logistics

A second day in the new office. Jill, the MM national manager is coming from Sydney to negotiate a strategic plan with her three Victorian state project officers. But first there’s public transport to negotiate.

I’m experimenting to find the best way to get to and from Collingwood. By road it’s 30 kilometres door to door from Place des Cons (my house Croydon eyrie) to Carringbush House in Collingwood. I hope never to travel to work by car, but large loads of our professional development materials might force my hand. Riding the bike on the road is not desirable. The Eastlink bike path is unlit and a fair bit of my commute will be in the dark.

By public transport I have the choice of train and train, or train and tram. Yesterday I go train-train, changing at Parliament. The knock-on effect of being four minutes late out of Croydon gets me to work half an hour later than anticipated. Today I plan to exit Parliament and hop on the 86 tram. Trouble is that commuters can’t get out of the station’s northern exit. It’s myki’s fault.

For over a year I use myki—order a plastic card, top up (your account), touch on (the card-reader) on entering the station, and touch off on exit—but most of my fellow Victorians stick to paper tickets, Metcards, and just walk out through the station barriers.

The changeover to myki-only is happening now. The fatal system flaw is not enough card-readers, slow card-readers at that, so thousands must queue to touch off and exit the station. It’s an entirely predictable nightmare. So this morning I don’t catch a tram because I can’t get out of the station.

Yesterday Cathy comes from Adelaide to induct Sasha and me. Today Jill arrives from Sydney to lead us through the logistics of what we, the Victorian MM project officers, do, and where we do it. Full-time Sasha gets half of metropolitan Melbourne and two country regions, Viv northern metro and one country region, and I score the eastern half of the state.

I reflect on my way home on how life shifts: a month ago I’m unemployed. Life is disorganised and pointing in many directions; today I’m hard-wired for action, locked into perpetual motion.

I get one hour at home to pack my mentor training materials, feed the JRT and apologise to him for abandoning him, and point the Jazz toward Bendigo where I’ll spend the night in BJ’s spare room. Tomorrow I train mentors in Wedderburn.

Rock on.