Greens for light rail

zephyr9673 said :

I hope they get in, the frustration of a party that aims for balance of power is pathetic.
Greens you are are in politics to rule, be prepared to take government or be prepared to be thrown out.

I am reminded of Labor in the Norther Territory, very comfortable in oppostion, that is annoying, to an electorate, The CLP got so bad laber fell into power, this is the situation for the greens, aiming for enough power to stifle, that is very annoying.

They should keep thier focus on Refugees, Labour and the coalition are as pathetically racist as each other, the greens have the only humane position, but are happy to aim for the balance of power. Let me say it another way, we have 2 Racist positions and a dynamic responsive young political party, that hasn’t realised it needs to win this election.

I hope they storm home, and the country wakes up watching, you entered politics, you should have stayed on the doll if you didn’t want a job.

Now, sit down while I explain something to you. The Greens are aiming to hold the balance of power as it is the best they can possibly achieve. To form Government in their own right they would need to secure the majority of votes (after preferences) in the majority of seats in the country. This will not happen.

I hope they get in, the frustration of a party that aims for balance of power is pathetic.
Greens you are are in politics to rule, be prepared to take government or be prepared to be thrown out.

I am reminded of Labor in the Norther Territory, very comfortable in oppostion, that is annoying, to an electorate, The CLP got so bad laber fell into power, this is the situation for the greens, aiming for enough power to stifle, that is very annoying.

They should keep thier focus on Refugees, Labour and the coalition are as pathetically racist as each other, the greens have the only humane position, but are happy to aim for the balance of power. Let me say it another way, we have 2 Racist positions and a dynamic responsive young political party, that hasn’t realised it needs to win this election.

I hope they storm home, and the country wakes up watching, you entered politics, you should have stayed on the doll if you didn’t want a job.

Has anyone had a look at the Gold Coast light rail website lately? Their initial 13km railway is costing $949 million, only $365 million of which is coming from the Federal Government.

A light rail in Canberra would need to be in the region of 40km (Y plan; Originating in Belco and Gungahlin, meeting in Civic and carrying on to Woden and Tuggeranong with a spur going from Civic to the airport. Doing the rough maths, ie $73 million per km including stops, A Canberra light rail, at today’s costs, would be up around the $3 billion mark.

What percentage of that could the ACT government afford? And, would the Federal Government be prepared to fund the balance?

Here’s a public transport solution for ya:
http://dvice.com/archives/2010/08/crazy-huge-chin.php

I don’t think a light rail will be of any real use. They can’t even sort out the Bus timetables properly.So how are they going to get that going?
Will Homer Simpson be driving?

What is all this change for the sake of change?

The “Canberra isn’t exciting” is a load of clap trap perptuated by people who no nothing about Canberra

A light rail isn’t going to change the misconceptions of the Canberra Bashers

Oh, I think I was on page one when I made that comment. It’s gonna look a little wrong dozens of replies later. My apologies..

Wish you were up for election in the next local showdown Braddon Boy, wouldn’t it be nice to have someone there who didn’t just visualise metal scraps and dicky signs as high class art and pretty painted roads and a tree place that trees just walk out the door on.

I am so ‘out to lunch’ on this debate though.. Love the thought of it and always have but it doesn’t make me want the greens in for it. I love the thought of the greens too, but I don’t think that worked!

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

This is the first year of my voting life I’ve looked around and decided that all of the parties are f*cking no-hopers. There’s not even a ‘lesser of two evils’, or a ‘you’re dumb but they’re dumber’. The race to the bottom must be nearing its end.

Vote Cthulhu: Don’t settle for the lesser evil!

With the Greens proving themselves to be fairly useless when supposedly able to influence government (eg in the ACT currently), I don’t think I have much faith in them doing anything significantly green OR useful in the Federal scene.

I thought at least we in Canberra might get a green-waste service or an annual kerb-side pickup of non-standard rubbish (eg computers, TVs, whitegoods, other waste) but something so practical and enviro-friendly doesn’t seem to be that important to our green Green local politicians.

Urban, you been sucking in spores while exploring them sewers?

The Age and podcasts from the ABC radio in Melbourne, will tell you how bad the trains are in that city and how the trams are ancient and wheelchair unfriendly and do not service the great metro area. Last Tuesday in fact the whole train system came to a halt forcing Govco to gives free public tranport this Friday past to all.

Well, here’s an interesting and VERY little know fact. Canberra HAS had a working tram way with a fare charging tram operating on it. I actually drove that tram myself on a couple of runs. It was for a very short period, and the route was less than a kilometre on a temporary track along the north side of Kings Way heading east from the Civic swimmming pool to the round about.

Also, the Hi-Trans reports were for medium sized cities of up to half a million. Anyone who would suggest that public transport in Melbourne is bad must have arrived there on a Sunday, durng a power blackout. Public transport in Melbourne is brilliant! It rivals cities such as London, Paris, New York and Chicago. You really do not need a car in many parts of Melbourne. It is easier to travel by public transport.

I personally would like to see Canberra move from being a little town to a fully fledged city with light rail. But yes, I agree with many that this gets banddied around as an election ploy and I’ve yet to see any new light rail built tat wasn’t anything more than a temporary tourist attraction.

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

You do realize that the bus service runs other routes besides the inter-town right?

*hand on cheek, jaw dropped*

Why no, I hadn’t realised that! I just assumed that the 2xx express I catch to and from work most days was misnumbered and driven by somebody who wasn’t sure about the fastest route between town centres. Thank you so much for pointing that out. You’re clearly Classics material.

I can’t wait til they build a light rail stop a block from my front door where the bus stop is now. I mean, it’s heavily developed suburbia, so it’ll have to be underground, an elevated monorail or they’ll just knock down some houses. But what an age we’ll live in!

What I meant was that you only seem to refer to to the inter-town when commenting about the bus service, and from your second comment you don’t seem to realize the extent to which having light rail take over the inter-town routes will improve suburban routes by allowing action to concentrate their resources to those routes. So there will be no light-rail to your house, but there will be more buses available to feed into the light rail system.

The local lobby group must have not heard about this, as there has been no update to their website for almost a year:

http://www.actlightrail.info/

Maybe they are still at one of their monthly meetings?

You do realize that the bus service runs other routes besides the inter-town right?

*hand on cheek, jaw dropped*

Why no, I hadn’t realised that! I just assumed that the 2xx express I catch to and from work most days was misnumbered and driven by somebody who wasn’t sure about the fastest route between town centres. Thank you so much for pointing that out. You’re clearly Classics material.

I can’t wait til they build a light rail stop a block from my front door where the bus stop is now. I mean, it’s heavily developed suburbia, so it’ll have to be underground, an elevated monorail or they’ll just knock down some houses. But what an age we’ll live in!

Erg0 said :

thy_dungeonman said :

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

Isn’t that the point, though? Replacing the inter-town buses with light rail isn’t going to address the shortcomings in the rest of Canberra’s public transport. Don’t get me wrong, I think that light rail will be better than the current buses, but I don’t think it should be the first thing that money is spent on when improving public transport in this city.

Yes but light rail being independently run to ACTION will give ACTION the ability to concentrate resources on suburban routes rather than the inter-town service which probably takes up most of their buses atm running ever 5 minutes. And the choice here is really light-rail given to us by the federal government or nothing at all, so whether or not it’s the best way to address Canberra’s transport needs it’s certainly the only solution that’s has any chance of seeing the light of day given how much the local labor government cares about public transport.

thy_dungeonman said :

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

And a 300 bus is going north or south.

You do realize that the bus service runs other routes besides the inter-town right? and sure if you take that as an example of the other routes they would seem to be doing a good job, but the 300 route is the only route that even approaches reliability and convenience in the whole bus system.

Isn’t that the point, though? Replacing the inter-town buses with light rail isn’t going to address the shortcomings in the rest of Canberra’s public transport. Don’t get me wrong, I think that light rail will be better than the current buses, but I don’t think it should be the first thing that money is spent on when improving public transport in this city.

sepi said :

Everytime I try to catch an ACTION bus the route has changed and the price has gone up by about a dollar.

You clearly don’t catch busses very often

sepi said :

And the bus that used to go from our house to work was abolished. We bought the second car.

Sounds like an excuse – I am sure you wouldn’t have to walk much further to an alternative bus stop/route

sepi said :

ACTION buses are packed to capacity, not coping with demand, cot a fortune and still make a loss. how can it not be time to try something else.

Some busses are quite full, most are not. And seriously, what is the worst thing that is going to happen – you’re going to have to stand up?

sepi said :

As Canberra grows and grows, a transport system with a larger carrying capacity than buses will be needed – why not get started on one now?

Then why not spend the money that would go on this white elephant on making the bus system even better?

I just don’t get why people are so opposed to this. If you personally believe you would not use light rail, fine, but why can the whole idea?

Because it is a bad idea and a waste of money. I don’t believe in supporting bad ideas just because they are ideas – I would be surprised if anyone did

the current public transport system is really not good.

I completely disagree – It works very, very well for me and has for a long time.

tbh i’d rather they create and express bus down the middle of northborne between the trees.

Pandy said :

What do the proponents for light rail want down Northbourne?

An inter-town high speed rail link with high density cluster housing around the stations at limited points along the way with commuter parking nearby? That could allow speeds of up to 80km/h with running and be situated down the centre of the median strip and with priority crossing given to the very fast light rail.
Think Adelaide.

Or trams with stops situated every 400m travelling at an average of 18km/h. This would allow for high density apartments right along Northbourne, especially where those crappy 50s public housing units are.
The track could be situated on the kerb side lane making the trams more accessible to the user, instead of having to cross 3 lanes of traffic and lycra clad recumbent cyclists. Think Melbourne.

I think pretty much all the serious proposals for rail in Canberra are based on the former system, a high frequency, mostly grade separated and dedicated right of way system with limited stops connecting major activity centres, with the intention of encouraging development around stations.

Everytime I try to catch an ACTION bus the route has changed and the price has gone up by about a dollar.

And the bus that used to go from our house to work was abolished. We bought the second car.

ACTION buses are packed to capacity, not coping with demand, cot a fortune and still make a loss. how can it not be time to try something else.

As Canberra grows and grows, a transport system with a larger carrying capacity than buses will be needed – why not get started on one now?

I just don’t get why people are so opposed to this. If you personally believe you would not use light rail, fine, but why can the whole idea?

the current public transport system is really not good.

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

And a 300 bus is going north or south.

You do realize that the bus service runs other routes besides the inter-town right? and sure if you take that as an example of the other routes they would seem to be doing a good job, but the 300 route is the only route that even approaches reliability and convenience in the whole bus system.

What do the proponents for light rail want down Northbourne?

An inter-town high speed rail link with high density cluster housing around the stations at limited points along the way with commuter parking nearby? That could allow speeds of up to 80km/h with running and be situated down the centre of the median strip and with priority crossing given to the very fast light rail.
Think Adelaide.

Or trams with stops situated every 400m travelling at an average of 18km/h. This would allow for high density apartments right along Northbourne, especially where those crappy 50s public housing units are.
The track could be situated on the kerb side lane making the trams more accessible to the user, instead of having to cross 3 lanes of traffic and lycra clad recumbent cyclists. Think Melbourne.

They don’t for buses now because the bus system changes so frequently

Oh please. A couple of routes every six months, maybe? And we bus users seem to cope.

Try carrying out that conversation if you are a Japanese tourist or Chinese migrant with limited English ability.

Because foreigners are stupid, amirite? I mean, they might be able to fly here, and get to a transport hub, but after that they’re useless. And what a few hundred mill when we’re talking about maybe reducing temporary confusion for a tiny minority of people? Money well spent.

You can be pretty damn sure a train is going to head one of two directions along a track

And a 300 bus is going north or south.

(Thanks for the Claverton link, by the way – very interesting!)

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

People will come to rely on it, pay more for a home near it, and not buy a second car because it will always be there

Like they don’t for buses now?.

They don’t for buses now because the bus system changes so frequently, just because a bus stop is serviced by a direct route to the city now doesn’t mean it will be in 6 months time. If a rail station has a couple of hundred million worth of tracks and right of way to the city, you can be pretty sure it still will in 20 years time.

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

many more people (about twice as much) will catch a rail

Got any evidence?

“Consistent market research and experience over the last 50 years in Europe and North America shows that car commuters are willing to transfer some trips to rail-based public transport but not to buses. Typically light rail systems attract between 30 and 40% of their patronage from former car trips. Rapid transit bus systems attract less than 5% of trips from cars, less than the variability of traffic.”

http://www.claverton-energy.com/sustainable-light-rail-2.html

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

occasional users and tourists

Yes, let’s spend a tonne of cash and years of time so that ‘occasional users’ are ‘less confused’.

Given that with the exception of the Federal Public Service, Tourism is the largest employer and contributor to the ACT economy, it might not be a bad idea.

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

“Does this bus go to Woden?”

“No, Platform 9, love. Five minutes.”
“Gosh. I wish somebody had spent hundreds of millions of tax dollars so I could’ve avoided that situation. It will haunt me til the end of my days.”

Try carrying out that conversation if you are a Japanese tourist or Chinese migrant with limited English ability.

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

The light rail route is also clearly defined with clearly defined stops

Is it the bus interchanges you have trouble ‘defining’, or the non-moving structures on the side of the road with signs that say ‘BUS STOP’?

No, it is the ROUTE in particular that is hard to define. You can be pretty damn sure a train is going to head one of two directions along a track, a bus could go anywhere on the road system.

Braddon Boy said :

The point is though, people are talking it down with untruths and emotional rubbish and clearly have little idea of what the potential is. They just think their precious road space, which is their God given right, will be stolen from them.

What’s up with that? It really does have the potential for a simply awesome outcome, why do so many people focus on the “well it might fail” aspect.

Look at the GDE or Sydney Cross City Tunnel, badly planned and executed infrustructure is still badly planned and executed infrustructure, regardless of whether it is rail or road.

The other thing I don’t understand is how drivers seem vehemently opposed to light rail and public transport in general with the “it’s going to make traffic worse” opinion. If you want nothing more than to drive your car, then isn’t it in your best interest to try and get as many current drivers off the road and into public transport, rather than pushing for more roads which lure more people into their cars?

Look at what happened to Melbourne, since the 1969 Melbourne Transport plan the government there has poured money into new roads and freeways and neglected public transport to the point that The European Community’s HiTrans best practice Guide to public transport network planning uses Melbourne as it’s case study on how not to plan and execute public transport.

And surprise surprise, despite such heavy road investment, traffic congestion there is still thoroughly horrible.

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

For such an educated city, we can be incredibly short sighted.

For an educated person, you fail at…well, so many things, Let’s make a list, shall we?

People will come to rely on it, pay more for a home near it, and not buy a second car because it will always be there

Like they don’t for buses now? And the government should spend however many millions of dollars so it can improve property values for a privileged few? Excellent argument.

From experience ACTION buses are very liable to change routes, so it doesn’t really make sense in the long term to let it influence your housing decision. The point of improving property values is to reduce the cost of light rail indirectly through increased revenue from property sales, something the government seems to practically live on atm.

many more people (about twice as much) will catch a rail

Got any evidence?

No, but light rail certainly has a more reliable reputation than buses, plus tit is easier for cyclists to use and generally more pleasant to ride on.

occasional users and tourists

Yes, let’s spend a tonne of cash and years of time so that ‘occasional users’ are ‘less confused’.

“Does this bus go to Woden?”
“No, Platform 9, love. Five minutes.”
“Gosh. I wish somebody had spent hundreds of millions of tax dollars so I could’ve avoided that situation. It will haunt me til the end of my days.”

Thank goodness you were there but some people aren’t so lucky, apart from the inter-town route, it does require some knowledge to figure out which bus to catch, especially with frequent route changes, a train route is visible and it is obvious it can only go from A to B, a bus route on the otherhand is (apart from on a route map) invisible and punctuated by stops that may or may not be used. Also making it easier for occasional users helps to turn them into regular users and as for tourists, I once had a Japanese exchange student staying with me, she knew the bus routes to get to college where we but when the bus inevitably failed to arrive on time (by at least 20-40 minutes) she would say “it’s so bad of ACTION”, I did feel quite embarrassed this is the capital after all.

they will be on the main arterials and through town centres

So totally different to buses then, which use main arterials and travel through town centres. Gotcha.

I think he’s simply stating this to explain how it would being integrated with the bus network.

The light rail route is also clearly defined with clearly defined stops

Is it the bus interchanges you have trouble ‘defining’, or the non-moving structures on the side of the road with signs that say ‘BUS STOP’?

I refer to my comments about visibility before. but also with a bus interchange any bus going in any direction will stop at a no-relative point at the interchange, whereas a train will either go in one direction or another, towards or away from where you want to go.

recruitment of drivers

“It’s hard to find bus drivers these days.”
“Let’s spend a few hundred million on trains!”
“Maybe we could use a fraction of that money to increase pay rates for bus drivers.”
“Choo choo!”

It’s not ACTION paying for the light rail, it’s federal funding and light rail doesn’t go “choo” Plus there are more issue than simply money with the whole recruitment problems, maybe if ACTION could get their stuff together we wouldn’t need light rail, but they can’t so we do.

It has often been said … I know some people

Oh, well that settles it then. ‘They’ say so, and you totally ‘know some people’.
And some lady was able to find the inter-town after talking to you, no light rail no.

See you on the bus. You know, the one that’s cheap and runs between town centres every five minutes using roads we already have.

Maybe cheap at a user level but what about the report that they were wasting up to %30 of their funding? Sure it runs between town centers every 5 minutes but apparently Canberra is one of those cities were the population isn’t concentrated away in town centers. And was many people have stated the suburb to center services are quite poor. I myself hve experience this, having to ride instead of take the unreliable, unconnected bus from warmanga to woden and then take the bus with my bike to civic, It’s a 20 minute car journey but a 1+ hour journey using only buses.

Just think of light rail as a more pleasant and efficient inter-town service that will allow a better suburban services, take up less road space and use less fuel.

The problem with buses is they travel on the roads that cars use.
The belconnen bus way was a good idea. As is light rail that doesn’t use the roads.
I don’t catch buses because i may as well drive. But a lot of people commute between the town centres. If i could drive 5 minutes to the town centre and light rail to the city say in 10-15 minutes, i’d catch it.

If the light rail was a dedicated busway, it would probably still work as well. You keep the cars for local use to and from town centres. Car parking would be located in the suburbs on cheaper land as well.

Nobody ever wants to pay for anything. Happy to take tax cuts and then complain about lack of infrastructure and services. Liberals were happy to manage the economoy so well and spend nothing but give tax cuts. Labor now want to spend money and put country into debt. We can’t win it seems.

Looking at the maps that the Greens have provided it appears that O’Connor Ridge is not longer considered significant or sacred to them any more.

The proposed track would take the exact line that the proposed spur road for the GDE could have taken across the O’Connor ridge from many years ago.

Obviously this is just a case of hollow promises and election pork barrelling green style – if it comes to build it they will decide to ultimately reject it on environmental grounds.

colourful sydney racing identity said :

the head said :

colourful sydney racing identity said :

Stalinist much? The Greens propose it. Do not debate it’s merits. Accept your new overlords.

Stalinist a little, perhaps.

Sometimes leading a horse to water isn’t enough; you have to shove his head in the river and show him what he needs….. or let him drown figuring it out.

touche.

Indeed; e.g. just two years ago trying to outfit a new home with efficient and attractive lighting was near impossible. Finally incandescent globes get banned and suddenly the market is flooded with efficent and affordable products.

the head said :

colourful sydney racing identity said :

Stalinist much? The Greens propose it. Do not debate it’s merits. Accept your new overlords.

Stalinist a little, perhaps.

Sometimes leading a horse to water isn’t enough; you have to shove his head in the river and show him what he needs….. or let him drown figuring it out.

touche.

colourful sydney racing identity said :

Stalinist much? The Greens propose it. Do not debate it’s merits. Accept your new overlords.

Stalinist a little, perhaps.

Sometimes leading a horse to water isn’t enough; you have to shove his head in the river and show him what he needs….. or let him drown figuring it out.

the head said :

What a small minded bunch you are in Canberra. You get a proposal (from the party who will likely hold the keys to the Senate and federal funding of such a project) for a massive improvement in your public transport infrastructure and you whinge and moan.

“We’re too small”, “I like my car”, “Greens are crazy”.

Attitudes like the one’s shown here just prove that Canberra doesn’t deserve one cent of federal funding towards an initiative like this. How sad that Canberra will only ever be known for Porn, Pyrotechnics and Pollies. At least you’ve got Summernats.

Stalinist much? The Greens propose it. Do not debate it’s merits. Accept your new overlords.

For such an educated city, we can be incredibly short sighted.

For an educated person, you fail at…well, so many things, Let’s make a list, shall we?

Why are Canberrans so scared of anything new?

Maybe if you put a little hat on that straw man he can drive your imaginary train.

People will come to rely on it, pay more for a home near it, and not buy a second car because it will always be there

Like they don’t for buses now? And the government should spend however many millions of dollars so it can improve property values for a privileged few? Excellent argument.

many more people (about twice as much) will catch a rail

Got any evidence?

occasional users and tourists

Yes, let’s spend a tonne of cash and years of time so that ‘occasional users’ are ‘less confused’.

“Does this bus go to Woden?”
“No, Platform 9, love. Five minutes.”
“Gosh. I wish somebody had spent hundreds of millions of tax dollars so I could’ve avoided that situation. It will haunt me til the end of my days.”

they will be on the main arterials and through town centres

So totally different to buses then, which use main arterials and travel through town centres. Gotcha.

The light rail route is also clearly defined with clearly defined stops

Is it the bus interchanges you have trouble ‘defining’, or the non-moving structures on the side of the road with signs that say ‘BUS STOP’?

recruitment of drivers

“It’s hard to find bus drivers these days.”
“Let’s spend a few hundred million on trains!”
“Maybe we could use a fraction of that money to increase pay rates for bus drivers.”
“Choo choo!”

It has often been said … I know some people

Oh, well that settles it then. ‘They’ say so, and you totally ‘know some people’.

See you on the bus. You know, the one that’s cheap and runs between town centres every five minutes using roads we already have.

I am a born and bred Canberran… and I am the kid that once I dreamed of a Roller Coaster to take me to Primary School (instead of walking). That would have been cool.

This “proposal” comes up at every election. I believe there were even plans at one stage, as Canberra (well inner Canberra) was designed for a light rail, which is why the median strip down Northbourne is so wide.

Whilst I can see both sides of the argument, having done some time in Russia and the UK, as well as Perth and Sydney… I would definitely catch a light rail.
If only for the non-stress of getting to work.
Buses in this town have always been bad, but they were better when I was a kid.
A light rail could also connect to the far reaching “Canberra District”, such as Quangers, Bungendore, Yass, Murrumbateman etc… for all those folks commuting in every day.

I am a “for” light rail… but I also know it will never happen.

Thumper, don’t get me wrong, I don’t think it will happen either, at least not for quite a while. But if enough people support it then, in theory at least, as a democracy the governments should do it. If for no other reason than they will get themselves re-elected.

The point is though, people are talking it down with untruths and emotional rubbish and clearly have little idea of what the potential is. They just think their precious road space, which is their God given right, will be stolen from them. They are probably the same sort of people that would have complained about damming the Molonglo to make LBG (we’ll lose our crossings), building of the airport (we’ve got the train), building Parliament House (too much money, what’s wrong with the old one?), paving Garema Place for pedestrians (oh no, not our road!!!), I could go on.

For such an educated city, we can be incredibly short sighted.

Erg0 said :

the head said :

Like a light rail system for the Gold Coast perhaps?

I don’t know much about public transport on the Gold Coast, so I couldn’t really say. I do know that it’s got nothing to do with public transport in Canberra, though.

It is a system that had a serious application from the Qld Govt and was funded under IA. Vision + govt support = positive outcome.

As to why not buses – one big reason: trains can fit bi-directional lanes in a much narrower corridor than for buses. (Think Northbourne *between* the trees.

Erg0 said :

the head said :

Like a light rail system for the Gold Coast perhaps?

I don’t know much about public transport on the Gold Coast, so I couldn’t really say. I do know that it’s got nothing to do with public transport in Canberra, though.

Except that funding from the federal government would be used in either or both of them. I just assumed that people in Canberra who pay taxes to the Federal Government would want to see some of that money returned to their local community in the form of projects that a city Canberra’s size otherwise wouldn’t be able to fund. But I guess you’re right, taxes raised in Canberra should be spent on other cities.

Your donation to a ‘project X’ in ‘marginal seat Y’ is much appreciated Erg0.

Why are Canberrans so scared of anything new? To the point of using lies and fear to get people to see it their way. People have to remember, this is light rail, not trams. Think trains that can go on the road and interact with pedestrians. Compared to trams and heavy rail, it’s the best of both worlds. It’s fast, reliable, own right of way (mostly), quiet, limited well defined stops, aesthetically sympathetic, etc.

The fact that light rail isn’t flexible is one of its strengths. People will come to rely on it, pay more for a home near it, and not buy a second car because it will always be there. Granted, the reason for this is largely psychological but being able to see the tracks is a big part of this. The importance of this is not to be underestimated, for the same route, same travel time and same frequency, many more people (about twice as much) will catch a rail based transport over buses, even with busways in place. In contrast, ACTION change their timetable seemingly every 6 months, how can the occasional users keep up.

Property prices around stations do increase, and to say otherwise is a blatant lie. To not include this fact in any cost/benefit analysis is shoddy work. In any case, the PricewaterhouseCoopers report showed that a light rail system in Canberra would have a cost/benefit ratio of 1.62, and that was with a grossly inflated construction cost.

The light rail route is also clearly defined with clearly defined stops. This helps immensely with the legibility of the system and for occasional users and tourists. The current bus system has got to be one of the most complicated systems for any non regular user compared to any major city. (I know we are not a major city.) This is something else that will attract users that otherwise would not have used a bus system.

No, it will not go trundling down every quiet suburban street, they will be on the main arterials and through town centres. They are surprisingly quiet and unobtrusive, I know what I would prefer to have go past as I’m sitting at a café talking to friends. Light rail is different to the noisy rattlers they have in Melbourne and 100 times better than diesel buses.

One of the problems the management of ACTION is having at the moment is recruitment of drivers. With light rail, many drivers will be freed up to service the suburbs more frequently and act as a feeder service to the rail system. This will increase the frequency and reliability over the whole public transport system.

It has often been said that the lack of a decent public transport system is holding Canberra back. A proper, integrated and well funded public transport system has the power to transform the liveability of a city.

I know some people like it quiet with nothing going on and no excitement for anyone, but you can move to Yass or Bungendore. Canberra is the nation’s capital and should be an exciting, lively and happening city, instead we are populated by people who are so afraid of change.

PrinceOfAles said :

When did this town become so cynical of everything?

2nd March, 1991.

Last night I cycled from Hackett to Manuka, saw some friends and went to a movie. It took me about 45 minutes to get there on my not very fast bike (it’s over an hour by bus) and when the movie finished at 12 I had a way of getting home even though the buses had finished. By car it would have been about 15 minutes and given me the same flexibility for staying late.

While light rail seems like a sensible idea, it’s certain that the bus was a useless option yesterday. It was car vs bike. I usually only take the bus when I want to go into Civic or another town centre.

My only concern with the light rail idea is that it would be geographically limited and without proper timetables and information services people are going to find it just as hard to plot light rail into their travel as it is currently to coordinate multiple buses particularly when you don’t know which bus you want! I imagine I’d have to hoof it down to Northbourne to catch the train to Manuka so for a quick travel I’d need to catch the #2 bus to Dickson. It’s going to work best if there is a great route finder like in Sydney. Better yet if there’s an iphone app!

the head said :

Like a light rail system for the Gold Coast perhaps?

I don’t know much about public transport on the Gold Coast, so I couldn’t really say. I do know that it’s got nothing to do with public transport in Canberra, though.

Erg0 said :

the head said :

What a small minded bunch you are in Canberra. You get a proposal (from the party who will likely hold the keys to the Senate and federal funding of such a project) for a massive improvement in your public transport infrastructure and you whinge and moan.

“We’re too small”, “I like my car”, “Greens are crazy”.

Attitudes like the one’s shown here just prove that Canberra doesn’t deserve one cent of federal funding towards an initiative like this. How sad that Canberra will only ever be known for Porn, Pyrotechnics and Pollies. At least you’ve got Summernats.

Please excuse my desire for your tax dollars to be spent on something useful.

Like a light rail system for the Gold Coast perhaps?

The intertown bus service is excellent in peak times – the problems are the connections at either end. If you only have a short walk at one end then it is much faster / cheaper than driving.
I like aussieboy’s idea to be able to request a lift to the town centre – I wonder if there have been any studies on this sort of thing.

In the future, as the size of the city increases (and hoprefully as the utilisation of public transport increases) then converting the intertown services from busses to light rail makes sense. The ALP recognised this and wanted to pave the way for this by having dedicated bus corridors that could be easily converted.

People should remember that in no largish city is one form of public transport successful. London has the tube, main line rail and buses. What you want is an integrated network, convenient timetabling and single ticketing. Maybe its time for the next plank. These things have long lead times and waiting till congestion is twice as bad or petrol prices doubles doesn’t make sense.

The car will always be the main form of transport in Canberra but we should always be striving to give people a range of transport options to meet their needs in a sustainable fashion. More people using efficient public transport will help keep road congestion down. It would be great if more people gave it a go rather than slagging it off (funny as it can be).

Meanwhile I’m off to read up on the Greens light rail report.

Trains could work well – if the system was set up decently, ran frequently, was cheap to use and integrated with the buses. Use the train to replace the intercity buses, take the intercity buses and add them to the suburb feeder runs, make them more frequent, add in some minibuses as outlined by aussieboy.

aussieboy the advantage is that trains should be able to scale up easier than buses can.

Richard Bender said:

“They probably looked at real experience, e.g. Portland in the United States, to find that people prefer to live in areas with good road access rather than good rail access. The myth of increased property values with rail is exactly that, a myth”.

Portland is a sh*t hole with a whole heap of infrastructure and social issues = a very poor example.

Try looking at European cities and you’ll see that rail infrastructure is the bedrock of a functioning, vibrant city where people what to live. The greater Washington DC area is also a stellar example – plenty of people living on the periphery, travelling into the capital via rail. The “rail corridors” in Virginia and Maryland are booming – with property prices going through the roof (or were before the GFC hit).

Anyway, point is, there are clear examples where this type of infrastructure is the best option by far. Building more roads is a very poor option. Either way, its got to go underground at some point in the future. Why not link up the satelite suburbs with fast modern light rail. Get rid of buses and unclog the roads!

the head said :

What a small minded bunch you are in Canberra. You get a proposal (from the party who will likely hold the keys to the Senate and federal funding of such a project) for a massive improvement in your public transport infrastructure and you whinge and moan.

“We’re too small”, “I like my car”, “Greens are crazy”.

Attitudes like the one’s shown here just prove that Canberra doesn’t deserve one cent of federal funding towards an initiative like this. How sad that Canberra will only ever be known for Porn, Pyrotechnics and Pollies. At least you’ve got Summernats.

Please excuse my desire for your tax dollars to be spent on something useful.

Grr damned html tags.

the head said :

What a small minded bunch you are in Canberra. You get a proposal (from the party who will likely hold the keys to the Senate and federal funding of such a project) for a massive improvement in your public transport infrastructure and you whinge and moan.

“We’re too small”, “I like my car”, “Greens are crazy”.

Indeed. It seems the John Hargreaves Vision Vacuum is infectious.
Even Stanhope is putting it down in the Times today, using inaccurate and spurious ‘information’.

As I wrote to the Times this morning:

Jon Stanhope is wrong to claim the cost-benefit analysis for a Canberra light rail system does not stack up. Their own report by Pricewaterhouse Coopers showed a net benefit to the community in excess of $1 billion in reduced road construction, maintenance, reduced bus costs and much more. It came down to a return on investment of almost 15%!

The ACT Government’s own report demonstrated that to not go ahead with light rail effectively equates to them being negligent with our money.

And yet the PWC report underestimated the benefit of rail by failing to include the increased land values along the dedicated public transport routes. Rail would be unable to be undone by a single foolhardy decision like the ACT Government’s route slashing that so damaged Action’s reputation in 2007-08. That would translate into increased rate revenue and land sale prices.

Stanhope’s bid to Infrastructure Australia was also ‘designed to fail’. The fund was clearly only for ‘shovel ready’ projects. But the bid asked for funding for the entire network in one hit. Yet the PWC report stated nothing could start for several years, thus ensuring it would not get approved.

If Stanhope is a leader of vision for Canberra’s transport future, he should submit a new Infrastructure Australia bid for stage one of a staged light rail implementation, taking full advantage of the benefits of upcoming land sales along the proposed routes.

I support the idea in theory but strongly doubt it will ever happen. Just too hard to implement and will be way, way too costly. Frustrates the heck out me that my 10km bus ride in to Civic can take over an hour, hence I mostly cycle (in about 25 minutes). If there was a train I still have to get to the station and wait for it, which still has to take around an hour no matter what.

I think there are far simpler and easier ideas. For example, in Melbourne the train ride is free if you’re in the city before 7am. The ACT goverment could implement this overnight and it would immediately help all traffic flow in and around Civic in the mornings. Did everyone see how quiet it was on the roads when ACTION had their strike? It could be almost this quiet every day!

What a small minded bunch you are in Canberra. You get a proposal (from the party who will likely hold the keys to the Senate and federal funding of such a project) for a massive improvement in your public transport infrastructure and you whinge and moan.

“We’re too small”, “I like my car”, “Greens are crazy”.

Attitudes like the one’s shown here just prove that Canberra doesn’t deserve one cent of federal funding towards an initiative like this. How sad that Canberra will only ever be known for Porn, Pyrotechnics and Pollies. At least you’ve got Summernats.

This would be a good solution if it serviced most of Canberra – So a line that covered Belconnen to Civic to Woden,Tuggeranong, Erindale, Gung-ghastly etc so we could get quickly between the town centres.

Oh sorry, thats what the Action bus network is meant to do.

So who is to say that a light rail system will be any more timely than a Bus? People complain of waiting too long out of peak for buses. How will it be any different for light rail? And of course we need all the infrastructure, carriages (lots of carriages = lots of $$) drivers etc etc etc.

Improve AACTION, give us more services, more EXPRESS services between interchanges – that means not just Expresso’s but also express 300 services from Belconnen to Civic to Woden to Tuggeranong without all the stops in between.

Bring on light rail for the future. Buses aren’t the answer as roads will become more and more clogged as time goes on. This city needs to get away from it’s dependency on cars, better city planning that wasn’t so car-centric would help too.

Such a shame its the tree-huggers who are pushing this idea so as a result it will never be implemented.

And where are people going to park at these magical light rail stations? Or do you catch a bus to the light rail station, wait, catch the light rail? If the later, it won’t work in the same way that people hate changing buses at Belco at the moment instead of having straight through travel to civic.

People need to think really really hard about what we are trying to replicate. Successes like Portland or Melbourne are a completely different scale to canberra (like 2-4 million people instead of 400k).

The size of Canberra does not warrant traffic bypassing type public transport as the traffic is not bad enough and never has to be. We seem to be trying to kill off one of the benefits and attractions of Canberra.

Talking to a random NRMA insurance person the other day on the phone (she was sydney based) she was saying how her husband always talked about his visits to Canberra where you could drive anywhere in 20 minutes. Yes there are exceptions – but this is a positive that people like about Canberra.

If you want to spend some dollars on rail, lets look further afield where distances could be cut by fast transport and build a fast transport system to Yass, Goulburn or Batemans Bay. You could easily increase the population centres of these places very rapidly if you had fast, regular easy transport and at the same time take some pressure of houing in Canberra. Crazy? Probably? Any less crazy? Well….

where would it even go? down the middle of northborne?

I say keep the buses, or monorail… monorail *starts dancing*

When did this town become so cynical of everything?

What’s the point?

The intertown/redex bus services are really good (better than anything in Sydney) – very frequent, lots of dedicated bus lanes, high quality interchanges and direct routes.

Over the current offering, light rail offers no distinct advantage – both good bus corridors and tramways can provide effective mass transit.

The problem in Canberra is what happens in the suburbs. Density is far too low here for frequent buses, let alone trams. Its time the Gov started contemplating more progressive public transport policy – here’s some food for thought:

Imagine if there was a fleet of minibuses run by Action.

Every house/business would have a stop within 400m of the front door.
15mins before you needed transport, you’ simply request a bus to pass your stop (either online, with a smartphone app, or even with a button at the actual stop). 15mins later, a bus shows up and whisks you away to your nearest town centre.

The buses stationed at various points around Canberra would have sophisticated navigation systems constantly being updated with passenger pick-up requests. You’d input programming ‘rules’ to ensure a relatively direct route and timely journey.

This system would be flexible enough to enable 24hr public transport, and give the Gov the ability to stop the wastage caused by empty buses driving around suburbia every hour.

The Greens could promise to paint Canberra mauve – with the full knowledge that they will never govern therefore never have to deliver it~

Peak Oil: was so 2008 when prices were heading towars $2 per L. then the GFC and all that talk of peak oil went out the window and so was the justification to increase prices of oil. Seems that the Greens are wheeling out the boogey man again. Sorry I am over it.

At Joker, why would I ride my bike to Belconnen Town Center from Scullin, so that I can get go to the Belconnen markets? Easier for me to go by car.

“I love it when no-hope candidates make populist promises that they know they’ll never have to fulfil. They’re selling pork barrel futures, I suppose.”

Haha….hot diggity dog!!

Richard Bender said :

They probably looked at real experience, e.g. Portland in the United States, to find that people prefer to live in areas with good road access rather than good rail access. The myth of increased property values with rail is exactly that, a myth.

You are grasping at two different concepts there, one is that people would rather have good road access than good rail access, which I can accept as plausible, the other is that rail stations do not increase the property values of surrounding areas. The latter concept is hard to believe, I think the experience of most cities is that rail stations increase the desirability of surrounding areas (and thus prices).

I’d be genuinely interested to see evidence supporting your claims, particularly with reference to Portland.

17 years ago I couldn’t afford a car, I would catch 6 buses a day to get from Tuggeranong to Bruce CIT
some nights I would wait over 40 minutes in the city to catch a bus in the middle of winter. I gather nothing much has changed at Action Buses. I rode my bicycle instead it over an hour, much faster than the ‘service’ Action could deliver.

I reckon a rail service sounds great. Ride your bicycle to the station get on with your bike and get off at your the next station and ride to your destination. This would reduce obesity and stimulate the bicycle industry.

Also it would reduce the trade deficit due to importation of oil and foreign motor vehicles and soften the blow of ‘peak oil’ and the rising cost of oil due to up and coming economies competing for oil and lessen the requirement to build and maintain road infrastructure.

More importantly, change the culture of the up coming generations in their attitudes to personalized transport, a 1500kg vehicle hauling a single person around is not efficient.

Pollies will fight transport reform due to the Loss of excise and GST revenue on fuel and new vehicles taxes.

sepi said :

Trains, light rail and trams work fantastically well in other cities – like most of europe.

It seems born and bred canberrans have an unreasonable hatred of trains.

This dismissal of something unknown reminds me of when canberra went from 2 tv stations to 5, and people said it would never work in canberra because the one existing commercial channel had all the good shows.

I have no problem with trains, I used them in Perth for 10 years or so and found them much better than the buses they replaced. However, the problem with Canberra’s public transport isn’t that it takes too long to get from town centres into Civic, it’s that it takes too long, and isn’t sufficiently convenient, to get to the town centres from surrounding suburbs.

Can you really picture anyone who doesn’t currently catch the intertown buses saying “oh, I’ll take public transport now that it’s a train!”

commoner said :

I’d rather vote for the Monster Raving Loony Party ….

But I heard their new leader is Bear Ghryls and he’s advocating building a subway!

I hear Shelbyville has a monorail. Maybe we aint good enough for light rail.

And this little GEM:

Mining tax revenues would be used to fund a light rail system for Canberra ahead of other cities if the Australian Greens have their way.

Greens leader Bob Brown today called for a national inventory and implementation study to develop light rail in all Australian cities.

The nation’s capital would be the first cab off the rank, he said.

A national scoping study into the establishment of a light rail system would cost $10 million.

The Greens will not back away from raising more money from Labor’s minerals resource rent tax to fund the light rail system and high-speed rail links between Australian capital cities.

http://au.news.yahoo.com/a/-/latest/7647991/mining-tax-could-fund-light-rail-greens/

Australia to fund light rail for ricj Canberrans? Hah! ha! hah! hah! Stop it you are killing me!!!!! Please quick let the Telegraph be told that we will be taking tazes away from their Western Suburbs so that those rich overseas students living in Crace can get to Dendy Cinemas. Ho! Ho! Ho!

Richard Bender said :

How can an infrastructure project that will forever be on the public teat be beneficial to the ACT economy? Or is Mrs Hatfield Dodds suggesting that taxpayers from outside the ACT should subsidise the project?

Well, we’re all paying the money into this federal fund anyway.. at least we should put our hands up to get something out of it instead of losing it to Sydney and Melbourne like usual.

Hi Commoner.

I’d rather vote for the Monster Raving Loony Party than for the Greens.

Yes, but if you knew something about the policies of the Greens, what would your opinion be?

How about we see if we can get the bus system working for only millions before sinking BILLIONS into steel tracks, platforms, wires, switches…

Trains, light rail and trams work fantastically well in other cities – like most of europe.

It seems born and bred canberrans have an unreasonable hatred of trains.

This dismissal of something unknown reminds me of when canberra went from 2 tv stations to 5, and people said it would never work in canberra because the one existing commercial channel had all the good shows.

How is train going to be better than a bus in Canberra again?

I say use the money to cover the costs of a better bus system that runs more often (and gets to places FASTER).

Good grief.

It’s happened.

I agree with Woody.

Some Letters to the Editor are spot on, particularly on those issues which the major parties (including the Greens), and the CT itself, cannot bother to cover as they don’t carry enough votes or media revenue. This where a sensible, no-nonsense, practical party is required – which the Greens definitely ain’t.

How can an infrastructure project that will forever be on the public teat be beneficial to the ACT economy? Or is Mrs Hatfield Dodds suggesting that taxpayers from outside the ACT should subsidise the project?

Gungahlin Al said :

…Honestly, who would do a cost-benefit analysis on public transport without factoring in increased land values and therefore increased sales and rates revenues??

They probably looked at real experience, e.g. Portland in the United States, to find that people prefer to live in areas with good road access rather than good rail access. The myth of increased property values with rail is exactly that, a myth.

This is the first year of my voting life I’ve looked around and decided that all of the parties are f*cking no-hopers. There’s not even a ‘lesser of two evils’, or a ‘you’re dumb but they’re dumber’. The race to the bottom must be nearing its end.

YES!!!!

Erg0 said :

I love it when no-hope candidates make populist promises that they know they’ll never have to fulfil. They’re selling pork barrel futures, I suppose.

You can say that again, the Greens are just after some cheap votes with policies straight out of the letters to the editor of the CT. Even more reason not to vote for them.

I’d rather vote for the Monster Raving Loony Party than for the Greens. The Green (Slime) party is just a collection of whackos pushing weird left-wing causes. I wish they’d just go away.

I love it when no-hope candidates make populist promises that they know they’ll never have to fulfil. They’re selling pork barrel futures, I suppose.

Good on them. It’s a solid and professional report that makes good reading.

Clearly no such vision in the ACT Government. So it falls to the Greens to fill the void.

I’m surprised the CT report today on the Auditor General’s opinion on the ACT’s Infrastructure Australia applications didn’t mention the …woeful PWC submission on light rail.

Honestly, who would do a cost-benefit analysis on public transport without factoring in increased land values and therefore increased sales and rates revenues??

And who would start off an application for a fund that is for “shovel-ready” projects only by saying ‘nothing could start for several years’??

Don’t tease me Greens!