Opening of Station St bridge across the Patterson River

The opening ceremony of the new bridge joining Station St Bonbeach with Carrum. Premier Daniel Andrews and Carrum MP Sonya Kilkenny can be seen at 1:30. This bridge is associated with the upcoming road-rail grade separation at Carrum Station.

Premier announces orbital rail - via Facebook

At precisely this time (7:01am 28th August 2018) the premier Daniel Andrews announced on Facebook that Labor would build a suburban orbital rail loop from Cheltenham to Werribee to link most radial train lines.  

What became known as the SRL would dominate the 2018 state election campaign as well as being a major part of the 2022 campaign. Both delivered record majorities for the Andrews government. 

Codenamed 'Project Halo' the plan was cooked up by PWC consultants working with the premier's office.  Not even the Department of Transport knew it was being formulated. Its Secretary Andrew Bolt resigned shortly afterwards.

The SRL was popular, tapping into a legitimate shortcoming of Melbourne's public transport - that is that non-radial public transport was slow, infrequent and sometimes even missing. And Melbourne's surging population growth combined with low interest rates made now the right time to build something visionary. 

Daniel Bowen's write-up here. 

Note: This item added retrospectively for posterity.

Various train timetable changes commence today

The Mernda extension started yesterday. Other lines also got service changes. 

Most notable include 35 extra services for Werribee on weekday evenings and 80 extra weekly services for Cranbourne and Pakenham also on weekday evenings. The latter extends Dandenong's 10 minute frequency from Flinders St to 9:30pm.  

https://web.archive.org/web/20180915082121/https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/getting-around/network-changes/meet-mernda-your-new-line/

Note: This item has been added retrospectively for future historical purposes.