Extra money going to buses

“Sometimes people say things that are not to be taken entirely literally.”

DMD – It’s good to see you apply this rule universally.

I won’t attempt, Nyssa, I’ll GIVE you a response.

Perhaps you need a lesson in how the English language yourself. I’m no master of it, I’ll admit, but I will pass this little tidbit on to you. Sometimes people say things that are not to be taken entirely literally. An exaggeration of something, i.e. ’empty schools’ may not necessarily mean that is the case – especially if it is obvious both parties know it’s not the truth. It is being used to strengthen a point – that is , in this case, that the schools are underpopulated. You wouldn’t give resources to empty schools would you? No, Nyssa, the answer is no. But in the case of underpopulated schools, it seems a little more gray. Putting things in black and white, whilst being something you should never base an argument on entirely, can be a handy tool to clarify your argument (usually to dimwits).

I read this aloud in my best play-school voice.

Since you don’t seem to understand this, you are on detention until you do. Corner! Now, Nyssa! Don’t make me redden your hand with this ruler now! Or break your legs!

Oh and DMD, you need to read more because the schools were UNPOPULATED. They were underpopulated – according to the bean counter.

Please don’t attempt a response. You bore me.

*laugh* Oh Heavs, that was such a good one!

Top of the class for you mate!

Jeez Nyssa. You’d think that you would be pleased they are selling all the school land off. Maybe it will reduce house prices and you’ll finally be able to buy that house you’ve been bleating on about for the last 12 months.

Nyssa….your opinion is, and definitely seems to be influenced by your profession on this matter. I don’t blame you, though. It’s pretty damn close to home for you. Or work, I should say.

You are quite welcome to have an opinion. We live in a democracy. But I am quite welcome to disagree with it – and we all know, in the political arena, colorful language and insults bury flowery words before the match even begins.

Closing down excess, unpopulated schools saves more money for resources. That will stop you having to buy them.

Doesn’t forming a proper argument mean addressing someone’s point and not repeating the same point over and over when it’s been adressed? If so, then I’ll take a pass on your offer, thanks.

Maelinar – it’s not really a different stance. ‘Big Kev’s’ pledge seemed to me to be more about providing more resources to students instead of maintaining empty buildings.

I also have a really immature reply to 3ft ass comment. But it’s really bad, really really really bad. So bad that if I don’t click ‘say it’ now, I will type it.

Just to divert from nyssa and DMD’s *wonderfully entertaining* insult swaps…

While there were indeed efforts to get the airport serviced by buses over the years, the responses were indeed always along the lines of “the airport shouldn’t have built those offices there so they can get stuffed”.

However since then other community groups, the GCC (see here http://www.gcc.asn.au/content/view/326/328/ ) and a number of private individuals made submissions to the recent ACTION Inquiry and participated in other ways of getting the message across like ABC Radio’s Transport Forum hosted by Alex Sloane.

I believe what has made a difference now is pointing out that there are now several thousand people who work out at BBP and those people cannot “get stuffed” – they were moved there by their employers, many live in ACT electorates, they have not been getting fair and equitable service from their government, and they have a vote coming up next year.

But whatever – end result is the services are going in. Good outcome for all.

I’m interested in knowing what the Labour party perspective is on this issue, particularly in relation to big Kev’s federal stance on education, and how the local labour party must be just waiting for somebody to politely mention that they have closed a whole heap of schools which seems quite a different stance.

DMD, what rubbish are you dribbling now?

You are acting like a child – ooh I said something as an individual, but nooooo I said it and I’m a bad person because in the little world inside your head, teachers can’t have an opinion.

Are you for real? You need to spend more time paying attention to what I wrote. I never said teacher benefits OR that teacher come before better resources.

Do you use that thing 3ft above your arse?

I buy most of the resources for my students btw.

Now, did you read my last post slowly? Because I think you missed a bit.

CHILDISH TAUNTS?! Ahahahahahahahahahaha!

Who’s childish here? Suggesting that teens legs be broken to stop them stealing cars? Sounds like infant logic to me….

Obviously, you missed the ‘obvious joke’. I don’t think you really break kid’s legs. But do you? Honest.

Students see one side of the the education system, a bloody important one. Schools are about STUDENTS learning – not about teacher benefits. Doesn’t mean teacher’s shouldn’t be a concern of the education department. They should be. But the concerns of teachers shouldn’t come before better resources being provided to students.

DMD, read this slowly and then read it a few more times.

I said that my opinion on that was MY OPINION. I don’t bring MY OPINION into the classroom.

If you would now like me to educate you on how not to be an infant online, let me know. Because only a person of such low intelligence would constantly use childish taunts instead of adding to the conversation.

And seeing as you only ‘just finished school’ – perhaps your lecturers (assuming you are a uni student) need to educate you on forming a proper argument.

AD, no they aren’t as they only have ONE SIDE of the picture – from a student’s perspective.

DMD, I guess my sarcasm was lost on you because you missed the ‘sausage factory’ analogy entirely.

Oh well, here’s hope you’ll learn to read.

They didn’t have the money then, probably, Pandy. Probably being spent on having a school in almost every bloody suburb so teachers like Nyssa risked less people dobbing her in for trying to break students legs.

Hang on Gungahlin Al before your head explodes from delusions of grandeaur. Bus services to BBP were being lobbied for 3 years ago. Hargraeves said then that the airport could go get fracked.

“There will be direct services to the airport’s Brindabella Business Park from Gungahlin, Civic and Woden. There will be more frequent services to the Parliamentary Triangle and Gungahlin.”

Caf: I have confirmed with Action that the Gungahlin-BBP service is planned to commence on 28 April next year, which coincidentally would be exactly one year since Gungahlin Community Council started campaigning for such a service: http://www.gcc.asn.au/content/view/216/328/

Action advise me that the plan is for three moring services Gungahlin to BBP and three evening services back home. Start point is the Town Centre, and down Horse Park Drive and Majura Road. Presumably there’ll be some stops along Horse Park for Yerrabi and Harrison residents.

So that will be maybe 100 cars a day off Majura Road, and if the buses fill up, they’ll just have to put on more.

Credit where it’s due – Transport Minister John Hargreaves and Action boss Tom Elliott listened and acted. Good on them.

There’s a “but” though, and this is where we need help from Gungahlin residents.

This is still officially a proposal, and will be published as part of consultation on the full bus service network review, which will be released for public comment on Monday 19 November, with submissions due by 21 December. Details will be on http://www.action.act.gov.au

It’s important that everyone who is likely to use this new service lodges a brief comment supporting the proposal.

We are very close to pulling off a good win…

And don’t forget, Diane, buses are good too. You’re not as absent as some.

Does anyone know if this could even mean they may consider nightriders on every fri/sat night? That would drastically reduce the mass amounts of drink-driving that goes on then…

I think that someone who attended schools as a child is qualified to call themselves a specialist. Doesn’t mean that everyone who went to school is a specialist – but those who have thought about it and their own personal experiences probably have every right to qualify themselves. mkay?

The actual best form of schooling would be one on one 100% customised schooling. But I think that small underfunded schools are stupid. Large schools with loads of money for facilities and good teachers. much better than small schools. I propose that the problem may be far more personal to you nyssa and less about what is good for the kids.

More kids accessing the same facilities, which justifies more spending on them…

Less public money being spent on oversized buildings, which means more money for services that benefit everyone…

More kids, from different parts of town, coming together to form a ‘community’. A CANBERRA community, because that’s the town we live in – not the Allied Suburbs of Wankery or whatever you seem to want….

And I thought you liked smaller schools anyway….

DMD, yes because the ‘sausage factory’ of 800-1400 students is a great idea! Well done.

ACTDET has and will move all teachers affected by 2020. And reality is, some of those schools which didn’t close will have less numbers in 2010 than those schools which were forced to close.

Gotta love strategic planning.

now now, people who resort to ad hominem attacks are silly morons.

No, I’m not an education specialist. I’m a canberra resident and a voter. I also have a brain and some concept of logic – enough to see that books and computers help students more than empty buildings which cost way too much to run.

Where are the Cook teachers who didn’t have a tantrum now? In bigger schools teaching more kids?

DMD, it comes out of my own pocket you idiot because the kids DON’T have the right equipment.

If the money is given to ACTDET, it won’t go into buying books etc. See that would be TOO EASY.

Oh and yes Cook teachers are/were excellent. I know of at least two who left the system in DISGUST at 2020.

“People like me”? Care to explain? Or are you too busy trying to piss people off with your bollocks and not seeing past your rose coloured glasses?

Oh please don’t tell me, you’re an education specialist because you went to school as a child.

Well ACT Light Rail Coalition want to have a tram go TC to TC every 5 minutes. Surely that will help no?

I wont hold my breath waiting.

Will the $75 million improve that, Nemo? More routes, perhaps?

DMD – “Well they can catch a bus, can’t they.”

No, actually they cant. There is no bus to catch in the morning.

This just means more parents are having to drop their kids at school and thereby reducing any incentive to use public transport.

Well, if that comes out of your own pocket…wouldn’t you want that money coming from the government instead? Or are you an idiot?

(double spacing woohoo!)

Well, I assume the school won those awards because of the skilled teachers who worked there, not the building itself. It’d be better if those same teachers were educating more children at once, really.

There’s never enough said. Not while people like you have a say.

We need education money spent on materials to actually help educate the kids

What? You mean the RESOURCES teachers buy all the time because their students don’t have them?

I’ve run out of exercise books and pens and rulers and erasers and pencils etc and I still have 5 weeks to go!

Cook was a school that won awards, did a great deal with literacy and numeracy AND was able to grow – but were denied by ACT Govt.

Enough said.

Yes Mr Post Nazi.

Wasn’t GDE and Brendan and Gary production that Stanhope inherited?

Look ideally suburban schools and shops are a great idea. Whether we can afford them is another question.
If we ban supermarkets in Mall’s opening after 6pm and on weekends and increase our rates by heaps then we can go back to the ideal Canberra that used to be.

If not then we need to make decisions about what we can and can’t afford. Some of those decisions will always be a bit sus in hindsight.Of course we could always just complain

Blame my teachers!

I went to a ‘community’ school.

Okay?

Nyssa – I’m sure your kids are healthy. Congrats. You sound like a good parent. As for others, well, why should everyone else in the community have to suffer because they’re too lazy to raise their kids? My anger is directed at the stock ‘concerned parent’ – not the good ones – but the ones who are generally small-time paper columnists who complain about why nobody else is doing their jobs for them. I’m talking about the ones who complain about m-rated films after 8:30pm on the telly because they fail to supervise their children’s watching habits, the ones who complain about violent video-games because they apparently have no control over what they buy for their children, the ones who get playgrounds shut down because they can’t be bothered watching their children in-between Janet Albrechtsen articles and champagne. I’m pretty sure some of these whining and expensive dining stereotypes have infiltrated the ‘save our schools’ program, no doubt because they feel the only time they should ever show concern for their kids is when they have an opportunity to scream it in the ear of politicians who want to seem ‘community-sensitive’. I mean, honestly? Cook primary, I’m looking at you here – being the closest school to me that’s being closed down – Aranda and Macquarie primary are really not that far! The same goes to the first primary school I ever attended – 180 students, with another school in the next suburb, bordering one school-less suburb from which you can access another school? Quit your bitching! We need education money spent on materials to actually help educate the kids – not thousands of stupid buildings! God I hate you, stereotype!
As for a ‘sense of community’? What’s more going to create a Canberra community? Having school-kids and parents mingle with those only in their suburb? Or from several suburbs around?

GDE was not really this govt’s fault – the FEDs stepped in, as well as the protesters. The govt should have done all the environmental studies properly though, so as not to be open to protest and court cases.

I do think they shut too many schools. Sure some had to go, but now that the budget is in surplus I think they were a bit hasty. I don’t think big schools are good for the students. Being stressed and bullied is not off-set by having a better art-room or computer at a big school.

And I think it is a bit of cheek from Andrew Barr (and unwise) to keep spouting on about the excellent education system, when so many people are still upset at losing their school. Some areas in Weston Creek are now very poorly served with schools. And the school in every suburb has not been the case for decades, so it is a red herring really.

I’m glad they are trying to do something about the busses.

We can all just be glad that at around the time the budget went in to “dire straits” the ACT Govt found enough money to spend on bike racks for the front of buses – I was yet to see one of those racks being used but can now confirm I know of one person who uses them, so those $100,000s were obviously well spent. then there was the debacle with the gungahlin drive extension that they now keep heralding as a wonderful piece of infrastructure – only wasn’t it meant to cost about half as much as it now costs and wasn’t it meant to be dual carriageway originally? way to manage your costs and contractors, Mr Stanhope for the better transport of the ACT. so, now that there’s some unexpected cash floating around, do you think you could actually spend it on upgrading services and infrastructure in an efficient manner?

The world is changing. We have to be rational about how we spend money. Why spend 3 times the amount of money paying the overheads of 3 different schools when we can consolidate those school into 1 school that would still well service the student population?

There is not an endless supply of public money. We have to try to get the biggest bang for our buck possible.

Underutilised = more money when we sell it off and bugger the people/families/community that did support it.

For example, Cook PS. 100% committment from the community. Closing because they can’t expand – ACT Govt wouldn’t move the people out of the other side of the school.

So they close when they were able to expand.

Hrmmm..what a waste of a resource.

I look forward to reading (again) about parents disgruntled with their child’s forced move early in 2008.

Having local shops in every suburb used to foster a sense of community, too. Kambah had about 6 local shopping clusters all over the suburb when I grew up there, but that’s a lot less now because it just wasn’t viable.

Walking distance is a poor justification for keeping expensive public facilities open, especially when they’re underutilised.

Actually DMD, my kids play sport, swim and walk our dogs every day.

I’m talking GENERALLY i.e. about most kids in Canberra. Or couldn’t you make that differentiation?

Having a school in every suburb once used to instil a sense of community – or didn’t you notice it when 2020 came out?

A better public transport system suits the Govt – they hike up parking fees and transport fees (bus tickets) because they can.

This Govt has had AGES to get a decent transport system in but they have failed.

They couldn’t even run a chook raffle.

Yeah, it is, Bd84. But I did actually have to catch the bus for 30km along the captains flat road. F- the paper run though. I’ll be prepared for my kids though…
Look, what exactly are you all whining about anyway? Would you prefer we have a school in every suburb, so the education department would have to split their budget amongst them, leaving each with less overall?
And Nyssa – if the only way you can conjure to stop your kids from getting fat is to make them walk half a suburb or so to get to school, then you would be (or are, I don’t know) a pretty lazy parent. Take the kids for walks yourself. My Dad used to (and still does with my seven year old brother). Get them involved in sporting programs, get them swimming, karate – hell, make them do laps of the backyard every evening.
Having a school in every suburb only benefits slack parents. Having a better public transport system benefits children and everyone else who uses buses – not to mention the environment.
And Nemo, you live in Gunghalin, I assume. Sucks to be you.

and it cut the rest of my message off.. I forgot what it said.. with lesst than 120 students, something about Stanhopeless closing schools before it is required which will lead to increased class sizes and overcrowded schools..

and they could catch a bus, if they can ever find one that turns up and actually goes near the school.

DMD, well la-di-da.

Weren’t you a ‘good boy’?

If the child has to ‘catch a bus’ for a school FOUR suburbs away, wtf does that say about our education system and 2020? Wtf does it say about the PE push in primary schools – what a waste of money, especially when the kids could have walked.

As a little kid, I had to catch the bus from West Ryde to Carlingford, as my mother moved us to West Ryde but didn’t change our school.

Mind you, I had a lot of ‘big’ streets to cross (had I walked) and last time I looked, no one wants to cross Drakeford Drive during peak hour in a car, let alone on foot.

Why don’t you start up a school bus system like they have in the US? Perhaps an hour or so with school kids will shut your yap?

My dad did too Deadmandrinking, he also got up at 4am did his 20km paper run on his bike, got home in time to make everyone breakfast and iron his uniform then trekked his way to school.. I think it’s the token story of the 50yo+ man lol

Anyway ACTION + new buses = good. Mentioned above that they haven’t sold any buses since the budget got cut, true.. but they got rid of too many buses expecting that funding would come, which is now why services don’t run when a bus or two break down..

As for school closures there is no doubt that some of the schools closed were just too small to be viable, i.e. melrose primary and the other few schools which had

Well they can catch a bus, can’t they.
Stop whinging. I used to live 30km from my school as a young-un. It really isn’t that hard for a kid to catch a bus.

Our closest school is 4 suburbs away. Every child in our street attends a school more than 10kms away.

Your simplistic idea that kids are just going to the next suburb is wrong.

Or maybe little chubs can walk an extra suburb, Nyssa

What a shame that they cut bus services so badly in the first place, driving hard-won bus passengers back to their cars. Now Action will have to start all over again.

Really, I thought this schools issue was settled? The school situation in the ACT had to get real and consolidate. I think it was a good thing.

Well actually Sepi the buses they sold off were old and were replaced by the current batch of Scania’s that are on the road. Since the service cuts last year they have not sold ONE bus at all. So clearly the new buses are additional capacity.

As for the school issue you guys need to get real. They needed to be closed. We in Canberra were spoily by being run by the feds, the reality is it costs us way too much. School rationalisation may be a bitter pill to swallow for some but it was needed. There is only a finite resource (money and teachers) they need to be sent to where the students are, which now days is in the Tuggeranong Valley and Gunghalin. Clearly schools in Belco, Woden and Western Creek have to close or merge at some point. And yes it is to save money but if the government spent too much you would all be up in arms too. The government can never win regardless of what they do.

DMD, instead of *gasp in horror* walking to their local school and thereby assisting in LOWERING the obesity rate of school aged children.

Well, $75 million for public transport is always good in my book, and to be honest, many of the schools that closed down were getting pretty useless, considering proximities to other schools.
Now the kids will have better buses to catch to the *gasp in horror* next suburb!

The real answer is that the Stanhope government has deemed us, and I mean all of us, too irredeemably stupid to be worth talking to. The Costello report, which details the Territory’s true financial position has been sealed by cabinet and we voters are not allowed to know what it says.

O, and S4anta, the performance of schools had absolutely nothing to do with their closure, it was always about selling prime real estate to provide a war-chest for Stanhope’s run at getting re-elected in 2008. The bread and circuses started in the last few weeks in case you hadn’t noticed.

“ACT Light Rail are disappointed that yet another opportunity has be squandered with no announcement of funding for a proper feasibility study into light rail in the Territory,” stated ACT Light Rail Deputy Convener, Jonathon Reynolds

“As the primary mass transport in the ACT, buses have repeatedly and conclusively proven to be an ineffective and unattractive method of primary transport for commuters,” Mr Reynolds concluded.

The Federal Candidates present at the forum all agreed that light rail in the Territory was the only viable long term option for the ACT in its future public transport requirements and needs.

[ENDS]

Well pity about the busses they sold off to save money – now they’re having to buy new ones…

Simplfying the nightmare timetable system is a great idea though, and keeping all route numbers the same at all times – good idea.

This bit of the article seems worthy of picking out, given the complaints that we’ve seen aired here on the matter:

There will be direct services to the airport’s Brindabella Business Park from Gungahlin, Civic and Woden. There will be more frequent services to the Parliamentary Triangle and Gungahlin.

Simple. Shutting the schools have seemed to have enabled them to place funds going to underperforming schools into others area of the ACT economy that may need a kick along.