Another price hike for Train/Tram/Bus Fares? Meh.

It's hard not to gape your mouth open when you found out that the fares for public transport in Melbourne is going to increase again by next Monday. What was once $3.20 for a 2 hour pass is now $3.30. It's a small increase, but when you realise that it was only $3.10 last December (and the year before), it makes you want to reach your wallet and hide it from Yarra tram officials.

Melbourne has the most expensive public transport system (in terms of fare, of course) in Australia. Is the steep price worth it? Judging by the number of cancelled trains and late trams, no, probably not. But that's not to say that Melbourne has a bad public transport system. Of course not. No matter how bad it is in terms of fare and timeliness, it's still much, much better than third world countries and even the US.

I guess all of this is due to the fact that the government is catering more to car-users. There has been no rail development to the outer suburbs, whereas the Eastlink freeway has become the major focus in the last few years. It is true that  this is a blessing for the suburban dwellers, since they can use the new freeway to commute to Melbourne, but there are those who don't have cars and have to travel to the city. And I guess that's one of the reasons why you still see a large number of people riding the train on peak hours. Another reason is that there are new suburbs; i.e. planned housings, that has a significant number of people that uses public transport to get around. And there aren't enough trains and railroads.

Here's hoping that the fare increase will improve the system.

In other news, this autumn may be the warmest since 1998, and probably the warmest May in 153 years. Some analysts are concerned that this is caused by global warming. I, on the other hand, think that this is quite normal. There could be a pattern in autumn temperature that we don't yet know of. I just think it's fancy that we're having a warm autumn and possibly winter.

And in other (trivial) news, detectives in Ballarat are investigating an alleged threat by a student in a Catholic girls' school to shoot her schoolmates during an assembly. One thing came to my mind when I was reading this: "Is she a South Korean?"

Just kidding.

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