The Transport Workers’ Union (TWU) is calling for the Victorian bus and coach industry to keep its drivers in mind when taking on extra rail replacement services
The Transport Workers’ Union (TWU) has raised fears that there aren’t enough bus drivers in Victoria to cover for upcoming rail replacement works, saying that it could place a squeeze on the state’s drivers.
After being faced with a rail works blitz across June and July, bus operators will be called upon again across September with another influx of disruptions set to hit Melbourne.
Rail replacement buses will be required across the western suburbs once again, with the Sunbury, Williamstown, Werribee, Craigieburn, Hurstbridge and Mernda lines all affected at various times across the coming month.
Melbourne’s east will be hit as well, with the Belgrave, Lilydale and Frankston lines to require replacement buses due to improvement works and level crossing removal projects.
While it won’t be quite as daunting of a task as when nine of Melbourne’s 16 train lines were down for two weeks across winter, there will still be a significant demand for bus operators across the weekend of September 8-10.
“I think the resources and the driver fleet are going to be stretched,” Transport Workers Union (TWU) Victoria/Tasmania branch secretary Mike McNess told ABC.
“There’s going to be increased pressures placed on the drivers to get this work done. I think bus operators are going to rely more and more on people who have completed a whole shift and are then perhaps expected to go and do extra work doing overtime on the rail replacement.”
Works on the West Gate tunnel caused significantly delays for commuters between June 23 and July 9 (during the Victorian term two school holidays), as the Sunbury, Williamstown, Werribee, Frankston, Upfield and Craigieburn lines all experienced either partial or full station closures.
V/Line services were also affected, with the Geelong and Warrnambool, Ballarat, Ararat and Maryborough, Bendigo, Echuca and Swan Hill and Gippsland lines all requiring rail replacements on the weekend of June 23-25. This extended to night services on all but the Gippsland line from June 26-29 as well.
The Dynon Road bridge was also closed during this time period, resulting in drivers also having to take alternative routes from the western suburbs into or through the CBD.
McNess says the Melbourne workforce is at least “a couple of hundred drivers short” in the Melbourne metropolitan area for the normal level of required service work operating the city’s bus network. Compounded by long hours across weekends and late at night, McNess fears a potential squeeze on the state’s bus drivers.
State government data estimates that at least 32,000 commuters catch trains along the Sunbury, Williamstown and Werribee lines alone during the school holiday period.
Many bus operators have extra contracts for rail replacement and will pull from their existing pool of drivers to provide those services for the public impacted by rail works.
“There’s not many specific operators that are contracted to do replacement work only,” McNess says.
“That work needs to be completed, and more often than not they’re just relying on normal service drivers to do the extra rail replacement as well.
“Some of them do have an extra pool of drivers that they might use, but invariably they’re leaning on people that are doing route and service work as well. I can certainly vouch for Melbourne and Victoria that it puts considerable stress on the driving force.”
The upcoming September rail works will be more spread out, but will see the following lines require replacement buses:
- Hurstbridge and Mernda lines: September 1-3, September 8-10, September 15-17, September 23-25
- Belgrave and Lilydale lines: September 9-10, September 22-24
- Frankston line: September 1-3, September 11-13
- Cranbourne and Pakenham lines: September 2-3
- Sandringham line: September 11-13, September 17-24
- Werribee and Williamstown lines: September 11-13, September 17-20
- Sunbury Line: September 3
- Upfield line: September 11-13