Article: Young fear attack on late-night trains

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Young fear attack on late-night trains

Young fear attack on late-night trains

    * Lucie van den Berg
    * From: Herald Sun
    * December 13, 2009 8:40PM

MORE than three quarters of young Victorians have felt threatened on public transport a new survey on personal safety and public transport reveals.

Young adults feel "very unsafe" waiting at the train station and using public transport at night.

They are calling for greater security-guard presence, panic buttons and a no-tolerance approach to boost safety levels.

Drunk people, long waiting periods and badly lit platforms were the biggest deterrents for young people from waiting at a train station at night.

The Monash University's department of civil engineering report found that 30 per cent of young people have seen someone attacked on public transport.

About 60 per cent of respondents have witnessed someone being threatened.

Less than 5 per cent have been attacked.

The Public Transport Users Association Daniel Bowen said the concerns of young adults were echoed by the wider community.

He said putting staff on every station from the first service in the morning to the last service in the evening, cutting waiting times and more funding for trains and trams should be a priority.

Despite their safety concerns, availability, reliability and frequency were considered more important and harder to achieve than feeling safe on public transport.

Metro Trains spokeswoman Lanie Harris said the rail operator was committed to tackling personal safety and issues around the reliability of services.

She insisted that many of the initiatives that young people were requesting were already in place, though conceded that improving safety was a key priority.

Adding staff to 22 previously unmanned stations, enhancing lighting at stations, more CCTV and making people aware of the safety initiatives already in place were cited as examples of Metro's plans.

"We are doing a great deal to address safety issues, but there is always more that can be done," she said.

"We already have 350 authorised officers deployed around the network.

"Every single incident is recorded and logged and we use an incident management system to deploy personnel at the trouble hot spots.

"We have emergency buttons at stations and on trains."

She said the perception of personal safety doesn't always match the actual safety levels.

"There are 350,000 passenger trips a day made from 211 stations, and the actual number of incidents is very small in relation to how many people use the system.

"But that doesn't mean we won't keep working to improve things. It is our responsibility to listen to what the community is saying and respond."

Catching a tram and travelling on public transport and travelling during the day was considered the safest way to travel by many young adults.

The typical survey respondent was a student with a car in their 20s.