Just when things are quiet, we get a shooting and a machete attack on the same day. A woman was shot by her ex-partner at the Watergardens Railway station during the evening peak hour. With trains arriving every half hour to bring residents home, many were unable to move their vehicles because they were part of the crime scene. Good thing it was a Monday evening. There would have been more people milling around on Thursday and Friday evenings, with the attached Watergardens shopping centre opened til 9 pm.

Earlier in the day, a teenager was attacked with a machete in Copperfield College on their Delahey campus. How a youth can go around carrying a machete baffles my mind, and where in Victoria do you buy a machete?

Just another day.

News Link
The Age “Double shooting at station”
Herald Sun “Gunman shoots himself dead …”
The Age “Teenager to face court …”
Herald Sun “Teenager to face court …”

Oh boy Melbourne really likes fucking with the Western suburbs. Have you guys not noticed how bad news from the supposedly richer and more Anglo (read: less immigrants) Eastern suburb is always lame one liners like ‘Missing Dog Found’ or ‘Fire In Camberwell Put Out No One Is Seriously Injured’ but news from the Western suburbs always come out bad.

‘Woman Found Murdered And Dumped In Footscray’

‘Gang Fight In Sunshine Believed To Be Racially Motivated’

And I remember reading this in the papers once, it went something along the lines of:

‘I was sitting in Sunshine train station, where the bus depot is, and I saw gangs of Vietnamese and Africans sitting in groups. Sunshine and the Western Suburb is a dangerous place to live. The difference races do not integrate and they clash often.’ - some bloody politician

It infuriates me when I see how biased the media is towards the Western Suburbs. I’ve been living here for over half a year now, and although I cannot say that it’s the safest area, the old rhetoric such as ‘OMG you live in Sunshine? You’re gona be fucking murdered.’ is so old.

The Western suburbs, particularly Footscray and Sunshine, have definitely cleaned up and if anything, young couples are looking towards these areas for their first homes.

But I digress.

Now would anyone believe me if I told you there’s a conspiracy by Connex to screw Western Suburbians as well?

Well, two things.

How else does one explain why at peak hour in Melbourne Central platform 3, there are 2 EMPTY trains leaving for Cragieburn within 5 minutes of each other while the PACKED LIKE SARDINES train leaving for the Sydenham line leaves every 20 minutes.

Also, why are there less Zone 1 stations in the Sydenham and Werribee lines compared to every other lines? People living in the North, East and Southern suburbs have Zone 1 stations extending as far as Huntingdale or Reservoir, while the Westies have to cough up Zone 2 fares. This isn’t so apparent along the Werribee line, as the first Zone 2 station - Aircraft - is considerably far away from the Melbourne City Loop. But along the Sydenham line, how is Ginnifer a Zone 2 stop? It’s only 9 stops out of the City Loop!

Here’s a link to the Connex train network and tell me I’m wrong!