One of the busiest roads to cross the South Morang rail line is Keon Parade at Reservoir. It still has a level crossing but won't for long with the premier announcing its removal as part of a tranche of 10 in 2021. The rail will be elevated with the new station being built south of Keon Parade.
The removal will benefit two state seats; Preston (Nathan Lambert MP) and Thomastown (Bronwyn Halfpenny MP). Both are traditional safe Labor seats though the 2022 election saw 10-15% falls in the ALP primary vote.
Reservoir is massive. It's about the size of three or four normal sized Melbourne suburbs.
The Mernda line runs through the heart of Reservoir, stopping at Keon Park, Ruthven, Reservoir and Regent. It's been extended twice to serve outer growth areas. But its basic off-peak frequency is unchanged from the 1990s except for Jeff Kennett's Sunday frequency increase and Daniel Andrews' Night Network. In contrast politically favoured lines like Frankston had service roughly double 7 days (improving from every 20 to every 10 minutes all week in several stages).
In 2010 and 2014 the Coalition promised off-peak trains every 10 minutes to Mernda and in 2017 across the suburban rail network. When David Davis became shadow transport minister the Coalition dumped rail frequency advocacy (and lost both 2018 and 2022 state elections badly).
Street transport varies hugely, ranging from frequent trams in the south, frequent weekday buses in the north-east and only occasional buses in the north-west. The northern Reservoir area around Keon Park has historically suffered from being in a politically safe seat.
The area's last significant bus upgrade was the boost of Route 560 to become the 902 SmartBus under premier Brumby. Other routes were run by Reservoir Bus Company whose routes were complex and unchanged for decades. Dysons took them over but despite potential synergies there were no substantial network changes with little interest from government to reform services.
Political interest has revived lately though. Road and rail infrastructure got renewed when the new Reservoir station was built and the government has commenced a review of buses for Melbourne's north. Like is desirable to prevent here, central Reservoir's grade separation / station rebuilt was a stand-alone project with no significant changes to bus routes and schedules that rarely connect with trains.
Two bus routes (555 and 902) pass Keon Park station. Issues with them include:
Route 555: Frequency unharmonised with trains meaning variable connections. With the bus every 22 minutes and train every 20 minutes (weekdays interpeak) almost no two connections have the same waiting period. It's a similar story on Saturday with Saturday morning service every 30 minutes, dropping to about every 45 minutes in the afternoon and on Sundays. Some Route 555 trips go a different way which detracts from network legibility.
Route 902: Similar issues with Route 555 though more important as this route intersects rather than parallels the train. Due to this route's 15 minute weekday/30 minute weekend service the same connections recur about every hour on weekdays and every two hours on weekends as bus frequencies do not mesh with the train (typically every 20 minutes). Route 902 is a very long orbital route whose retimetabling would be a substantial project with several interdependencies.
The other two bus routes in northern Reservoir are the 552 and 558. Both have all the typical inherited problems with ex Reservoir Bus Company routes including weak termini, inconsistent deviations, Saturday afternoon frequency reductions and timetables unharmonised with trains. Route 558 is better continued west to Campbellfield shops so is out of scope of this discussion about Keon Park station (which is to the east). However Route 552 has no similar logical northern terminus except for Keon Park Station. While Keon Park station is still not a particularly strong terminus it is stronger than the existing terminus, provides an alternative train connectivity as well as wider regional travel via a connection to the 902 bus.
Bus service upgrade opportunities
1. Bus route 555 frequency harmonised with trains with weekday service boosted from every ~22 to every 20 minutes and weekend service adjusted to every 20 or 40 minutes. If the route length is inconvenient for this frequency interlining with other routes (which also have similar non-harmonised frequencies) may be desirable to allow this to be efficiently done.
2. Bus route 552 extended to Keon Park Station with timetable harmonised with train frequencies. The timetable revamp should include a constant Saturday frequency as the existing timetable has a Saturday am peak as a remnant from 40-50 year old travel patterns.
3. Bus route 902 frequency harmonised with trains, especially on weekends. While highly desirable this is a significant project with metropolitan-wide implications. It is not cheap, local and simple as is the emphasis here. Hence it is probably best done in conjunction with splitting orbital routes to remove inefficient overlaps and make improved service more cost-effective.
While this shouldn't stop small revisions being made, it should be noted that the above routes are within the terms of reference for a bus network review underway for Melbourne's north. Some ideas for bus network revamps in the area are presented here.
Rail service upgrade opportunities
In addition to bus upgrades rail service upgrades are also possible. Having a major rail line with such low frequency (where waits can exceed journey times) would be unthinkable in Sydney or Perth. However the Mernda line (and others in Melbourne's north) has intervals between trains as long as 40 minutes on Sunday mornings (compared to 15 minutes in Sydney and Perth) and 30 minutes at night (compared to widespread 15 minute evening frequencies in Sydney). Melbourne's north is particularly poorly done with waits for its trains being roughly half that of better served lines in the south and south-east like Frankston. The Age reported on this train service disparity yesterday with editorial boost for more all day frequency here.
Eventually it is desirable that services operate at 'turn up and go' frequencies, ie with no more than 10 minutes between trains, at least during the day. This level of service would encourage low car lifestyles as needed in areas like Preston to reduce traffic congestion. Also it would relieve pressure on trams closer in which are more suited for shorter trips but gets used for longer trips due to its higher frequency.
Priorities for Mernda line service upgrades, starting with two that can be done cheaply with the existing infrastructure and rolling stock, are below:
a. Upgrade Sunday morning frequency from every 40 to every 20 min (as done on the Werribee line in 2021)
b. Upgrade evening frequency from every 30 to every 20 min (as done on the Werribee line in 2021)
c. Upgrade peak and off-peak daytime frequency from ~20 to 10 min all week (no infrastructure works required as existing peak service already exceeds 10 min).
Conclusion
The project to remove Keon Park's level crossings has great opportunity to transform the community and transport for the better. Today I've given some cost-effective service-related tips on doing this to help people get to stations and have a better service when they get there across a wide part of Melbourne's inner north.
Your thoughts are appreciated and can be left below.
3 comments:
MoT, these proposals in your posts are great, but the fact that you seem to only talk about what should be done and not what has been done makes it confusing on whether the thing has been done or not. For example when I saw the title “Level crossing removals and better bus service” I thought that it did happen until I read the blog post and somewhat confusingly thought that it did not. Perhaps you could improve clarity on what has been done and what has not, otherwise your blog posts are great.
Another good post. Forgive my ignorance but what is the actual purpose of the 555 if it just seems to overlap the rail line? Could the resources not be better used to boost frequencies on more useful lines?
@Unknown. Noted. As a general rule you can assume reforms haven't been done but I'll try to be more clear.
@TheFuture. A fair point on parts of the 555 though it served some destinations the train doesn't eg Northland and the main shops at Lalor (which don't align with local stations). And there's some unique coverage. Plus it gets reasonable usage and is probably the least dysfunctional of the old Reservoir Bus Company routes. If it ran through Brighton like demographics I'd probably suggest scrapping it. But it doesn't. And it skirts areas like north-west Reservoir with just the terrible 553 & 558. The whole area needs big bus reform but I'd keep the 555 or something like it.
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