Another week, another #SardineSydney story in the mainstream media on how the city’s population is swelling way above the capacity of its infrastructure.
The latest example relates to Sydney’s long suffering trains, where skyrocketing passenger numbers have again caused chronic crush-loading chaos. From The ABC [my emphasis]:
Sydney Trains has apologised to commuters for major delays across the network at peak hour last night but insist a new timetable introduced late last month is not to blame.
Wynyard and Town Hall stations were so overcrowded commuters were advised to walk to Central, Museum, St James or Martin Place stations to catch trains.
Commuters were also asked to consider delaying travel if it was not necessary.
Sydney Trains said the delays and cancellations were a result of a fatality at 6:30am on Monday at Wentworthville in western Sydney which led to the closure of the T1 Western Line…
Commuters at Wynyard station this morning complained about the long delays…
“I would have thought it could have been fixed by the evening, you know after two hours, let’s get back to the schedule.”
In a statement, Sydney Trains apologised to customers affected by the delays, that were felt more than 12 hours after the incident.
Chief executive of Sydney Trains Howard Collins said there were record numbers of people using the network and the delays were not due to timetable changes.
“This is not an incident at one train station,” he said.
“This was a very difficult situation really cutting off our main arteries on one of our lines.
“Whether this was the old timetable or the new one, under the circumstances we were facing yesterday, we would have seen the same effect.”
But Opposition transport spokesperson Jodi McKay said the chaos was a direct result of the timetable.
A leaked internal rail document warned the new timetable could cause “irrecoverable” delays after an incident, Ms McKay said.
The 52-page document, 2017 Timetable: Network Operations, details the impact of the changes to the network.
“Since the Government introduced the new timetable, the system has been stretched so tight that the slightest incident reverberates through the entire train network,” Ms McKay said.
It’s the same old story that we’ve read over and over again.
As shown in the next chart, Sydney’s population has increased by 774,000 over the past decade, or by 77,400 people a year or 1,500 people a week, which has already crush-loaded the city’s infrastructure (e.g. trains, roads, hospitals, schools, etc).
And the situation is set to deteriorate badly over the next two decades, with the State Government projecting that the city’s population will expand even more quickly – growing by 87,000 people a year (1,670 people a week) – with Sydney to add an addition 1.74 million people – equivalent to a Perth:
Clearly, the best way to alleviate Sydney’s infrastructure and housing woes is for the State Government to tap its federal counterpart on the shoulder and demand they slash Australia’s skilled migration program. Under current settings, incumbent residents of Sydney are facing big cuts to their living standards along with expensive infrastructure bills.
