Daily Commute

Inspired by The Age "Management Line" Blog article Daily Commute Blues, here is my typical morning commute, as recorded by me last Monday.

7.15 am leave home, walk to bus stop
7.22 am arrive at bus stop
7.31 am bus arrives at stop (7 minutes late)
7.59 am bus arrives at Indooroopilly Bus Station (12 minutes late)
walk to Indooroopilly Railway Station
8.04 am arrive at railway station
8.06 am train departs Indooroopilly (1 minute late)
8.23 am train arrives Central Station (1 minute late)
walk up hill to office
8.30 am arrive office (dead on time)

The last few days the bus has been arriving at Indooroopilly as late as 8.02 am meaning I get the 8.08 stopping train.

I also recorded it the week after Easter when both schools and universities were on
vacation:

7.15 am leave home, walk to bus stop
7.22 am arrive at bus stop
7.26 am bus arrives at stop (1 minutes late)
7.45 am bus arrives at Indooroopilly Bus Station (2 minutes early)
walk to Indooroopilly Railway Station
7.50 am arrive at railway station
7.51 am train departs Indooroopilly (1 minute late)
8.05 am train arrives Central Station (1 minute late)
walk up hill to office
8.12 am arrive office (18 minutes early)

What a difference education trips make!

About my job

When I interviewed with my employer in February I interviewed for a transport planner job, and said that strategic planning with an emphasis on modelling was where I wanted to go, so to speak. This was seen as acceptable all round.

In the 2 months I have been there, I have probably spent 60 minutes on transport planning. Instead I have been working full time as a project manager. This means:

* Writing weekly and monthly progress reports
* Defining staff tasks and setting deadlines
* Monitoring staff progress
* Organising meetings and workshops, and attending same
* Writing minutes and agendas
* Collecting data and reports from clients
* Allocating staff time to budgets and reallocating as required
* Organising contracts and work tasks for subcontractors
* Sorting out the mess caused by not having everything in place properly the first time

Emotionally draining and intellectually stultifying.

There is absolutely no way I want to do this full time for the rest of my career. In fact, I don't know if I will last till the end of the month, the rate I am going.

grr >:/

April had better be wet

No sooner had I published yesterday's post than we got a spot of rain. Just enough to layer the dust and make me bring the washing in. According to the bureau 1.2mm at Brisbane Airport weather station.

Still, April (and May, June, July) are going to have to be incredibly wet if Brisbane is to avoid disaster. Jan/Feb/Mar are supposed to be the wettest months, but in the March just gone we got less than 1/5 of the average rainfall for the month.

Check the graph below which shows average and past 12 months' rainfall for Brisbane (airport).

I have heard on the grapevine that 'apocalypse' scenarios for Brisbane are being considered: when does trucking of drinking water start, what are the evacuation options if the pipes run dry.

Scary stuff.

Why do they keep saying it will rain?

I have come to the conclusion that the Bureau of Meteorology model to predict short term rainfall needs serious recalibration.

It seems like every week for the past 6 weeks the forecast has been "fine" with showers later in the week. As the week goes by, the forecast slowly changes to "fine" with a few showers by the middle of the next week, and by the middle of the next week, well, you get the picture.

There was even a day (when I was in the country) when I was warned to get home early because a major storm was approaching Brisbane. Brisbane had 1.4mm of rain that day.

The fact is that in the two months that I have been in Brisbane there has been one day of reasonable rain that I can remember, plus one very light sprinkle yesterday.

I get the feeling that normal service won't return any time soon.