Melburnist's braindump

Trenches and elevated rail - Melbourne examples

Wed, 13/01/2016 - 14:00 Alastair Taylor

There's been a fair bit of level crossing removal spin in the mainstream media this week, with terms like 'skytrains' and the State opposition taking an apparent position on the 'best' method of grade separating level crossings. The 'best' solution for each grade separation project depends on many...

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The full Regional Rail Link in driver's eye view - timelapse

Sun, 21/06/2015 - 09:16 Alastair Taylor

The Regional Rail Link is now fully operational. Geelong line V/Line trains are now running via the new track and two outer suburban stations have been opened. The Regional Rail Link authority which supervised the construction of the new track has published this timelapse video of the entire length...

Capping off a big week for land use policy in Melbourne

Sun, 19/04/2015 - 10:00 Alastair Taylor

It's now time to breathe. Has there been a more intense week for land-use policy announcements? We are counting down to the annual state budget in a few weeks so one would naturally expect snippets to filter through in the pre-budget period. But not like this. From Wednesday to Friday, each day...

CBC report: Do our cities still work?

Sun, 01/02/2015 - 15:26 Alastair Taylor

Thanks to social media and maintaining an healthy interest in what's happening up in the Great White North, the following youtube video has been flashing across my twitter feeds and facebook timelines a lot. It's a 20 minute segment titled "Do our cities still work?" and produced by the ABC-...

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Napthine Government planning legacy: what about Residential Zone reform?

Tue, 04/11/2014 - 07:00 Alastair Taylor

If you were awake on Sunday morning, and on Twitter, you might have noticed there was a bit of a buzz about an op-ed published in the Sunday Age written by Professor Michael Buxton. In his 875 word piece Buxton said "Guy's main legacy is reshaping inner Melbourne as a high-rise city" and then went...

Striking a real balance in Transport Policy

Fri, 22/08/2014 - 13:00 Alastair Taylor

What are state politicians referring to when they talk of balanced transport policy? Is it committing to a goal of balancing how we transport ourselves to work, to school, to the shops or to meet friends and family? Or is it simply neutering a mode versus mode funding allocation when projects are...

City breaks, V/Line and Victoria's regional cities

Tue, 15/07/2014 - 13:00 Alastair Taylor

It was with great surprise that I recently discovered V/Line had commissioned short clips advertising the benefits of utilising their services to travel to a regional Victorian short break destination. In the videos the most useful information is conveyed about both the services V/Line operate to...

How new rail lines are built... in two minutes

Mon, 09/06/2014 - 13:57 Alastair Taylor

This is one for the gunzels and construction nerds out there; something light for the last day of the Queen's birthday long weekend. Once again the Department of Transport, Planning and Local Infrastructure (DTPLI) have come up with the goods. They published a two minute time-lapse video on their...

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Solar Freakin' Roadways

Sat, 24/05/2014 - 13:22 Alastair Taylor

The Street. It's a thoroughfare for pedestrians, cyclists, trams, buses and private vehicles. Footpath to footpath, the surfaces which make up the various zones of any street, road or freeway are generally made of concrete or bitumen. When a foothpath is not in use, or when a street doesn't have...

To build or not to build High Speed Rail

Wed, 23/04/2014 - 14:57 Alastair Taylor

There's been a lot of interesting analysis on Beyond Zero Emissions release of their Zero Carbon High Speed Rail report launch this past week and I thought I'd link in some of the more pertinent discussions. Alan Davies writing on his Crikey blog " High Speed Rail: too good to be true? " went...