Victoria’s regional train service came to a total standstill following a “communications fault” on Wednesday morning.
V/Line updated all passengers of the major disruption via Twitter, warning of significant delays as long as 90 minutes for all trains including the Bendigo, Geelong, Ballarat, Gippsland and Seymour lines.
“All train services on the regional network are currently suspended due to a communications outage which restricts the ability for the V/Line control centre to communicate with trains on the network,” the Department of Transport said.
Regional commuters took to social media to express their frustration, calling the train system a “joke” and questioning how a statewide network could be brought down by one failure.
The Department of Transport said that engineers and communication partners addressed the issue and some services began to resume around an hour after the initial disruption. The Geelong and Gippsland lines remained severely delayed, and various coach replacements also remained in place.
V/Line trains came to a standstill following a communications fault.Credit:Justin McManus
“We have implemented our backup communications system after an earlier communications fault and trains are returning at normal speed. Customers can expect delays of up to 60 minutes,” V/Line said.
Metropolitan V/Line services were not disrupted.
Last year a major power fault in Melbourne’s CBD sent the regional rail lines into chaos. Trains did not run for hours as bus replacements were put in place across the network.
V/Line measures its performance monthly and promises to offer compensation when targets are not met.
“Our reliability target is for at least 96 per cent of scheduled services to run,” V/Line’s website states.
“Our punctuality target is 92 per cent … On long distance services it is measured on time to 10 minutes 59 seconds.”
At the time of publication, no compensation for disrupted regional travellers had been announced.
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