Page 506 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 19 February 2020
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
Wanniassa, signed by nearly 700 residents, calling broadly on the government to reinstate some, if not all, of the bus services cut from Wanniassa. Why was this the case? The number of patrons dropped dramatically. Many bus routes went through areas where there are few stops or where the stops are remote from residences. Large areas of the suburb have no nearby bus service.
The bus routes take little account of not just the climate in Canberra, where it can be enormously hot during summer and really cold during winter, but whether the walking distance of up to a kilometre or more is suitable and appropriate for residents, including elderly residents, and especially in a suburb like Wanniassa where there are a number of hills. To get to their nearest bus stop, elderly or other residents now have to go up over a hill and down a hill to get to that kilometre-or-so-away bus stop. And the same is the case on the way back. It is not easy for them. It is not easy, and it is having an adverse impact on them—on their inclusion and on their ability to participate in their community and in social events.
It is about elderly people. It is about people with mobility issues or people with disability. It is about parents with prams, and it is about grandparents who are looking after grandchildren and trying to take them out and about during the day. It is evident that this bus network is not meeting the needs of those people.
They are not providing adequate coverage of the suburbs. Bus stops have been closed. Why can we not ensure that Tuggeranong has an adequate bus service? Why? The commencement of the tram from Gungahlin to the city meant cutting bus services and bus stops in Tuggeranong. Why? The people of Tuggeranong just cannot understand why that is the case. I cannot understand why that is the case.
The new network has seen well over 100 tweaks. Now there are more changes coming. I am unsure when tweaks become changes and when changes become a new network; it is just a matter of muddying the waters to show how dismally that bus network is failing the residents of Tuggeranong.
That is just one small snapshot from Tuggeranong as to why my colleague Miss Burch’s motion calling on the minister to apologise for this debacle, this transport disaster, is being debated today. It shows the minister’s dismissal of and disrespect for Tuggeranong residents. It is no wonder that the residents of Tuggeranong, in return, talk about their distrust of this government.
MS LEE (Kurrajong) (3.24): I thank my colleague and fellow member for Kurrajong, Miss Burch, for bringing forward this motion for debate, and for her advocacy for the Canberrans that this government has clearly abandoned in its abysmal handling of public transport.
It matters little whether this is network 19 version 2 tweaks or network 20; whatever they want to call it, it is still a dud in so many ways. There are schools that have no buses, despite promises. Other bus users were told they would be listened to but they have not been. There is still no certainty about weekend services, especially Sunday services.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video