President Andrew James
Andrew is the President of the Australian Timetable Association, having taken up the role in 2022. Andrew has held a lifelong interest in transport logistics planning, particularly in rail and aviation, and has been able to further this interest in the many professional roles he has held within the railway industry in both New Zealand and Victoria.
Andrew currently resides in Auckland, New Zealand, where he holds a leadership role in the railway network control space. He has also held the roles of Train Controller in Victoria, Operations Management and Train Driving in Auckland, and Signaller in Auckland.
In addition to his duties as President of the ATA, Andrew is passionate about maintaining our transport history, and has a particular focus within the digital space, especially now that most transport data is digital in nature. Together with other members of the ATA, he is leading the transition to support the digital arm of the National Timetable Collection, and aims to lead the discussion with other like-minded organisations to provide a more formal structure for the retention of our transport history.
Vice President Steven Haby
Secretary Richard May
Richard has been fascinated by timetables from the time as an eight-year-old he found a copy of the South Australian railways public timetable at his grandparents’ home whilst visiting on holidays. Not only has a knowledge of timetables helped him explore many parts of Australia and also countries overseas when visiting on business or holidays, it has also revealed interesting clues as to how society has changed over time. Richard has been a member of the ATA since the late 1980s when he was living and working as a geologist in remote parts of Western Australia and the association’s publications became one of his few sources of reliable information regarding the ever-changing transport scene in Australia.
Treasurer Len Regan
Len’s dedication to timetables and transport information goes back to his school days in Newcastle. In Sydney, in the early days of the NSW Urban Transit Authority he managed a government program to rebuild the timetables and rosters of 35 private bus companies so that buses met the trains and ran improved services on weeknights and weekends. Then as Manager of Newcastle Buses he pioneered the transfer from manual working timetables to computer-based timetables.
For 20 years Len’s business Transit Planners was a strident advocate for public transport improvements. He used many techniques to produce better timetables and integrated public transport information displays and guides.
Len joined AATTC in 1995 and followed Victor Isaacs as Distribution Officer from 2004 to 2012. He became Treasurer in 2008, Membership Officer in 2015 and Archives Officer in 2015.
His major commitment is to the National Timetable Collection. He was a member of the AATTC group that secured the agreement of the State Library of Victoria in 2009 to house and manage the Collection. Since then he has been collecting and storing timetables for the Collection. Once storage space was found at Prahran in 2017, he has undertaken cataloguing of the Collection. He is pleased that the Collection now has a quality library-style home at La Trobe University.
Assistant Treasurer John Abrams
John was born and raised on Sydney’s Lower North Shore. After leaving school he studied pharmacy at the University of Sydney. A few years later he moved to Canberra and spent 35 years in the Department of Health in the administration of the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS), in the pricing of medicines listed on the PBS and later as editor of the PBS Schedule. During that time, he also studied accounting, with an emphasis on cost accounting which was relevant to his work. After retiring from full-time work in the Public Service, he then worked part-time for 12 years for The Pharmacy Guild of Australia as its Pricing officer.
John joined the AATTC, as it was then, in the late 1980s, principally to gain access to the Distribution List, especially railway working timetables and special train notices. He uses these to locate trains that travel over little-used routes and crossovers that are accessed for rail cleaning purposes or during track work closures. He is what in rail-fan circles is termed a ‘microgricer’, seeking to travel over as much different track as possible.
Also, he is one of Hockey ACT’s accredited technical officials, so many Friday nights and weekends in the winter are spent at the Hockey Centre in Lyneham, Canberra.
Member Derek Cheng
Derek was born in Hong Kong where public transport timetables are basically non-existent due to their often frequent service levels. There were some maps available every couple of years but that stopped in the nineties. Bus companies used to post newspaper and bus stop notices for the launch of new services and later became pamphlets cable tied to the bus stop pole.
When his family moved to Sydney in 1995, he discovered the world of timetables at the State Transit information centres in the city. n a random browse in the newsagent he spotted the Travel Times, which lead him to the AATTC.
Derek had since visited all capital cities by 2002 and made sure he harvested a set of current timetables. His collection has grown a lot but has been neglected for 15 years as he relocated to Hong Kong and China for work. He also let his AATTC membership lapse until he returned to Sydney in 2020 and rejoined the current ATA.
Derek’s general interest is in urban bus, tram, train and ferry timetables, network maps and guide books.
He wishes to contribute to the ATA by inputting ideas, help with organising and managing an entity and other ad hoc challenges as they arise.
Member Hilaire Fraser
Hilaire joined the ATA in 2003 and enjoys collaborating with people who share a common interest in collecting and analysing timetables. He values the friendships formed and the collective wisdom of the group. He has served as Distribution Manager, Vice-President and President and continues as a Committee Member from NSW.
Since his teenage years, Hilaire has studied the integration of rail, ferry, tram and bus services, analysing the frequencies and route numbering systems of networks across Australia and New Zealand. He has a strong understanding of the geographical and social perspectives, whilst recognising the historical importance of timetables. Along with his wife, he enjoys transport days which involve exploring the public transport systems of Australian cities, ideally without retracing routes previously travelled.
A regular contributor to the ATA journals, Hilaire provides current news, analysis of transport operations and historical recollections. He also promoted the electronic distribution of our publications to include more colour photographs and links to supplementary material.
As printed timetables are replaced with electronic versions, the ATA is not only faced with a challenge, but a wonderful opportunity. He looks forward to being a part of the ATA as it navigates these changes.
Auctioneer Matthew Gibbins
The Times Editor Geoff Lambert
Dr Geoff Lambert is a professional neuroscientist and an amateur ecologist. He was born in Queenstown, Tasmania, in 1946 and made his first train trip three days later on the Mt Lyell Abt line to Strahan, but doesn’t remember much about it. His father moved to Bacchus Marsh to work for Maddingley Brown Coal in 1949. Until the family house was finished his father was a lodger in a level crossing house and quickly got used to the paper train passing his bedroom. Geoff’s family house was about half a kilometre from the main Adelaide-Melbourne railway. In consequence, all the local boys (AND girls!), himself included, were enthralled by the ever-increasing traffic on the line, through the 1950s … but never knew any details. While track-walking in about 1965, his dog dug up a WTT in the ruins of Rowsley station. From that day on, Geoff became a timetable collector. In about 1967, Jack McLean noticed one of Geoff’s cover photos in Divisional Diary and introduced himself as a “horariologist” (student of timetables). Jack created AATTC in 1983 and Geoff joined it in 1986. Not long after that, he helped Jack and Graham Duffin set up the Sydney branch. In the years since about 1999, Geoff has been The Times Editor, succeeding Graham. In addition to being the Editor, Geoff has also filled the ATA roles of President, Vice President, Secretary, Production Manager, Committee Member, Sydney Branch Convener and — for many years — ATA’s self-appointed archivist. He was closely associated with the late Kent Hannah, his US equivalent in NAOTC, and has presented slide shows about ATA and Australian timetables to NAOTC’s AGMs. He flies all over the planet for Working Timetables.
Table Talk Editor Chris Pandilovski
Chris has been a member of the Association since 2012. Chris has had a life-long interest in scheduling and timetabling, always looking towards optimal resourcing to deliver the best overall outcomes. As an employee at a NSW public transport operator, Chris has a good understanding of public transport operations through both internal and external prisms.
His analytical skills and attention to detail provide a more thorough and impartial delivery of news items, with government releases often needing to be de-spun. He also believes in the value of Table Talk as not just a current news publication, but a journal of current timetable news, in turn providing valuable information for future readers seeking key information on the present.