Page 147 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 15 February 2006
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Of the other opportunities and issues that are worth addressing are the potential for this type of public transport infrastructure to work well and how it is working in other places round the country and overseas. In particular, I want to address the issues that are frequently raised in this debate about how you should not be doing that but you should be building light rail, which seems to be the catch-all resort that we hear about from a number of members in this place. The first point I would make is that it is not about what vehicle you use. It is about how good the service is, how frequently it is delivered, and what the infrastructure does in terms of supporting access to and from it.
Light rail and buses can deliver exactly the same level of service. We argue, and the government’s studies back this up, that buses provide a greater level of flexibility. For example, they avoid the need for interchanging. With light rail, you are predominantly required to interchange. Light rail cannot service suburban Canberra. Light rail can only service trunk routes. So, as soon as you put in place light rail, you are requiring everyone who comes out of a suburb to interchange. You must interchange to get onto light rail. You must get off a bus and get onto the light rail.
With a busway, you can get on your bus in your suburb, your bus can service the suburban area and then it can use the trunk route straight into the city centre, with all of the advantages that that offers. There is no need to interchange, no need for that delay in terms of time, hassle, additional fare and whatever the other issues may be. That is one of the issues that the proponents of light rail have to address.
Another issue that the proponents of light rail will have to address, of course, is this fixation which I would really regard as technological determinism: have this vehicle and we get this good result. It is almost a “build it and they will come” attitude. It is not backed up by the facts. Take a look at the experience of bus rapid transit projects that have been put in place in other cities in Australia and overseas. There is a range of projects that are worth citing.
One is the Adelaide north-east busway, a dedicated busway corridor of 12 kilometres, using guided rail technology, which was opened in 1989 and built at a cost of $97 million. Another is the Sydney to Liverpool-Parramatta T-way, a combination of on-street bus lanes and dedicated lanes for 31 kilometres, opened in 2003 at a cost of $315 million. There were significant land acquisition issues in Sydney. Another is the Brisbane south-east busway, a dedicated busway of 16.5 kilometres, opened in 2000-01 at a cost of $400 million and yet another is the Brisbane inner-north busway, stage 1, a dedicated busway of 2.8 kilometres, opened in 2004 at a cost of $135 million. Other cities are also considering busway projects. In particular, more projects are planned and on the drawing board for Sydney, Brisbane and Auckland. It is also well worth highlighting the international experience of this type of public transport infrastructure. This type of public transport infrastructure is well used internationally, particularly in Canada and in a number of countries in South America.
Mr Mulcahy: South America!
MR CORBELL: The best example of that is the one in Curitaba in Brazil, which is recognised internationally as a leader in terms of the way it delivers public transport and integrates it with urban development. It is interesting that the experience in that Brazilian
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