Inglorious ACT Government failure on bus bike racks

thy_dungeonman said :

bd84 said :

Why bother counting? It’s not like they can magically add more bike racks on buses that have them if it ends up being very popular. One bike rack with a capacity of 2 is all it will ever be.

What’s so wrong about a bus not having a bike rack on it? If bus doesn’t have one, you can always get on your bike and RIDE it. I didn’t think that bikes were designed for you to ride to the bus stop and travel across the other side of town to your destination in a gas/diesel guzzling bus, it kinda defeats the point.

Anyway, the current ACTION fleet is never going to be 100% bike rack fitted, because they are not suitable for some of the fleet (and illegal for some buses) and there is little point fitting them to the older buses in the fleet which will be decommissioned in the next few years.

Be cause there might be a distance that’s too far to ride but my going part of the way by bus it becomes viable. I live in waramanga and it’s 13kms to the ANU, so I ride to Woden and catch the bus to civic then ride to the ANU, problem solved. I’m nota expecting all buses to have racks but the ones on the inter-town which is advertised as a bike and ride route should always have them, whenever a 300 pulls up without one I always stand there with my bike and give the driver a questioning glare. If they want to us to pay the same fare as regular users we should get the same frequency.

wow 13 kms, I would have been more likely to accept the arguement if you lived 25kms away in Banks.

Though it is good to know that you glare at a driver that has absolutely nothing to do with the type of bus that they show up in, I don’t think they would particularly care either. But I suppose the driver would get a chuckle at the idiot at the side of the road with a stupid look on his face, particularly when you think about how easy it would have been to catch that bus if you weren’t trying to take your bike with you.

Anyway, buses are designed to move people, you are a person, you pay the fare like everybody else does. If anything, passengers taking a bike on the bus should pay extra to cover the additional costs for fitting the buses with racks and for the delays it can cause as a result of the additional time it takes “riders” to attach and remove their bicycles to and from the bus.

bd84 said :

Why bother counting? It’s not like they can magically add more bike racks on buses that have them if it ends up being very popular. One bike rack with a capacity of 2 is all it will ever be.

What’s so wrong about a bus not having a bike rack on it? If bus doesn’t have one, you can always get on your bike and RIDE it. I didn’t think that bikes were designed for you to ride to the bus stop and travel across the other side of town to your destination in a gas/diesel guzzling bus, it kinda defeats the point.

Anyway, the current ACTION fleet is never going to be 100% bike rack fitted, because they are not suitable for some of the fleet (and illegal for some buses) and there is little point fitting them to the older buses in the fleet which will be decommissioned in the next few years.

Be cause there might be a distance that’s too far to ride but my going part of the way by bus it becomes viable. I live in waramanga and it’s 13kms to the ANU, so I ride to Woden and catch the bus to civic then ride to the ANU, problem solved. I’m nota expecting all buses to have racks but the ones on the inter-town which is advertised as a bike and ride route should always have them, whenever a 300 pulls up without one I always stand there with my bike and give the driver a questioning glare. If they want to us to pay the same fare as regular users we should get the same frequency.

Why bother counting? It’s not like they can magically add more bike racks on buses that have them if it ends up being very popular. One bike rack with a capacity of 2 is all it will ever be.

What’s so wrong about a bus not having a bike rack on it? If bus doesn’t have one, you can always get on your bike and RIDE it. I didn’t think that bikes were designed for you to ride to the bus stop and travel across the other side of town to your destination in a gas/diesel guzzling bus, it kinda defeats the point.

Anyway, the current ACTION fleet is never going to be 100% bike rack fitted, because they are not suitable for some of the fleet (and illegal for some buses) and there is little point fitting them to the older buses in the fleet which will be decommissioned in the next few years.

I have always found these two points amusing:
(http://www.action.act.gov.au/bike_n_ride.html)

# Passengers may use bike racks on other routes if available. However ACTION does not guarantee bike racks on routes other than the 300 series.
# Depending on operational requirements at times some buses on the Intertown route may not be fitted with bike racks

So at the same time as guaranteeing that there will be bike racks on the 300 series (as implied by the first point) they are then contradicting themselves with the second point.

la mente torbida said :

I utlise intertown services every day. Sure, the occasional bus doesn’t have a bike rack – what do I do? – wait 5 minutes for the next one. Sheesh.

I get your point (I’ve only ever used the racks between Civic and Belconnen), but “intertown” does include the whole 300 series. If you miss a 31X out in the ‘burbs you’ll be waiting at least half an hour for the next one.

Sometimes there are worse consequences than just a wait — once I saw someone with a bike turned away from the last 300 out of Civic at 11:55pm because it had no rack. It’s also no fun if you only want to get the bus because you’ve gotten caught out in bad weather.

It’s incredible that anyone would run a “trial” and then not keep basic stats on how much it’s used, particularly when Stanhope said in the LA that he would do so.

FAIL (again), Stanhope.

I usually ride to and from work (getting my exercise in for the day). One night a week I jump on a green bus to Canberra uni. Class finishes at 9.30 and by the time I pack up, finish with students, I race out, unlock my bike and ride to the stop on College Street to catch a bus at 9.48 back to Woden. That got in about quarter past 10 at night. Then I’d jump on my suburban bus to Tuggers.

The recent timetable changes now have my suburban bus leaving earlier than my Uni bus gets in. I can’t say I’m interested in riding another 10 kms from Woden at quarter past 10 at night, and the next surban bus goes shortly after 11 pm. If I stay on the intertown bus past Woden I have a paultry 5 kms further to ride.

I love riding my bike, but praticalities sometimes make it more trouble than its worth. Is there a timetable that could suit me I’d continue to use the bus, but as it is now, on these days, I drive because its easier and quicker – especially in winter.

I utlise intertown services every day. Sure, the occasional bus doesn’t have a bike rack – what do I do? – wait 5 minutes for the next one. Sheesh.

“Instead she says the Government decided to stop tracking bike rack use altogether (no button on the console one imagines), ceased installing new bike racks, and now sends buses without racks out on services scheduled to have them.”

True, false, half true.

(A) From 1 July 2009 the console button was de-activated since using the bike rack no longer resulted in a free ride.
(B) Not only are all new standard buses fitted with a bike rack, since March many existing buses have had a bike rack installed. Refer http://www.actbus.net for more info.
(C) The only services which are “scheduled” to have bike racks are the Intertown services. To quote the ACTION website “Depending on operational requirements at times some buses on the Intertown Route may not be fitted with bike racks.” This is nothing new.

If every bus had bike racks, I’d take my son to school on the bus (he’s too young to go by himself) and then ride to work – and I wouldn’t mind paying a normal passenger fare. As it stands, my wife drops him off most days.

I understand that you can’t please everyone all the time, and that it would be impossible for Action to guarantee room on a bike rack for every user on every bus – however, they seem to have adopted the “a half arsed solution is better than nothing” approach.