Since the beginning of my internship at the Public Transport
Authority I have been planning the opening of the Butler train station.
It was my role to organise most of aspects of the event,
from organising the plaque, the ribbon to cut, the community involvement,
completing the run sheet, to writing promotional material in the lead up to the
event.
While my boss did the very important tasks such as writing
speeches for the Premier and managing media, the planning was very much left as my responsibility.
A week prior to the event everything was on track for a
perfect event. The weather was to be 28 degrees and sunny with minimal wind.
Until three days prior when a storm began to develop. It was to hit at 10:00am
on 21 September, which coincidentally was the start time of our
event.
Contingency plans swung into action. Many of our plans had
to be cancelled or changed. Being a train station we had very little room
inside. Enough room for the guests, but not enough for community activities. Due
to the weather two community activities had to be cancelled. The remaining groups
soldiered on but struggled to proceed in the rain.
Despite the poor weather the official proceedings went ahead perfectly.
The Premier Colin Barnett and Transport Minister Dean Nalder both gave
fantastic motivational speeches to all that were present. The guests then made
their way down to the platform and rode the very first train from Butler
Station.
Click here to see Channel Nine’s coverage of the event.
If you pause this video at 11 seconds you’ll see me in my two seconds
of fame on the right side of the screen in a bright orange t-shirt.
It very was satisfying to see a project I had built up from the ground successfully come together.
Whitney
