Ruth Sandy from Merlynston is an Angry Upfield Line user. (There is even a Facebook group – Angry Upfield Line!) Angry Upfield Line users live north of Batman Station. They don’t just want more frequent services. They want the scheduled train to actually turn up. Too often, trains are short-shunted – that is, they are turned around at Batman. Ruth says that when trains are short-shunted, she has to wait for up to 40 minutes for a train.

The latest train performance data shows that in February 2026, over 3% of Upfield Line trains were short-shunted. Thanks to More Trains Melbourne’s North for alerting us to this.

Passengers on the Upfield Line were promised better services with the opening of the Metro Tunnel. But there were NO extra services – just some minor timetable tweaks.

And reliability has worsened. In February 2026, 96 trains on the Upfield Line were short-shunted. That is 3.1 % of trains – an average of three to four trains per day. As the graph shows, this is far worse than normal (apart from that blip in December 2024).

When trains are short-shunted, people living north of Batman have to wait for the next train. Because of the single track in the 4 km section between Gowrie and Upfield stations, trains can’t pass each other in this section. So if a train is behind schedule, it turns around to avoid a financial penalty. Angry Upfield Line users like Ruth are also angry these short-shunting instances are not included in the statistics for reliability of the train line.

Even if the short-shunting wasn’t happening, passengers on the Upfield Line still have a poor service. In peak hour, trains are scheduled for every 16 minutes. Compare that to the trains going through the Metro Tunnel – they are scheduled to run every 3 to 4 minutes!

And what about off-peak services? On Sunday mornings, before about 10am, trains come every 40 minutes. We are still waiting for the off-peak improvements promised in May 2025. They promised us an “increase in off-peak services with trains running at least every 20 minutes on the line, including late at night and on weekends“. The Minister for Public and Active Transport reckons we will get these services this winter.

The government wants more people to travel by public transport – and so do we! But we need a frequent and reliable if we expect people to use a train rather than a car.

“If I have an appointment, I will choose to drive because I cannot rely on the train system” (Ruth Sandy, Merlynston)

Ruth Sandy says: “I cannot rely on the Upfield to get me somewhere. If I have an appointment, I will choose to drive because I cannot rely on the train system.” Thomas Mackliley, another Angry Upfield Line user, says he is too often late to events because of the poor reliability.

This situation will only worsen. As Ruth notes, “We are the least important train line in the whole system. And that is so wrong. When you consider the number of people who are moving into our area – we are doing the heavy lifting as far as apartments go in Melbourne, and we are happy to do that, but you need the corresponding infrastructure.”

So what can be done? Residents have been asking for a better Upfield Line service for decades. See blogsite and Facebook page. The state government has clearly not delivered on the promises made for the Upfield Line. But it’s an election year. We need to keep up the pressure.

Obviously we need the government to do the following. But even if they are put in the budget this year, they will take years to deliver.

• Duplicate the Upfield Lie between Gowrie and Upfield Stations, so that trains can run more frequently, and delays do not effect subsequent trains.
• Deliver the planned turnback at Gowrie, that was shelved a year ago.

So what can be done immediately (while we are waiting for the infrastructure to be built)? Here are some suggestions.

• Penalise the operator when trains are short-shunted.
• Add additional train services, which turn at Batman, while maintaining the 16 minute frequency of trains heading to Upfield. Then run frequent bus services to the north.

Buses are very cheap to operate. There has long been a proposal to significantly improve the frequency of bus route 531. We wrote about this in October 2025. This bus route currently starts at Bakers Rd and runs every hour. We suggest it be extended south to Coburg Station, where there is space for buses to turn around (as bus routes 526 and 530 do currently). We also suggest improving the frequency of bus route 530. This bus route, which services much of Fawkner, currently runs about every 30 minutes on weekdays until past 9pm, and every 40 minutes on weekends. Running it every 10 to 15 minutes would make it a much more useful service.

Do you have any other ideas to improve the frequency and reliability of service on the Upfield Line – both in the short term and long term?

Meanwhile, please send an email to our local representatives, saying we need much better public transport in the north of Merri-bek:

• Kathleen Matthews-Ward, MP for Broadmeadows, kathleen.matthews-ward@parliament.vic.gov.au
• Anthony Cianflone, MP for Pascoe Vale, anthony.cianflone@parliament.vic.gov.au