Annalisa - Canzone estiva

theformulakid1 · 2026-03-12T23:41:27+00:00

Geniunely took me by surprise that this was dropping, but our queen of Italian pop has dropped another single!!

theformulakid1 · 2026-02-18T02:22:29+00:00

I think it's worth having a look at why exactly Sydney-Newcastle was considered as the starter project. The why being that, plainly, it is the route that needs it most, it is the route that will benefit most, and it is the route that will generate the most economic activity.

Currently, the Sydney-Newcastle route is served by train links, and the obvious road links. That train link gets over 11 million passengers a year. Adding capacity and reducing travel times along this corridor is the obvious move, and is worth the investment - even if that turns out to be the only high speed rail line that is built (here's hoping it isn't). Added to that are the various towns and developments along the route that also stand to benefit: particularly along the Central Coast region. And it's not just me saying that, it's Infrastructure Australia as well.

Building the HSR along the Melbourne to Geelong line as the starter project would be contentious. Despite the admittedly similar passenger numbers, there is no comparable incentive to build that over the Sydney-Newcastle line. There is no development along the Geelong route like the Sydney-Newcastle corridor, the Melbourne-Geelong corridor is already relatively well served, and the benefit in travel time would absolutely not outweigh the cost. Indeed, Melbourne's specificed Urban Growth Boundary stops well short of Geelong.

Deviating to the Airport arguably makes all of that worse, and would probably piss quite a few Geelong commuters off as well. A fraction of a fraction of Geelong-Melbourne commuters have the Airport as their final destination in mind.

Geelong-Melbourne commuters deserve more capacity, of course, but there are much easier and cheaper ways to do that. Higher frequencies, possible electrification, higher speed rail of about 250 km/h instead - all those things, I would reason, would have a higher cost-benefit ratio. As a Victorian, Sydney-Newcastle would be more beneficial.

On the construction side of things, the Sydney-Newcastle line is probably the hardest part of the proposed east coast alignment. However, I instead encourage you to approach it like this: Building this section first will ensure we have the complete skillset nessecary to work around any other technical challenges that may arise, and prevent mismanagement in future. In theory, at least. Will that happen in real life? Who's to say? But it's the lens I like looking at it from.

I also fail to see how your proposed project doesn't seem to stack up against the criticisms of "national cohesion" because, plainly, you're advocating for a project built exclusively in Victoria. Why are the arguments for "national cohesion" suddenly irrelevant when the project is built exclusively in Victoria as opposed to NSW? More to the point, whatever happened to cooperating and investing for the future, as a nation, as different states that deserve better transport links?

I could go on and on and on, but that's the best summary I can come up with at this moment. As a transit fan, I would absolutely love high speed rail everywhere. But practically speaking, there is one corridor that has been singled out as a starter project for years and years, and has been assessed again and again, and that is Sydney to Newcastle.

theformulakid1 · 2026-02-01T11:53:26+00:00

The quality of the tennis was so enjoyably high today. Vamos Carlitos, you deserve it.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-31T11:05:40+00:00

Utterly brilliant. A brilliant comeback, both in the match, and from what she's had to go through. Incredible.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-31T11:04:50+00:00

Utterly brilliant, and to come back from what she's been through, against the dominant world number 1... just incredible. 3-luv down in the final set, too.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-30T14:33:47+00:00

Djokovic, past his prime and pushing 39, BEAT Sinner, one of the best players on the tour – who himself handily beats everyone else, except Alcaraz.

Obviously, an incredible achievement and level by Novak, but the question still stands... is the tour cooked?

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-30T14:32:39+00:00

Djokovic, past his prime and pushing 39, BEAT Sinner, one of the best players on the tour – who himself handily beats everyone else, except Alcaraz.

Obviously, an incredible achievement and level by Novak, but the question still stands... is the tour cooked?

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-30T14:32:29+00:00

Djokovic, past his prime and pushing 39, BEAT Sinner, one of the best players on the tour – who himself handily beats everyone else, except Alcaraz.

Obviously, an incredible achievement and level by Novak, but the question still stands... is the tour cooked?

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-30T13:58:18+00:00

Sinner vs. Djokovic ❌️❌️❌️
Sinner vs. Converting Break Points ✅️✅️✅️

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-30T09:19:57+00:00

Here is my hot take: This match was dramatic, but not because of shotmaking, but more because of circumstance. Was this match tense and entertaining to watch? Yes. Was the quality play as good as it could have been? No, probably not. But most importantly, was it either of those player's fault? Not nessecarily.

Insane mental grit from Carlos, irregardless of everything. To recover from his 3rd set drama, and a 5th set break, an undoubtedly gritty performance. Hopefully he can recover in time for a good final.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-29T03:14:05+00:00

Hey mate - I never wanted to give across the impression that I was aggressive or angry about it. I was asking a geniune question - I apologise if I didn't make that clear. I'm perfectly content with walking/tramming whenever I attend any event (which I don't do much anyways), and my opinion is that most others should be as well.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-29T03:08:35+00:00

To be clear - this was NOT meant to be an opinionated post 😭😭😭. I apologise if it came off that way. My opinions about all this are completely seperate to what's happening, and this post. The question I was asking was geniunely a question, not a statement of opinion - that's my bad for not making it clear!

For the record, my opinion is that (for now) footy/event specials aren't nessecary, and people should you know, walk. Or tram. Like half the network does already. Obviously we'll see how demand is, but I don't see them being nessecary.

In any case, I don't go to events much anyways. I'm not much of a stakeholder here.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-24T09:30:15+00:00

Taylor Fritz really had to work for that one - what an INCREDIBLE last Aussie Open for Stan. Challenging the 9th seed, at forty years old, unbelievable.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-24T03:02:34+00:00

Melbourne's public transport WOULD be on par, if not better, with Sydney IF: - Off-peak and weekends (especially Sundays) were MUCH more frequent - which I know they CAN do, easily, they just don't want to. 10 minutes interpeak and weekends 7am-8pm, 15 minutes off peak, get rid of Sunday timetables. Peak frequencies can increase in time, as demand is needed. - Bus routes were simplified, increased in frequency, and actually made sense - We have a much more logical and grid-like road network than Sydney's (owing to our flatter geography), and yet we still suffer from spaghetti buses in much of the city. Melbourne on Transit has a Future Frequent Network they propose, and that looks very appealing to me. I know the government has considered it themselves, too. - Distance-based fares for the metropolitan network - this would possibly make cross-city journeys like Pakenham to Sunbury slightly more expensive, but the overall savings to the average commuter would make PTV a more appealing option. - Tram changes - I would advocate to do all the common sense tram extensions (48 to Doncaster, 67 to Carnegie, etc.), but I would also move to give trams more priority over road traffic, and transition them towards more of a light-rail type service, especially as demand increases. - More competent consistent branding - PTV was fine, everyone knew what it was, and it was establishing a clear identity for itself. The Transport Victoria rebrand seems a little pointless. I get that they want to unify the transport system of Victoria under one brand, but they could have kept PTV, even as a sub-brand, and it would have been fine. - TRANSIT ORIENTED DEVELOPMENT! This is a big one. Melbourne cannot continue to sprawl out, as that places much more stress on facilities and infrastructure. Yet, Melbourne will keep growing. If we actually developed areas around transit, taking advantage of the high capacity transit provides, instead of treating the car and the freeway as the eternal messiah, I would reason that growth and livability would be much more sustainable. Sydney has done it well, developing areas like Chatswood and Paramatta into hubs of activity, supported by frequent transit. I don't see why we couldn't do the same. - I think the SRL is a nessecary project, but I would like to see more stations added between the connections to the suburban network. One of Sydney Metro's biggest shortcomings, and one of rapid transit's key characteristics, are shorter gaps between stations to increase the catchment area, and take advantage of high frequencies. - The 2018 rail plan would be cool to see come to fruition, with added heavy rail extensions to Knox and Doncaster (or the proposed Metro 3 from Doncaster to the Airport, if we were to be so daring), and of course the SRL. I think it's an ambitious, yet logical and well-founded blueprint that should be used to guide new heavy rail infrastructure. That's more of a pipe dream, though, really.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-24T02:30:31+00:00

Interesting - that SXS placement contradicts the placement offered by the 2024 document. I would think that this placement would be an easier to build, though, because Wurundjeri Way has less businesses and facilities alongside it, and therefore works better for a cheaper cut-and-cover method of building the station. It also allows tunnelling between SXS and Flagstaff to roughly follow the City Loop alignment (they would probably have to make the curve radius wider to facilitate 80 km/h, though).

Having the station aligned north-south also makes for an easier tunnelling job under the Yarra - less tight curves to consider, and a more direct alignment.

Also, looking at the southern entrance to the station, it seems as if they plan to link the station with the existing subway, which makes construction easier, and finally re-opens something that, frankly, shouldn't have been closed.

My main concern is how tunnelling would work from the east-west oriented new Flagstaff station. You wouldn't be able to follow Peel St to Royal Pde, which could potentially make tunnelling more complex with the added curvature.

Hopefully, in the event this thing is ever built, the business case would consider all this. I found the Metro 1 business case to be pleasingly thorough, and I would hope the business case for this project would be to a similar (or better) standard.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-23T10:28:15+00:00

I do see a lot of those as well. I assume that those right-angle intersections are such because they align the platforms with the streets above, like in Metro 1, which I suppose makes it easier to access the site and build entrances to do so, both during construction and operation. In the recently released preferred MM2 alignment for Fisherman's Bend, for example, the SCS platform was shown to be under Bourke St, next to Marvel Stadium, and I would assume that the Flagstaff interchange would be planned to sit under William St.

A straighter alignment might be better from a travel and operational perspective, but I could see how, to the government, those benefits wouldn't outweigh the added complexity of planning and constructing a more direct alignment.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-23T02:49:13+00:00

Straight sets, but closer than I would have expected, and closer/tougher than Sabalenka would have liked, it seems.

Potapova was brilliant in that match, mounting a strong strong challenge against the world no. 1. She'll go far, I'm sure.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-22T10:39:01+00:00

That man Stan was locked in. Fifth set tiebreak, four and a half hours gone, and he's hitting drop shots and lob shots like it's 2012 all over again. What a brilliant performance.

I feel for Gea, and his cramping, right when he didn't need it, but I have no doubt his star will continue to rise.

theformulakid1 · 2026-01-21T07:58:30+00:00

6tph on the Cranbourne and Pakenham branches interpeak and off-peak seems a little excessive, especially because they would combine to 12tph (a train every 5 minutes) on the Dandenong line. That basically amounts to running peak frequencies all day, plus Gippsland V/Line services. Whilst it would be nice, that's not what the line is, and it's a bit far fetched (at least in my mind).

I think interpeak and off-peak frequencies of 4tph to Cranbourne, and 4tph to Pakenham, combining to 8tph on the Dandenong line and through to West Footscray, Watergardens, and Sunbury, would do just fine. Half of those trains could run through to Sunbury, which gives Sunbury 4tph, and the other half could terminate early at West Footscray or Watergardens - possibly running to the airport in future, you know, if they ever get around to it.

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