melbourne to Thomastown for a few years. This June 2014 Bendigo Advertiser article contains complaints from local bingo operators about patrons being lured to Thomastown by bigger prizes and free buses.   

TBC's bus network was not stable. Different suburban and regional centres were experimented with. For example in December 2013 the places with free buses included Melton, Hoppers Crossing, Altona North, Taylors Lakes and Geelong. 

The centre's website in October 2015 listed bus departures from Melton, Hoppers Crossing, Laverton, Ballarat/Maryborough and Shepparton. There were also pick up and drop off from home buses in the Kingsbury/Preston/Reservoir and Mill Park/Epping/Lalor/Thomastown areas (presumably one bus each). Maryborough, in particular, has a very high concentration of low income pensioners. As does Corio near Geelong. 

Another list is below. This is probably the largest extent of the network with Geelong, Ballarat, Shepparton and Bendigo covered. However Maryborough was not.

Here's another list with Bendigo removed (June 2016).

Fast forward to 2018 and we have a slightly pruned back offering without Shepparton and Seymour.

However this still-active link, with the new West Side Bingo name, has a timetable that does mention Shepparton. This, and all buses to Thomastown, were not to last for long. Close readers will also notice another name change to 'The Bingo Centre'. 

The map below is an attempt to show from where in regional Victoria bingo bus routes ever ran to Thomastown. Not all ran on the same day or even in the same year. And frequency may be less on outer portions. Still it shows how TBC attempted to be the bingo magnet for populated Victoria's western half. 

Move to Sunshine

The new name came with a new location in Sunshine near Albion Station. It's still served by SmartBus but Route 903 instead of 902. This connects it to more places, including some that for a while were on its private bus network such as Altona North. There are more local buses nearby including services to Melton, Caroline Springs and Highpoint. And Sunshine has no shortage of low income older people (who bingo marketeers target) in suburbs surrounding it. 

What of the bingo bus network? That still runs. This has been pared back to two routes - south-west (Hoppers Crossing) and west (Melton/Ballarat/Maryborough). 

I looked again more recently (though still pre-COVID 19) and the west route had been cut back to start at Melton. Arguably even this is unnecessary since the regular Route 456 mentioned above does this trip at a high speed. However the 456's evening finish may be too early for the trip home. 

Right at the moment no buses run. Neither is there bingo. As a non-essential entertainment venue the centre is closed until further notice due to the COVID-19 outbreak. 

Conclusion

The Thomastown Bingo Centre has at times had an amazing private bus network covering large parts of the state's western and northern half. Especially its lower income areas. It continued this, though on a smaller scale, since its renaming and move to Sunshine.

Comments on this and other extensive private bus networks run by entertainment venues would be appreciated. And do you know of anyone whose tried to use these 'free' services for non-venue travel and got away with it? Would buying a single drink then going be enough or do they make it hard for people to leave?   

PS: An index to all Timetable Tuesday items is here.

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