Opposition
The triplication project was opposed by Melbourne public transport lobby group, the Public Transport Users Association, which advocated the alteration of stopping patterns and an increase in trains running directly from Richmond station to Flinders Street Station as a cheaper and simpler alternative. In a report titled Getting Melbourne’s Rail System on Track, it described the triplication project as "ambitious" and said it would "not only be expensive but also unleash years of major disruption on the line".
The project was also opposed in a report by Dr Paul Mees, then of the Urban Planning Program, University of Melbourne, who concluded it was "an expensive distraction from the real issues. The problems of overcrowding, late running and cancellations are actually a result of poor timetabling and management, not of infrastructure limitations. The problems could be solved quickly and inexpensively if the real problems were dealt with forcefully." Mees advocated the use of spare platforms at Dandenong and Oakleigh stations and proposed a possible new timetable, which included city-bound trains passing through level crossings at stations such as Murrumbeena at the rate of 22 per hour between 7.30 and 8.30am.
The Victorian Liberal Party's 2006 election policy statement branded the triplication plan as "another example of (the Bracks Labor Government's) mismanagement and an inability to run major projects". The party proposed spending $3 million on investigating simpler, less expensive options to relieve congestion, including the construction of passing loops at various points such as Berwick and Springvale. It said problems on the line could also be overcome with improved timetabling.
Read more about this topic: Dandenong Railway Line Triplication
Famous quotes containing the word opposition:
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—Sarah Josepha Buell Hale 1788–1879, U.S. novelist, poet and women’s magazine editor. American Ladies Magazine, pp. 36-40 (December 1828)
“The opposition is indispensable. A good statesman, like any other sensible human being, always learns more from his opponents than from his fervent supporters. For his supporters will push him to disaster unless his opponents show him where the dangers are. So if he is wise he will often pray to be delivered from his friends, because they will ruin him. But though it hurts, he ought also to pray never to be left without opponents; for they keep him on the path of reason and good sense.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
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—Jane Austen (1775–1817)