This was published 8 years ago
Brisbane trains: Temporary timetable cancels 30 services a day
By Felicity Caldwell
There will be 30 train services cancelled each day under an interim timetable as Queensland Rail attempts to fix a crisis caused by not having enough drivers.
It comes after more than 100 services were cancelled on Friday due to a lack of available drivers following the opening of the Redcliffe Peninsula Line.
A temporary timetable with 30 cancelled services will operate from Tuesday.Credit: Glenn Hunt
A normal timetable is due to operate on Monday, with no planned cancellations.
The interim timetable was being finalised on Sunday, following an emergency meeting of the Queensland Rail board in Brisbane.
It will impact on about 2 per cent of services.
It is understood that from Tuesday, 30 services will be cancelled and 11 will be altered or partially cancelled from Monday to Thursday, reducing the number of train services from 1306 each day to 1276 each day, a 2.3 per cent decrease.
Before the opening of the Redcliffe Peninsula Line, 1218 services ran each day.
Cancelled services were selected based on which would have the least impact, lowest patronage and minimised delays to the next service.
Of the cancelled services, 25 had wait times of less than 15 minutes to the next same service, five had wait times of less than 30 minutes to the next service.
Impacts to services on Fridays were still be determined.
The interim timetable was expected to be available for the public to view on Sunday night or Monday. It was released on the Translink website on Monday morning.
Earlier on Sunday, Queensland Rail chief executive officer Helen Gluer said she expected the interim timetable to be in place for two weeks.
A furious Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said heads could roll over the debacle.
"Because how did it get to this? It has been planned for many years about the opening of the Moreton Bay Rail Link," Ms Palaszczuk said.
Disruption to services across the Citytrain network is expected to continue for weeks as the understaffed service trains up enough drivers to cope with the opening of the Redcliffe Peninsula Line, previously known as the Moreton Bay Rail Link.
Ms Gluer said after delivering a reliable service, the issue of what went wrong would be investigated.
"I am quite sure it will be a number of issues," she said.
Transport Minister Stirling Hinchliffe is due to brief cabinet on Monday with an update.
The Queensland Rail board convened an emergency meeting on Sunday to discuss the crisis.
On Sunday, Deputy Opposition Leader Deb Frecklington criticised Mr Hinchliffe for being at the Gold Coast 600, instead of being at the board meeting.
It is understood Mr Hinchliffe was asked by the Premier to represent the government on the Gold Coast in his capacity as Commonwealth Games Minister, and he dialled into the board meeting to address directors and the executive leadership team.
"The Supercars Gold Coast 600 was an outstanding event in its own right, but also another opportunity to fine tune preparations for the 2018 Commonwealth Games," he said.
"At the Supercars, I saw how many people had embraced light rail to get to and from the track. This will be an important element of moving people around during the Games."