UN 212: Werribee Fast Rail - our second Metro?

In a few months Melbourne's Metro Tunnel should be open.

Service will be frequent. There'll be excitement over the grand new stations and the ability to take one-seat rides under the CBD at good speeds. Travel will also be more predictable - unlike the cantankerous City Loop, there'll be no midday reversals, loop bypasses, transposals or long dwells at Flinders Street. 

 If the Sydney experience is any guide, people will be asking when we are getting a second metro. Not least because efficient cross-city rail transport, unlike in Sydney or Perth, is a novelty here. For many years after the City Loop opened in the 1980s it was not even possible without changing trains. 

In 2010, it became possible when some Frankston weekday trains were run through to the Williamstown and Werribee lines. You could jump on a train at Caulfield or South Yarra and have a cross-city trip to Southern Cross, Footscray, Newport and beyond. This was extended to more trains including weekends.  

This "cross-city group" has not run without trouble. Inconsistent passenger information, inaudible announcements and unexpected terminations at Flinders Street are frequent experiences. Rising from one's seat at Flinders Street to check if you are continuing through or will be turned back is common. 

A freshly painted wall makes your unpainted ceiling look worse than before. Similarly the new Metro Tunnel experience should raise expectations that the "other" cross-city line should get some love. It would serve the same old stations but that matters less than reliable consistent frequent service.

If you can harness the coming Metro Momentum to get two Metros for basically the price of one, then why wouldn't you create what could be called a second Metro? 

Especially if its destinations were useful, such as the fast-growing estates near Werribee and planned housing activity centres along the Sandringham line?

Such a project could include evening and weekend speed improvements, thus earning the more marketable title of: 

Werribee Fast Rail

The first stage of Werribee Fast Rail might include: 

a. Evening and weekend trips via express track with Altona trains starting Laverton. Provides a consistent pattern all week and reduces Werribee to Flinders Street travel time from 45 to 38 min. 

b. 10 minute off-peak frequency 7 days (up from current 20 min service)

c. 10 minute weekend frequency for Sandringham line including Sunday morning upgrade from 40 min

d. Upgrades to the currently dingy Werribee station 

e. Upgrade of Hoppers Crossing to a premium station, staffed first to last train (actually budgeted in 2010 but dumped by the following government and not revived)

f. Improved multimodal passenger information at all stations between Werribee and Sandringham including wayfinding and network maps

The above would build on the 10 minute weekday frequency that is already budgeted for on the Sandringham line as part of Metro Tunnel related timetables. Providing all week consistency between Werribee and Sandringham would be a major part of the timetable design process. 

The second stage of Werribee Fast Rail/Second Metro might include: 

a. New station with bus access at Paisley as supported by Hobsons Bay City Council

b. Extension to a station near Harpley Estate on existing track and/or Black Forest Road

c. Millers Rd Route 411 bus upgrade to SmartBus including extended hours and higher frequency

d. A new Newport - Fishermans Bend bus and other bus network simplification in Altona North
e. Bus network simplification on the Sandringham line including (a) upgrades to Route 606 and simplification of complex 600/922/923 route cluster, (b) A direct Sandringham - Southland bus via Bay Rd and (c) A direct Elsternwick - Southland bus via Nepean Hwy to replace the current 823. The last two are being advocated by the City of Kingston. None of these are dependent on Second Metro so can be done at any time earlier if desired. 

It's already been planned 

The above is not just a crackpot idea from me. This 13 year old PTV video has it, with the Metro Tunnel enabling the creation of four independent Metro lines, including the Werribee/Williamstown - Sandringham 'Cross-city Metro' with increased frequency. The other Metros, also with frequent all day service, would be the Frankston Loop Metro and the Northern Loop Metro involving Craigieburn and Upfield. 

In addition this 2018 Dan Andrews video on the Western Rail Plan described (at 0:15) an animation of a Werribee - Wyndham Vale extension as the 'Western section of the Suburban Rail Loop'. Western Melbourne viewers would also not fail to notice this animation depicted as the Suburban Rail Loop as progressing from west to east (though some others start it from the east, consistent with the Stage 1 announcement).  

Summary

The momentum and enthusiasm of the Metro Tunnel when it opens should not go to waste. It should instead be captured to set in train a second metro to commence as soon as possible after the first.

The most immediate and cost-effective approach to enable this are service and infrastructure upgrades like described above to create a Werribee - Sandringham cross-city Metro. Closely followed by similar for Craigieburn/Upfield's Northern Loop Metro.  

Index to other Useful Network items here

TT 214: Craigieburn upgraded bus timetables to start next month (and what's next for bus reform?)

A major feature of bus upgrades in 2025's state budget was a package for the Craigieburn area. These were needed due to the area's high population growth and the strong usage of buses in more established parts of Craigieburn. 

The upgrades, which will start on October 5, were announced on the premier's website and later on Transport Victoria's. However people might have missed it as TV put it in the Projects area, not where  they have other bus upgrades announced. 

PTV/TV shies away from using maps to publicly explain services upgrades even though they need to be produced to explain them to stakeholders such as MPs. Said MPs like them, and being better at public communication than the generally taciturn TV, sometimes post them online. So Ros Spence MP posted a handy TV-produced map on her Facebook page that you won't see on TV's. 

In summary the upgrades include: 

* Craigieburn routes 525, 528, 529, 533, 537 

- Monday to Saturday evening hours boosted to 11:40pm approx

- Monday to Saturday evening frequency boosted to 30 min

        - Route 525 made more direct with the extended 524 serving Kalkallo instead 

The operating hours extensions are arguably most significant of the measures above. These, along with upgrades to several routes in Werribee funded in the 2025 state budget and some earlier initiatives in Cranbourne, ditch the practice that all local bus routes in Melbourne should stop at 9pm Monday to Saturday despite trains, trams and SmartBuses continuing until at least midnight. 

The later trips represent an advance on the 7 day 9pm finish set down in the 2006 MOTC minimum service standards. This was a widely (but not totally) implemented plan that benefited over 100 bus routes in the vigorous period of bus service addition between 2005 and 2010. MOTC reversed about two or three decades of cuts which by late 1991 had removed almost all after 7pm and Sunday service from privately operated (but state funded) metropolitan bus routes.  

What didn't get changed on Craigieburn buses? Weekend morning start times remain too late for some early events or transport connections. Weekends remain at every 40 minutes even though a 20 minute service on routes like 529 and 533 would bring Craigieburn in line with Werribee which already has some 7 day 20 minute services. However Sunday evenings improve with their last buses now nearer to 10pm than 9pm. 

A notable omission is that Route 541 from Broadmeadows to Craigieburn North does not gain from these changes even though, with 24 hour weekend service, it could be a worthy replacement of the less known 953 Night Network only route. 

Also of future interest is what happens to evening bus frequencies when Craigieburn evening trains improve from every 30 to every 20 minutes after the Metro Tunnel opens. Maintaining connectivity will require some headway changes, possibly involving the 20 minute weekday service continuing to later at night before dropping to 40 minutes for the last few trips. 

Overall though these are a good set of bus service upgrades that will make a real difference to how people get around in Craigieburn and surrounds in the 8pm to midnight time slot. 

* 511 Modified to operate to Craigieburn station (instead of Donnybrook) 

Remains a limited peak-only service for now but will get extra trips next year. Craigieburn station has more trains and buses to other destinations. 

* 524 Extended north to serve Cloverton Estate and becomes bidirectional.

Some improvements to operating hours though ~7pm weekend finish remains. The extension adds coverage and replaces 525 in Kalkallo. 

* 543 Extended to Craigieburn Central 

Also with service boosts including:

- Weekday peak frequency boosted 30 to 20 min

- Weekday interpeak frequency boosted 40 to 30 min

- Later finish (10pm instead of 9pm)

As well as providing new coverage the 543 Craigieburn Central extension makes a lot of trips quicker; previously Greenvale and Mickleham Rd passengers had to backtrack to Roxburgh Park and catch a train or bus to get to Craigieburn, which is their nearest large centre. The extended route should get good usage from Day One as the extended route facilitates a bidirectional passenger flow across the day. 

Two things of are of note. (i) The opportunity was not taken to join it to Route 537 to provide a one seat (though somewhat indirect) ride to Craigieburn station and (ii) The 30 minute interpeak weekday frequency (which it shares with the 544) does not harmonise with trains every 20 minutes but offers a more intuitive clockface service that people will probably value more. It is also a step towards an ultimate 20 minute frequency as already runs on most Craigieburn local routes. 

Summary

These Craigieburn area bus network changes are good and will be welcomed by passengers. They bring much needed route coverage, frequency and operating hours extensions to a high patronage and fast growing part of Melbourne's outer north. Usage of the new services is likely to be above the metropolitan average for buses.  

However the government appears to be using a pivot to growth area service boosts like these as reasons to ditch its ambitious but unfunded program of Melbourne north, Melbourne north-east and Mildura area bus network reviews that were promised before the 2022 state election. When both are needed and should not be traded off against the other.

The fate of the bus network reviews represents a continuation of historical patterns writ large. The 2005 to 2010 period was marked by high activity in expanding growth area coverage, upgrading existing local routes and even rolling out new SmartBus routes with the majority of these initiatives done by 2010.

Bus network reviews were in the same MOTC package. They were commissioned but implementation was limited. By the time the reports came out the government's priorities had moved on (in this case addressing severe problems with rail crowding and unreliability) and political interest in buses (and especially network reform) had evaporated.

A similar thing appears to have been repeated (with even less to show) despite substantial DTP spending on staffing, consultants and reports to develop reform proposals that may never see the light of day. Like with financing for large infrastructure projects the financial and/or political appetite needs to be just right for significant bus network reform to happen. If the opportunity is not grabbed immediately it will vanish or at best be redirected to something else.  

Notwithstanding the high value of the funded bus upgrades in areas like Werribee and Craigieburn, dropping the ball on network reform will mean that 30 year backlogs in maybe two-thirds of Melbourne suburbs extend to 40 or 50 years if not more, leading to mounting inefficiencies and a bus network decreasingly fit for purpose.

It looks like the people of Reservoir North-West, for example, will continue to have their midday reversing, occasionally extending 558 bus that finishes at 1pm Saturday for years to come. That is unless an alternative more agile and politically acceptable path to successful and implemented established suburb bus network reform like Perth has developed expertise in can be found.  
 

See other Timetable Tuesday items here

UN 211: Talking buses - A massive week in the media

Executive Summary: A few thoughts on the future of bus network reform in Melbourne (it needs to proceed in some form despite the reported setbacks) and a summary of numerous media appearances in the last week.  

I've been in the media a lot lately regarding the documents about DTP bus planning that were tabled in the Legislative Council last week.

I was one of the first outside the department to read and index nearly 2000 pages worth of these documents and reports that reveal previously unknown information about Melbourne's bus services and  the implementation of the Bus Reform Implementation Plan as called for in Victoria's Bus Plan. I had worries that the network reform elements of the plan were ailing back in 2023. The released papers validate these concerns.

Background to the 2022 proposed bus reviews

About 18-24 months of substantial planning work, including public engagement and the use of consultants (which wouldn't have been cheap) was done before the plan to reform buses in the three pilot areas of Mildura, Melbourne's north and Melbourne's north-east was apparently ditched.

After that there was to be a staged plan to review and reform buses all across Melbourne out to 2031. This may have increased annual bus usage by around 80 million trips annually, making bus reform about four times the size of the Metro Tunnel and comparable in magnitude to the entire Suburban Rail Loop for its patronage impact. 

Despite Melbourne spending less than other cities on running buses, it is also true that (as it has pointed out) the government is continuing to invest in new bus services. Especially in outer western and northern suburbs with genuinely high transport needs. Examples include growth area funding through GAIC and funding for improved bus services that feed the Ballarat and Traralgon train lines as part of re-coordination with V/Line trains. The 2025 state budget was much better for buses (and also Metro train services) in Melbourne's west and north than the generally threadbare 2023 and 2024 budgets. 

However these upgrades, welcome as they are, do not address multi-decade network inefficiencies and service shortfalls that plague buses in the 5 to 25km ring from Melbourne. The reviews would have done that by tacking route overlaps and weak termini to get us towards a more direct network with buses every 10 minutes along main roads. Instead, especially on weekends, we have long gaps with parts of Bell Street Preston (for example) having similar 40 minute gaps between buses as local routes in the back streets of Moe. Low frequency and short operating hours contribute to the poor perceptions of buses confirmed by market research. 

Unless the government can revive bus network reform in some form (possibly involving simpler, quicker to implement reviews involving small clusters of routes), we'll be waiting years if not decades for weekend service better than every 30 to 60 minutes on key roads like Millers, Bell, Murray, Mahoneys, Warrigal, Springvale, Wellington, Cheltenham, Stud, Narre Warren - Cranbourne and more. Doing nothing here should not be an option given Melbourne's rate of growth and travel patterns that continue to change. 

Bus network reform can be controversial, creating 'winners' and 'losers' even though there might be an overall good. This might have caused some in cabinet to be wary of it. Maybe some involved bit off more than they could chew and/or did not sell the benefits sufficiently to people who mattered. Then there is the opex starvation problem where, especially in a low interest rate environment, it is easier to find (say) $10b for a capital infrastructure project than to fund (say) $200m extra annually for improved services, despite the latter often moving more people. 

 

Views may differ over the merits of the reform plan that got presented to cabinet and not funded.

But there is not doubt that proceeding with Werribee-style weekend frequency and operating hours bus upgrades on main roads and completing the 2006 minimum service standards program on popular local routes in areas with high social needs present a massive opportunity given the power of good quality bus services to spread connectivity, broaden housing choices and save people money. The success of this approach is shown by the strong patronage results arising from service upgrades on key routes such as 733 and 800. Candidate routes could include the likes of 160, 411, 418, 420, 460, 494, 495, 508, 532, 561, 570, 623, 630, 670, 693, 737, 742, 828, 841, 900, 901 (part), 902 (part), 903 (part), 926 etc. 

Media comments

My comments have been on bus service resourcing, bus network reform and tacking fare evasion. 

Here is where people saw, heard or read my comments:  

* 10/9/2025 Australasian Bus & Coach item on Melbourne's bus underspend
https://www.busnews.com.au/tabled-documents-reveal-victorian-government-underinvesting-on-metropolitan-bus-services


* 12/9/2025 Dandenong Star Journal item on bus service underfunding
https://dandenong.starcommunity.com.au/news/2025-09-12/underfunded-bus-boost-call/


* 17/9/2025 ABC News website item on bus network underspend and failure of bus reform plan
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09-17/victoria-bus-system-public-transport/105780926

* 17/9/2025 7am ABC Victoria Radio News item regarding bus reform plan

* 17/9/2025 ABC Melbourne radio interview with Raf Epstein on bus network reform (from 36:50 in)
https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/melbourne-mornings/mornings/105771218

* 17/9/2025 7pm ABC Victoria TV News item on failure of bus reform plans 
https://iview.abc.net.au/video/NU2502V260S00 

* 18/9/2025 ABC News website item on low touch on rates on Melbourne's buses
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09-18/victoria-bus-fare-evasion-public-transport-myki/105785946


* 18/9/2025 4:15pm ABC Regional Drive with Prue Bentley (approx 1hr 17 min in) 
https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/vic-statewide-drive/drive/105772482

* 18/9/2025 7pm ABC Victoria TV News item on bus fare evasion 
https://iview.abc.net.au/video/NU2502V261S00


Thanks to journalists Sean Mortell, Margaret Paul, Prue Bentley, Raf Epstein and others for compiling these stories. 

Index to Useful Network items