TRAMLINE EXTENSION

Dr McFETRIDGE (Morphett) (15:38): I would like to talk about our new trams, again. It is not quite a weekly update, but I will keep giving updates as long as they are required. It is bouquets and brickbats today. First, the bouquets. It is an undisputed fact that the new trams have been very popular. Thousands of people have been on the new trams. Can I just say, 'I told you so.' I have always had that belief, and I have said in this place for four years that light rail is the answer to modern public transport in Adelaide. The only problem is getting off and on the trams, as well as trying to get a seat at times. The new trams have excellent brakes, and I can vouch for that.

They have a couple of different sorts of brakes. They have electric brakes and a magnetic brake. I know this because, last Friday morning after leaving this place, I was not quite thrown to the ground but certainly I had to hang onto some of the poles. In fact, I was late for a meeting with the Premier at Brighton High School because of this. A stupid fellow stepped out in front of the tram on King William Street and the whole tram came to an absolute stop on a dime, and that was because of the new trams' modern brakes—electric and magnetic brakes. Fortunately, no-one was hurt. The crew was changed. The driver had to go because he was very shaken up by that idiot's actions.

It was a near miss. I hope that people do get used to the fact that trams are there. They are very quiet and sometimes difficult to hear, particularly with the other background noise. I hope that people do not step out in front of them because someone could get severely injured. I will give a big plaudit to the staff—the conductors, drivers, and also the assistants who have been helping out at the tram stops both down in my electorate in Morphett and in Adelaide, because they have been doing a terrific job. They have been very helpful and have been giving a lot of advice and assistance to regular users, visitors to town and also those who are just there for a bit of a sticky beak, for want of a better description. I hope people continue to use the tram as a regular form of public transport. I have used it just about every day since the extension has been opened.

However, it does have some issues. First, we paid over $5 million for each of these trams, yet they still go to Victoria Square: you cannot change the destination sign on the tram to City West. We can do it with buses and the old trams—they only went to Victoria Square and Glenelg, so you could wind it down—but we have $5 million worth of tram and we cannot change that. That begs the question: didn't we plan to extend the tram line anywhere else? Didn't we plan to extend the tram line beyond Victoria Square at any stage whatsoever? Maybe that was not the case, and I can understand only from Glenelg to Victoria Square, but you would think that on a $5 million tram you would be able to program not only the destination indicators on either end of it but also inside the tram.

Talking about inside the tram, the announcements still say that the next stop is stop 19 at Brighton Road, and then we go down to stop 21 at Moseley Square. Stop 21 at Moseley Square is now stop 17, and it goes all the way back to South Terrace when we change to South Terrace, City South and so forth. So, next time we buy some trams, can we make sure we can program them?

I was very concerned yesterday when the tram I was on ran a red light. I understand the red T means stop. I have been told by other people that trams are running red lights, and I understand this is so they can maintain schedules. I know that tram drivers are doing their absolute best to drive as safely as possible, but I hope they are not being forced to do anything they should not do.

I want to talk about the tram shelters. The day before yesterday (Monday) it was raining when I came to parliament. The tram stopped at the tram stop but only two of the doors were under the shelter: the third door was out in the rain. I have not actually stepped out and measured the length between the tram doors and the tram shelter, but I hope that was a consideration and that they actually cover all three doors when they stop.

The other problem I had was this morning I caught the quarter past 10 tram from Glenelg into town. Instead of getting here at seven minutes to 11, it got here at 1 minute past 11, so I was late for parliament. If we cannot run them on time, let us look at the programming and the schedules and do something about it so that people are attracted to a reliable and safe public transport system—not only the trams, but also the trains and buses. They do need to interconnect, because people have appointments they need to keep.