Services and Patronage
The Sandringham line runs at 7-8 minute frequencies in the weekday morning peak period and in the evening peak period. Off-peak frequencies run every 15 minutes between 9am-3pm and 6.30pm-9pm and every 10 minutes between 3-5pm. After 9pm and all day on weekends, trains run every 20 minutes up until last service. This does not include Sunday mornings when trains run every 40 minutes until 9.30am. Most services stop at all stations, however there is one scheduled limited express to the city in the afternoon peak running express from Elsternwick to South Yarra.
It is the only line in Melbourne to operate on a 20-minute frequency at night, and does so seven days a week. This compares to 30-minute frequencies on other lines (and 40-minute frequencies on some lines on Sundays). It was also the first to provide a 15-minute frequency between weekday peak periods. These frequencies are not due to it having greater use, but from an experiment in 1992 in increasing frequencies to see if that attracts additional patronage, this being possible on the Sandringham line without using extra trains by reducing layover time at the ends of the journeys.
Frequencies, this time in peak periods, were further improved a few years later, as compensation for withdrawal of the Sandringham services from the City Loop. The Cain Labor government in the 1980s proposed rebuilding the line as a light rail line, but since then patronage has grown considerably and even with the 8-minute peak-period frequency, trains are heavily loaded.
Read more about this topic: Sandringham Railway Line
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