Minister on track

DEPUTY Premier and Minister for Transport John Watkins paid the Illawarra a visit on Monday, May 15 to inspect three train stations at the request of Minister for the Illawarra David Campbell, and to distribute new timetable booklets with Wollongong MP Noreen Hay and Illawarra MP Marianne Saliba.

Mr Watkins travelled down to the Illawarra by train and met Mr Campbell at Bulli Station where they inspected the work being undertaken on the long awaited $2.6 million station upgrade.

The next stop in Mr Watkins visit was to inspect Woonona Station which is scheduled for a $1 million upgrade.

On arriving at Wollongong Station, Mr Watkins and Mr Campbell were joined by Ms Hay and Ms Saliba to distribute the new timetable booklets to passengers.

The new timetables, which come into effect on May 28, 2006 are designed to improve on-time running of train services, according to Mr Watkins.

At around 68%, the Illawarra used to be our best performing rail service in terms of on-time running, Mr Watkins said.

With the introduction of the new timetable in Sydney, on-time running improved so dramatically there that the Illawarra has slipped to last place.

The new timetable for the Illawarra and South Coast should see a significant jump in on-time performance, with our target being 92% on-time running.

If Sydney is anything to go by, we should see that improvement occur virtually immediately.

Mr Watkins said that the price commuters would have to pay for the improved on-time running would be slightly longer trip times in the order of 6-8 minutes.

However passengers will see a dramatic reduction in service cancellations and station skipping, giving them a much more reliable service, said Mr Watkins.

And when the new OSCAR rolling stock is rolled out to the Illawarra in the second half of the year, train travellers will enjoy a whole new level of comfort as well as the improved reliability of service.

According to Mr Watkins, the new timetables include some changes to stopping patterns and departure times of scheduled services.?

Commuters need to be aware of these changes before they come into effect, so I urge passengers to obtain a copy of the new timetables as soon as possible, Mr Watkins said.

Member for Wollongong Noreen Hay said she was very happy on behalf of commuters that the new timetables were about to start.

The new timetables will improve reliability of service and my constituents dont mind the cost of a few extra minutes, said Ms Hay.

According to Member for Illawarra Marianne Saliba, the new timetable will help commuters get home to their families after work much more reliably.

Attention has been given particularly to the PM commuter services, making getting home from work much more reliable, Ms Saliba said.

Copies of the new timetable can be obtained from the CityRail website at www.cityrail.info, by calling the 131500 Transport Infoline or from any train station.