Council
1 May, 2026
Pledge for six car trains
MEMBER of Polwarth Richard Riordan, Member for South West Coast Roma Britnell and Shadow Minister for Public Transport Matthew Guy have announced plans to begin upgrades on the Warrnambool Line if the Liberals are elected at the November state election.
The trio visited Camperdown Rail Station on Tuesday to make the announcement, holding a community listening post at various stops along the line to hear from commuters.
Mr Riordan said, with the Allan and Andrews Labor governments reducing carriage and seating capacity on the Warrnambool line, overcrowding had become chronic and unsafe.
“For too long, passengers in the south west have been treated as second-class citizens,” he said.
“Camperdown and Terang have been raised a lot recently, with your shire pushing for the rail trails – it’s part of tourism.
“At the moment, we’re stopping people from getting on the train with their bikes and luggage, so it’s stopping our economy as well as causing chaos for people going to doctors’ appointments or going to visit family.
“Cobden’s Hampden
p-12 all had an excursion to Melbourne see me in Parliament and they all got inconvenienced with the train because there weren’t enough seats.”
Mr Guy outlined the Liberals’ plan for improvements across V/Line services, which included actions to address community concerns in the short, medium and long term.
“What I do know is the problems being experienced on this line can be solved in a staged approach,” he said.
“Some of the things we can do fairly promptly if we change government in November, other things will take time.
“The first issue is that the train lengths when we’ve gone from diesel rail cars to VLocity – on a three-car VLocity, they seat 220 people.
“The five-car diesel-hauled trains – the N-sets – seated 370.
“While the government will say we’ve put more services on, what you’ve got is a cumulative loss of seats – you’ve got about 10,000 fewer seats each week.”
Mr Guy said there were an excess of five VLocity train carriages in the western suburbs network, of which two or three carriages could be used to lengthen the Warrnambool train service.
He said carriage storage could also be moved to Warrnambool to add more carriages to the morning services.
“The government and V/Line will say the platforms are too short and that’s why they taken carriages off at Waurn Ponds – that’s true,” Mr Guy said.
“I think at Camperdown you can get five cars maximum, but in Swan Hill line and in New South Wales where they’re running up to 10 car trains, the conductor will ask passengers to ensure they are on certain carriages to alight.
“That’s what we need to do in the short term before we do anything about carriage length, and we can do that, the conductors can do that and you can flip the switches to make sure the doors open on certain platforms at those carriages.
“That’s what we should be doing to deal with that problem in the interim – if we’re going to wait for platforms to be extended, we’re waiting forever.”
Mr Guy said the Liberals were also taking a plan to have purpose-built country trains to the election.
“They’ll be VLocitys, but they’ll be six cars long,” he said.
“VLocitys are only meant to run from Geelong to Ballarat, Bendigo and Traralgon, which is why there’s no reclining seats, no sunshades, no snack bar and hard seats.
“They’re not very comfortable because they’re only meant to be made for 160 kilometres in and out of Melbourne – they’re not made for long haul.”
Mr Riordan said Tuesday morning’s visit saw a strong crowd of people raising their concerns, highlighting the importance of the service to the Corangamite Shire.
“It’s really important – Corangamite Shire is a key part of my electorate, and the Camperdown Station is a really beautiful building,” he said.
“It’s a much-loved public service in the shire – it services right down to Port Campbell, which is a big service.
“It’s a service this community fought long and hard to retain in the 1990s – we now need to make sure it’s a good service.,
“People are choosing to live here but commute to work in Melbourne – having a good train allows people to have those lifestyle choices.
“Increasingly for healthcare, it’s important for an older community to get to Geelong or Melbourne for specialist appointments.”
Residents were asked to sign a petition to be presented in Parliament next week by Mr Riordan, Ms Britnell and Mr Guy.
Read More: Camperdown, local