Incredible turnout today at the largest local government strike in Victoria's history! The message from the thousands of workers here today is clear - Council workers deserve fair pay. Our wages have gone **down** in real terms by up to 12% over the past four […] [Original post on aus.social]

Great day out this morning for the very first X'Ttapolis 2 train in regular passenger service! This is Melbourne's newest EMU train that will start to replace the ageing, but beloved, Comeng fleet. Many people came to ride this service to Upfield and back […] [Original post on aus.social]

Happy birthday to the State Library of Victoria's LAB, which is one year old today! I wish all GLAM orgs had labs to foster innovation & collaboration. https://lab.slv.vic.gov.au

Spent a wonderful afternoon today at the Melbourne Tram Museum lost in the archives to research an upcoming video. A massive thank you to all the brilliant volunteers. Everyone is knowledgeable, passionate, friendly and very willing to help. If you've never been […] [Original post on aus.social]

Night for it #melbourne #australia #photography #sunset

This is gadgetbahn gold by @philip In the 1950s, the Victorian government was seriously considering a 40-seat helicopter bus service from the roof of Southern Cross Station to Moorabbin and Essendon Airports: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9Ybkpk3KaU It also predicted that, by 2003, helipads […]

Excellent post on the train frequency upgrades announced yesterday for Melbourne and Victoria from Peter Parker. It's very welcome news but also leaves significant gaps. E.g. the Ringwood Group will have a more frequent service at 9pm on a weekday than at 1pm […]

Glory be to the trams that still have openable windows #melbourne #melbournetrams #publictransport #transit

G class-only speed restriction sign spotted at the west end of Victoria Bridge in Richmond. I'm guessing this is for trams heading to Kew Depot further down the road for testing, as they are probably heavier than any current tram that regularly uses this heritage […] [Original post on aus.social]

Leading on from yesterday here is another bad disruption notice on the Transport Victoria website. Amongst other things, it tells people to catch a Glen Waverley train from Camberwell Station, and a Craigieburn train from Footscray Station. All completely wrong […] [Original post on aus.social]

Is it just me or has the disruption information from Transport Victoria become even worse recently? Take this for example. No City Loop trains for Burnley Group trains. The official advice is to take a "City Circle bus" (rail replacement bus) to get to City Loop […] [Original post on aus.social]

No thanks #food

One new issue with State Library / Melbourne Central that I have noticed since the Metro Tunnel opened has to do with interchanging. When coming out of State Library Station there are no screens to tell you the next train departures from platforms at Melbourne Central. The only bank of screens […]

Bank card touch on option spotted at a myki gate at Footscray Station. Only this one had it available though. #melbourne #MelbourneTrains #publictransport #transit

A new TV show is coming to Melbourne and Geelong! The show is called "Stories of Victoria" and will feature ten episodes. These will be compilations of some of my existing videos, organised into themes. Channel 31 is an amazing resource that has been around for decades supporting […]

QGIS 4.0 Norrköping is released! The wait is over! We are pleased to announce the new major release of QGIS 4.0. Installers for Windows, Linux, and Mac are already out. What's new? On the surface, existing users should expect to engage with a QGIS experience familiar to what they have come to […]

"Heat related speed restrictions"? It's not even 30 degrees. Very strange. #MelbourneTrains #melbourne #publictransport #transit #australiantrains

New tram route just dropped apparently #melbourne #melbournetrams #PTV #publictransport #transit

These signs are a juxtaposition that we hate to see. There are maintenance works scheduled on the Belgrave / Lilydale Line between Box Hill and Parliament on the same weekend as the Grand Prix and Labour Day. Not a great way to promote heading to the Grand Prix […] [Original post on aus.social]

I will be giving a talk at the next monthly meeting of the Balwyn Historical Society. The topic will be on the huge floods that devastated Victoria in 1934 with a focus on how it affected Balwyn and the surrounding areas. The talk will be held on Thursday 12 March at 7:30pm at the Balwyn […]

New video out today, my first covering a topic in the ACT! Learn about what I think was one of the most important events in Australia's 20th century history, the 1940 Canberra air disaster https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=U_q_W69AyI8 #canberra #disasters #australia #aviation #history […]

Countdown timer for a traffic signal but for trams! These are uncommon but not unheard of in Melbourne for pedestrian crossings. But this is the first I've seen for tram drivers. It makes a lot of sense here because it's for southbound trams at the very busy […] [Original post on aus.social]

Xtrapolis 2 spotted on the test track at Newport Workshops #MelbourneTrains #publictransport #transit https://www.flickr.com/photos/philipmallis/55109245358/

Hope everyone on the Lilydale Line is enjoying their one hour wait for the next train! #frequencyisfreedom #MelbourneTrains #publictransport #transit

After decades of advocacy, the new Gipps Street Ramp on the busy Main Yarra Trail was finally completed late last year. Local communities lobbied hard for a very long time to remove the former inaccessible and non-compliant steps. The solution built here is this […] [Original post on aus.social]

Early access to my next video for members! Check it out here. If you're not a member, you can sign up on the website, or it'll be publicly released in a few days. https://members.philipmallis.com/early-video-access-what-if-the-city-loop-but-above-ground/ #melbourne #history #MelbourneTrains […]

There is one metre of gas in this room

New post: the broken Box Hill Bus Station lift https://philipmallis.com/2026/02/05/the-broken-box-hill-bus-station-lift/ #melbourne #publictransport #transit #melbournebuses #buses

One other ongoing disruption is that the only lift to access the rooftop Box Hill Bus Station is still broken. It's been broken since at least last week. This is a major problem and is being poorly managed. There is no disruption information anywhere from PTV or […] [Original post on aus.social]

This is the scene at platforms 3/4 at Richmond Station for passengers waiting for a train to Frankston. Never seen it like this before. Day 2 of the #MetroTunnel so teething problems are to be expected as people get used to the new network. I suspect many of […] [Original post on aus.social]

First weekday of the "Big Switch" for the #MetroTunnel and it seems to have gone reasonably well, other than some teething issues that are to be expected with any project. There are important details to fix though. These are mainly legacy problems from previous […] [Original post on aus.social]

New post: why you should visit #morocco for its trains https://philipmallis.com/2026/02/01/why-you-should-visit-morocco-for-its-trains/ #publictransport #trains #transit #travel

Lots of gunzels out today on the network getting photos of the last HCMTs to run through the City Loop (at least in the near future). The problem is that there appears to be a big inconsistency for photography in what we've been told by the Government and what is happening on the ground. It […]

Interesting pedestrian crossing design on Little Lonsdale Street at Sutherland Street. It's unusual to have a pedestrian-priority crossing directly on an intersection but this is what has happened here. A raised threshold has been installed across the entire […] [Original post on aus.social]

First video of 2026 is a another collaboration with gunzel extraordinaire Taitset! Here we talk for a long time about the Metro Tunnel's "Big Switch", what it means and what we think. Grab a cup of tea and a comfy chair, and enjoy! https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=omeR4n_cvcM #MelbourneTrains […]

Spotted this brand new line diagram and rail connections sign at Parliament Station. The good: - Connecting transport is included - Fare zones are marked - Colours, fonts, etc are consistent with other PTV wayfinding - It's close to a map The bad: - It's been […] [Original post on aus.social]

New timetables for the "Big Switch" opening of the Metro Tunnel from 1 February 2026 have finally been published. Very underwhelming honestly. While it's great to have ten minute headways on the Sunbury / Cranbourne / Pakenham Lines, there are many missed opportunities across others. For […]

Not near the #vicfires at all but the smoke haze has reached Melbourne #melbourneweather #australia #melbourne

PSA: most V/Line rail and coach services for tomorrow 9 January 2026 have been cancelled. Trains will not be replaced by coaches. This affects services in the Central, Northern Country, South West and Wimmera Fire Districts All train services scheduled for the Albury, Ararat, Bendigo, Echuca […]

Well there goes Melbourne's rail network... And it only took one hot day to get here. #MetroTrains #melbourne #melbourneweather #MelbourneTrains #publictransport

Sinkhole in Heidelberg https://emergency.vic.gov.au/respond/#!/warning/38943/moreinfo #melbourne #australia

First post of 2026 on poor transport disruption information for upcoming closures of the Eastern Freeway: https://philipmallis.com/2026/01/05/hunting-for-north-east-link-disruption-information/ #melbourne #transit #publictransport #northeastlink

A Wikipedia page about why you shouldn’t use LLMs to write Wikipedia pages. Pretty funny. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Case_against_LLM-generated_articles #wikipedia #LLMs #citations

New blog post: 2025 in photos https://philipmallis.com/2025/12/31/2025-in-photos/ #nye #2025inreview #2025inreview

Melbourne's first level platform tram 'superstop' was built on Collins Street at Swanston Street in 2001. Unfortunately it the south-west and north-west ends of the stop were not built with pedestrian crossings. 24 years later this has finally been fixed with […] [Original post on aus.social]

Obligatory photos of hot cross buns already at Aldi, Coles and Woolworths on Boxing Day #christmas2025 #christmas #easter #easter2026 #australia

There seems to be a law of the universe for YouTube channels which creates an inverse relationship of expected vs. actual popularity of videos. In other words videos that you expect to do well won't be popular, and those that you don't will. #youtube #videos

Today's historic photo of the day: Exactly 40 years ago today, W7 class #tram no 1021 running a route 67 trip from Carnegie, heads west in Glenhuntly Road at South Caulfield Junction, Caulfield South, Vic, December 22 1985. Forty W7 class trams, built in […] [Original post on mastodon.online]

Last video of the year is out! This one is topical so I had a hard deadline to get it published. Thank you so much to everyone for your support over the past 12 months. Having an audience of interested people gives me the ongoing motivation to keep making videos. I have some new plans for next […]