John Silvester has an interesting piece up on The Age today about PSOs at railway stations. It is worth taking the time to read it.
About 20 years ago the state government started withdrawing station staff from the railway network. It was part of a general efficiency drive, trying to save resources in order to soften the operation up for the privatisation that followed. In the years that followed the major contribution of the private operators was the removal of station amenities from passengers -- toilets, most notably, and sheltered waiting areas.
I spend a lot of time on the trains, trams and busses. They are my main way of getting around Melbourne, and on the whole we have a very good transport system, just as long as you're not in a hurry after 7.00pm or trying to catch a bus on the weekend. One of the things I notice is the lack of amenity on all transport modes if you're waiting the 30-40 minutes between busses or trains at night. For example, along the South Morang line most of the older stations have had their waiting areas locked up behind barred gates. Stations such as Jolimont, West Richmond, Rushall, and Northcote offer no sheltered waiting areas, which gives theses stations a rather bleak and windswept feeling on a cold winter's night. They are the most unwelcoming places on the transport network.
This is some of what lies behind my underlying unease and resentment about the PSOs at these stations. They sit in purpose-built huts while the provision for passenger comfort of a century ago sit gathering dust and bird poo. I consider the expansion of 'law and order' policy to the staffing of railway stations to be a complete failure of government. Why can't we just have old-style station staff? Even, perhaps especially, the antisocial types that used to be such a feature of stations like Tooronga?
Another part of my unease comes from the experience of arriving at Birmingham (UK) in July 2007. In the heightened public panic of the days and weeks following attempted bombings in London and Glasgow the armed police presence around public transport was overwhelmingly visible. I remember being shocked at seeing heavily armed and armoured police wandering around the station concourse, and wondering what it meant for civic life to have people walking around with automatic weapons in a public place.
I am sympathetic with the quandary of PSOs having limited power: they have police-like status without being able to fulfil basic police functions. The latter part of John Silvester's article outlines this quite well, and begs the question of why we even need armed security on station platforms at all. It seems to me that improved passenger amenity -- you know, basic things like shelter and toilets -- would make a far greater difference to public perceptions about the transport system. You don't need police-like status to do that.
