By Wayne Kayler-Thomson
The science is in – public transport delays do impact on business productivity.
The overwhelming majority of Victorian employers in a recent survey say they have experienced lost productivity due to the unreliability of public transport.
In a snapshot blog poll undertaken by VECCI, 74 per cent of respondents report interruptions to business operations due to train delays and cancellations.
Eleven per cent of respondents reported no interruptions to operations due to public transport, while 15 per cent said they had noticed delays and cancellations but didn’t feel there was a correlation between the delays and their productivity.
Delays in services or cancellations on our train, tram and bus network are imposing additional cost and inconvenience on businesses, particularly in terms of employee lateness.
From time-to-time, external issues will impact on business operations, and many businesses factor that in, but when cancellations and delays are occurring so frequently across the network, businesses are feeling the impact on their productivity.
Many businesses, for example in retail, depend on a smooth transition of shifts, with staff arriving on time in order to open a store for a day’s trading, or take over from other staff.
As part of VECCI’s pre-budget submission to the State Government, VECCI has called for ongoing maintenance to be undertaken on public transport networks to avoid delays, including upgrading wooden sleepers to concrete sleepers and abolishing level crossings in Melbourne.
Some of this is being addressed in last week’s State Government Rail Works blitz.
Public transport is essential to transporting employees to work, particularly to and from Melbourne’s CBD.
Without adequate infrastructure, employees will increasingly turn to driving to work, which will only place additional pressure on our road networks and car parking facilities, as well as adding to pollution levels.
VECCI encourages a continued focus on urgent maintenance and upgrades of our transport networks to improve efficiency and safety.
A circle line from Melbourne through Caulfield, Frankston, Hastings, Geelong with trains every 5 to 10 minutes is the most effective way of servicing greater Melbourne. The vehicle and rail bridge crossing the heads is necessary now, not when statistics prove there is sufficient demand. We are cutting up Melbourne with a 37 Billion dollar transport plan because we haven’t moved population around the bay in the first place. Why is Melbourne waiting to duplicate this folly? A steel bridge may save $20 billion and boost employment and should be paid for by the Federal Government as a ring road and rail connecting three inter-capital link, as occurred with Adelaide.
It will encourage population to move around the Bay and where people prefer to live.
VECCI should join the lobby for the bridge and circle links now, not in 30 years.
The solution is to use the existing transport system in both directions more effctively at the same time. The idea of a ring road and rail around two cities by the Bay, Melbourne and Geelong, is the obvious solution to nearly all Victoria’s traffic and population difficulties and the High Street, Malvern problem. See maptag.com.au
It dumbfounds me that this is something Vecci feels is necessary to tell the Government. Not because it isn’t important, but simply because it is so obviously important to have a functional public transport system in any city that industry representatives should not need to pressure the Government into action.
If equal portions of tax payer revenue were spent on public transport and roads (instead of this absurd skewing of funds towards more and more highways), both options would be in far better shape.
A typical train ride between Balaclava and Footscray includes 15 minutes of delays; from late trains and stalled trains waiting to move along the line and not moving at all! It can be longer! You do the maths – 15 minutes, twice per day, is 2.5 hours per week, which equals 120 hours per year (=15 working days) stolen by the public transport system – WHICH WE PAY FOR IN CASH AND IN LOST WORK TIME & FAMILY TIME!!
Public Transport has worsened since the change over to Metro impacting on our employees and our school kids which in turn impacts on our working productivity having to fill in for the public transport.
Sick of it!