Melbourne train strikes hassle commuters on Thursday, Friday

The battle between the Metro Trains and the Rail, Tram and Bus Union (RTBU) is still continuing and has led to the cancellation and rescheduling of trains on Thursday. The Melbourne commuters, through these train alterations, have been warned that the situation is going to worsen on Friday’s four-hour strike from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm.

The staff began to walk out from their jobs at 3:00 am on Thursday. Metro Trains said around 50 railway services were affected early morning mostly between 4:00 am - 7:30 am. The Frankston line seemed to be affected the most along with Pakenham, Hurstbridge and Werribee lines, as these faced longer delays.

Passengers will have to face more disturbances on Friday, the decided date for transport strike. The station door will be shut at the main stations, including Flinders St, South Yarra, Frankston and Caulfield with around 689 services cancelled. It is assumed that the effect of the strike will be visible from 8:30 am as the staff will start preparing for the four-hour strike beginning 10:00 am.

The train may not resume service completely until 4:30 pm, which will affect the peak afternoon hours. Metro Trains has another demand of dividing the train network into five groups consisting of two to three railway lines each, where drivers won’t need to be trained on all lines. However, the RTBU is completely against it.

“We can’t train every driver on every new piece of infrastructure over the next three years – we just don’t have the time or the staff to do that,” Metro Trains boss Andrew Lezala said. Meanwhile, RTBU state secretary Luba Grigorovitch said, “Drivers are more likely to make mistakes endanger the safety of commuters if they are made to just drive on a couple of lines. That’s unacceptable”.

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