From: "Brian May" <brian@microcomaustralia.com.au>
The media has lost the point, it isn't just a tunnel, it is a complete redesign of how many lines use the city loop, making it more consistent and less confusing in the process (e.g. the 'new' loop pair will be bidirectional and won't change direction at midday every day).
Yes, but to achieve it, all four tracks are completely reserved. They are fed by more than one line each (they all split further out) and every disruption will immediately cause a backlog piling up. Imagine you are a sysadmin and have four machines exclusively dedicated to "their" services. What do you do when one is in trouble? (Well, if you do not shutdown a few services completely you have to mix again, as in "the old days") And this trouble, on an old railway and signalling system as Melbourne has, happens every day. Over the last years working where I work now I cannot remember _one_ time during peak hours when I took a train according to a timetable and it proceeded smoothly. Regards Peter