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^ How do Toronto's trams/streetcars survive winters then? Do the wires freeze/snap when the temperature plummets?

lol thanks. The Vic premier also taking some victory laps (victory on a big infrastructure build agenda!) and recently posted this... A timelapse through MM1 in the eastbound tunnel through Parkville and Arden stations to the Western Portal. Most of the fit-out looks complete, just need some...

An update - we had another state election two weeks ago and despite the media getting it horribly wrong, the Andrews gov (of the past 2 terms / 8 years) was returned, likely with an extra seat (!). The Big Build agenda rolls on - Suburban Rail Loop/SRL was definitely 'on the ballot' (again)...

^ it's all over for fossil fuels with the change in Federal Government. We're likely to be 80% renewables by 2030 (which is a key component of the soon-to-be legislated 43% Paris targets). Here in Victoria, the state gov has unveiled plans for a minimum of 9GW of offshore wind by 2040 (first...

4-5 years ago I stumbled upon data for Melbourne's network (16 lines of varying length [998km total track length of which 95% is electrified], a fleet of ~220 trains) and the peak demand was around 180MW (literally in the morning peak too - 7:30-8:30am). If we're only operating in pub-test...

For the data nerds out there, specs for the next generation of Xtrapolis (Xtrap 2.0 as known locally) trains that are now ordered,m with new people being recruited in Ballarat to build. (they're replacing Comeng on 3 different lines [including my own, woot]).

Swapping out diesel locos for electric ones as part of this upgrade seems to be on the money/prudent to kick this whole thing off. I'm not entirely familiar with the GO system but if it's anything like the big suburban networks in Australia, certain cohorts of cars / sets will be older than...

Introducing, the G Class. (A Flexity mark 2 - a shortened/variant on what we call the E-Class locally). Vic gov just announced Alstom got the contract for the generation Melbourne trams. The $1.85 billion pricetag also includes a brand new depot in the West to supplant capacity at another...

A fair whack more info has been released on the SRL project this past week - the full EES is now online here: https://srleastees.vic.gov.au/#/ Other changes since my last post: a new bill was introduced to the state parliament (and passed) which formally sets up the Suburban Rail Loop Authority...

That listicle from a fairly vanilla website say there is a gap of 10% or more between the percentage of voting age population (the figure listed above) and the % of registered voters. I'm calling bullshit. Why? Because when you are 18 it is compulsory to register on the electoral roll...

They're not very good / valid points on value for money because the assumptions in the video were about 3 years old and literally days later after it was published the main document suite underpinning the project got released. In short, the video/op-ed was dead in the water within days...

The vast suite of documents underpinning the SRL in Melbourne have been released, you can see the business and investment cases along with all their appendices including an economic appraisal here: https://suburbanrailloop.vic.gov.au/Library/BusinessandInvestmentCase On the other hand...

Who knows. The rule of thumb over the past 18 months has been that governments are being returned handsomely due to the pandemic - this is only a thing tested at the state level. Western Australia's government was returned with a massive majority (only 3 opposition MPs in the lower house...

Thanks for putting all that together. I've been going off the wiki data on this, but you need approx 1800m curve radius with 100mm cant deficiency for non-tilting trains on all curves for continuous 200kph speeds. But that's only part of it. I also wonder how this will work with local regs in...

Isolating ourselves from the rest of the world has seen a peculiar thing happen: money that would have been spent overseas has been spent in the local economy. It's stimulus that doesn't involve handouts from the government: it's private cash flowing more local and it's credited in giving us...

26,000 deaths in Canada and counting...... versus under 1000 for us. Over a million cases in Canada versus 30,000 in Australia and all that long COVID that'll be impacting the health system for who knows how long. If that's backwards to you then... hey, whatever floats your boat. We aren't...

Further to above, we're seeing more videos/renders of the Melbourne Airport Rail Link - still nothing on the airport station as yet (likely cos that'll be a federal planning thing). but it's all pretty clear what new infrastructure is going to be built now. MARL's going to use the MM1 tunnel /...

Since the end of lockdown 2.0 in October last year, life has pretty much been... normal. A couple of incursions here or there and there's been a few short-sharp lockdowns to allow contact tracers to get ahead around the country, but on the whole summer/autumn was normal. And we all got...

Hi from lockdown 4.0 currently scheduled to only last 7 days (here's hoping) after we've had 30 cases of the Indian VoC spread in Melbourne. The guy who brought it here had completed hotel quarantine in Adelaide and tested negative over each time he was tested in 14 days and when he got to...

A cool $1 billion has been put in this year's state budget for more Melbourne fleet renewal. The Gov have chosen Alstom to build 25 new versions of the X'Trapolis platform we already have running on various lines. X'Trap 2.0 (and the 65 Evolution/HCMT trains) is going to go along way to...