Oh wow! What lovely old train. Regardless of the people who don't understand public spaces, that looks like a really nice way to spend some time.

1 from me and a bonus from my mate

What gross people. But also, no photo?

You can change the colour of your head, torso and legs at one location in the game. So it would be possible for some players to paint themselves in emergency services colours and then roleplay when someone is reported missing or calls for help on one of the radios.

This is hysterical!

You can get lost, and then your friends need to form a search party for you.

I'm wondering if the Emergency Services will need to be called?

@MisterFrog @pHr34kY yeah, North-East Link was supposed to be $16 billion in construction costs and cost $100 billion over it's life time. But was predicted to produce $110 billion in value (In truck freight, roads for cars are always massive losses). But a $10 billion cost overrun means that it definitely won't produce any value at all.

We spent more money on roads, I believe :(

North East link, double the price (iirc) than the Metro tunnel

Metro Tunnel 2, city loop reconfiguration and a number of other projects (Melton electrification has been coming now for more than 10 years now lol) unfortunately haven't (yet) come to pass.

I believe we were better of with Labor, than what would have happened under the LNP, but I don't accept that infrastructure spending on public transport vs roads has been ideal.

We'll never solve traffic with more roads, we really ought to maintain the ones we have, and optimise them where we can - but massive enlargements really need to be a thing of the past.

The only solution to traffic are viable alternatives to driving, so the vehicles that actually need to be there (delivery, emergency services, disabled people) can be there with much less traffic.

conservatives have vowed to scrap it

No surprises here :/

We're broke, but we blew all the money on rail projects that were actually delivered so I'm not bothered.

The conservatives have vowed to scrap it if they come to power, and while they look like a pack of gronks, Labor is very much on the nose, so the next election could be anyone’s.

Also, it's really annoying that they refuse to bifurcate the end of the Upfield line, and even cancelled the turnback planned for Gowrie.

Though, shouldn't be surprised as it was under the LXRP, and those projects mostly benefit drivers.

Yep. I don’t trust Melbourne with good urban development (though I like the sky rail too).

Nah I feel you. It feels like we're kinda just tinkering around the edges, plus level crossing removals (I do actually rather love sky rail, in the context of the local area. The extra greenspace and amenities is really nice).

I really hope we can get more through running my reconfiguring the loop as you say.

In general I think we need to stop increasing the size of Melbourne and densify. Though, unless that's coupled with building reform (bring back public inspectors and actually throw the book at dodgy developers. In addition to much needed owners corporation Act reform), then that's not gonna go well

It's my biggest worry about the Activity Centres policy from the DTP/VicGov. I'm generally for it because our city is too spread out, ai just think it's going to go very poorly because it'll be a money grab rather than positive urban development.

I think this was always the elephant in the room with the metro tunnel. It was never going to be that great, and was basically just a service increase for two lines. But because of the loop’s legacy, that required a whole fucking tunnel and a bunch of underground stops.

Beyond that, there may be a benefit to public transport traffic in the CBD itself, as going up and down swanston is now faster on the metro than the tram, as well as Melbourne uni students. But building for the privileged residents/students of inner Melbourne isn’t great optics and for good reason.

As for the benefit to the other lines, I’ve always wondered how real that was going to be and how perceptible. I haven’t seen any solid numbers recently, but did see a break down not long ago that concluded that a good amount of the improvements will feel marginal. Which makes sense, all of the other lines are still on the loop.

Seems to me that the real challenge is undoing the loop. Maybe we’ve gone a fair way toward that already? Best thought I have on this is that you’d always have to change once you get into the city as no train goes around the loop apart from special “loop” trains that continuously circle around. Also I’m betting the connection between Flinders and Southern cross is a major bottle neck and pain in the ass to remove or improve (being so close to the river).

In short, it feels like Melbourne’s loop is a major pile of infrastructure debt that will take a lot to undo, of which the metro is just the beginning. I hope those big stations can be used for future infrastructure because they’re quite big for just one line.

But I don’t know what I’m talking about … these are just brain farts!

I just think it's a bit absurd we're not improving connectivity in the middle suburbs (15 km in ALL directions) and densifying there instead.

Melbourne is absurdly spread out.

We need to density by:

• Bringing back government employed building inspectors (builders/customer still need to pay the fee)
• updating building standards to make mid-rise apartments excellent quality
• update laws governing owners corporations to prevent:
  • the developer controlling the committee because it still owns 50% of lots (I would say they should be barred from any voting, at all, and should not be allowed to award long-term strata management contracts)
• overrule councils keeping the "character of their neighbourhood" which just usually means they want to hoard land for the wealthy instead of densifying. This has largely now begun, but sadly without the first 3 points...