10 May 2011

It is after 7:30 Sunday night in Civic & where is the farkin buses?

| Jono1974
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I went to visit friends in Sydney and came back by bus. I thought getting in at 7:30 would have thought that there were busses available on my return, I was wrong. Not only was I wrong but but a couple from the Philippines who had only just migrated to Australia a couple of months ago were wrong.

For the record I had checked the timetable and was under the impression that the last bus from Civic headed out at 7:55. I met the Phillipino couple at the bus stop and waited with them til well after 08:00 pm. I went out to check that I was indeed at the right bus stop. I came accross a bus on the way to Belco and asked when the next bus to Woden was? Told that there were no more busses to Woden. This was Sunday. The bus driver told me that he had once walked it from Monash to Fadden when he first arrived in the ACT.

Well fortunately I am not a slouch and I had my walking boots on and hoofed it all the way home (Mawson). Two hours later I got home.

In light of this I am wondering if the ACT government is serious about public transport. I notice that the government seems fond of all things Western Sydney (even taking up their AFL team) – I wonder if they have thought that the mayors of Penrith & Campbelltown would allow such a big hole in their public transport services.

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“where is the farkin buses?”

Where ARE the farkin buses”

“I wonder if they have thought that the mayors of Penrith & Campbelltown would allow such a big hole in their public transport services.”

Travelled publicly out that way of late? Thought not.

Innovation said :

Re Holditz’s #17 post – Didn’t the nightrider service go to all suburbs? If so, it must have been a pretty slow ride or was it several buses (which would have cost a bit)? A half hourly or even hourly late evening intertown service would probably only need a couple of buses on the road. Better minds than mine can work out whether (partly) empty buses to the suburbs or (partly) empty buses between town centres is a better use of tax payer monies.

Anyway, I presume that the data from MyWay will quickly identify the profitable routes and times and then services will be upgraded or slashed accordingly. The problems will be both identifying the potential demand for routes and times if there are no buses running at the moment (and which takes time to build up)and better coordinating any changes with the service that taxis do or could provide.

Until 2007 each Nightrider used to leave hourly from about 0100 til 0500 and cost $5 a ride. In 2008 they changed to leaving every hour and a half and costing $10 a ride. Under the old scheme full buses were common, under the new scheme many runs had no passengers. Which proves that if it’s frequent enough and cheap enough people are prepared to spend a while on a bus to get home after a night on the piss.

PrinceOfAles said :

Cost effectiveness shouldn`t come in to it. Buses are a public service not a source of revenue. ACTION is already heavily subsidised. Don`t get me wrong they need to try and recover some of their costs but a few extra buses on a sunday night would hardly break their bottom line.

+1

Holditz said :

eily said :

Agreed. Running just the 900 Belconnen to Tuggeranong til late (10-11pm) would be a good idea. It’s about $20-25 by taxi from Belconnen to Charnwood but $50-70 from Woden. I image taxi trips would cost about the same (and in many cases less) out to the suburbs from their nearest town centre.

You would think so; but I figure that ACTION/TAMS have already looked at the feasiblity, and unfortunately it’s just not cost effective. Don’t get me wrong, as a bus rider I would love buses to run later on Sundays- but there simply isn’t enough patronage at the moment. And no, “if we build it they will come” won’t work here. The fact that the patronage on the Deans’ late night bus runs during summer was pretty low attests to this. It’s a vicious circle- patrons won’t use the services, and ACTION won’t schedule services because there aren’t any customers to ride them.

The so called Nightrider bus only run once every one and a half hours to an area and took over an hour to get to the end. And if you lived further south then Woden …stuff. Not exactly practical. So no wonder few took it up. Tokenism at its worst.

Re Holditz’s #17 post – Didn’t the nightrider service go to all suburbs? If so, it must have been a pretty slow ride or was it several buses (which would have cost a bit)? A half hourly or even hourly late evening intertown service would probably only need a couple of buses on the road. Better minds than mine can work out whether (partly) empty buses to the suburbs or (partly) empty buses between town centres is a better use of tax payer monies.

Anyway, I presume that the data from MyWay will quickly identify the profitable routes and times and then services will be upgraded or slashed accordingly. The problems will be both identifying the potential demand for routes and times if there are no buses running at the moment (and which takes time to build up)and better coordinating any changes with the service that taxis do or could provide.

PrinceOfAles said :

A half hourly service between the interchanges on a sunday up until midnight is hardly an unreasonable thing to expect in a town of this size.

My experience is that a half hourly service during peak hours or any other time is an unreasonable thing to expect in Canberra.

PrinceOfAles3:21 pm 11 May 11

Ex Warrior said :

PrinceOfAles said :

Holditz said :

eily said :

Agreed. Running just the 900 Belconnen to Tuggeranong til late (10-11pm) would be a good idea. It’s about $20-25 by taxi from Belconnen to Charnwood but $50-70 from Woden. I image taxi trips would cost about the same (and in many cases less) out to the suburbs from their nearest town centre.

You would think so; but I figure that ACTION/TAMS have already looked at the feasiblity, and unfortunately it’s just not cost effective. Don’t get me wrong, as a bus rider I would love buses to run later on Sundays- but there simply isn’t enough patronage at the moment. And no, “if we build it they will come” won’t work here. The fact that the patronage on the Deans’ late night bus runs during summer was pretty low attests to this. It’s a vicious circle- patrons won’t use the services, and ACTION won’t schedule services because there aren’t any customers to ride them.

Cost effectiveness shouldn`t come in to it. Buses are a public service not a source of revenue. ACTION is already heavily subsidised. Don`t get me wrong they need to try and recover some of their costs but a few extra buses on a sunday night would hardly break their bottom line.

Ahh the bottom line is already well and truly broken!!!
Do you honestly think costs should not considered in running public transport systems???
Its about time people who used public transport worked their schedule around what currently exists. It’s painful seeing buses driving around at ridiculous hours of the night with no or few passengers. Stop complaining and start becoming a bit more proactive

So we`ll just cancel all buses outside of peak hours then? I`m sure everyone can change their schedule to suit. A half hourly service between the interchanges on a sunday up until midnight is hardly an unreasonable thing to expect in a town of this size. I agree it would not be a heavily used service but there is no other viable alternative for shift workers, students that may be “studying” at a friends place or whoever else may be happen to be around at that hour.

Revert to the good old days ACTION and grant the shifts again that made the service a service!

Look after your long term staff who saved all of the buses and depots during the bushfires ‘voluntarily’, risk their lives and keep passengers safe (most over a 20 year period), have been flexible, giving and assisted the elderly and disabled and over past years until changes to the timetables were made (2009+) delivered an excellent punctual service on the southside.

Constant changes (excluding the My Way ticketing in its infancy stage) has been a no win situation for everyone involved with ACTION.

PrinceOfAles said :

Holditz said :

eily said :

Agreed. Running just the 900 Belconnen to Tuggeranong til late (10-11pm) would be a good idea. It’s about $20-25 by taxi from Belconnen to Charnwood but $50-70 from Woden. I image taxi trips would cost about the same (and in many cases less) out to the suburbs from their nearest town centre.

You would think so; but I figure that ACTION/TAMS have already looked at the feasiblity, and unfortunately it’s just not cost effective. Don’t get me wrong, as a bus rider I would love buses to run later on Sundays- but there simply isn’t enough patronage at the moment. And no, “if we build it they will come” won’t work here. The fact that the patronage on the Deans’ late night bus runs during summer was pretty low attests to this. It’s a vicious circle- patrons won’t use the services, and ACTION won’t schedule services because there aren’t any customers to ride them.

Cost effectiveness shouldn`t come in to it. Buses are a public service not a source of revenue. ACTION is already heavily subsidised. Don`t get me wrong they need to try and recover some of their costs but a few extra buses on a sunday night would hardly break their bottom line.

Ahh the bottom line is already well and truly broken!!!
Do you honestly think costs should not considered in running public transport systems???
Its about time people who used public transport worked their schedule around what currently exists. It’s painful seeing buses driving around at ridiculous hours of the night with no or few passengers. Stop complaining and start becoming a bit more proactive

Bennop said :

I would have thought that there are hidden costs associate with putting a bus on the road, that make it a really poor use of money.

-Interchange supervisors
-On call security
-Back end admin
-Workshop staff etc
-Petrol
Not to mention the hourly wage of bus drivers which on a sunday night is a minimum of $52 and hour (assuming double time loading).

All this for 2- 3 people who sometimes make awkward interstate travel plans? Hmmmm.

ACTION has no on-call security, no idea what gave you that idea.

For driving and presumably supervising as well, outside normal operating hours (ie after 0130 and after 2200 Sundays) we get a 75% loading so $52.33.

PrinceOfAles12:46 am 11 May 11

Holditz said :

eily said :

Agreed. Running just the 900 Belconnen to Tuggeranong til late (10-11pm) would be a good idea. It’s about $20-25 by taxi from Belconnen to Charnwood but $50-70 from Woden. I image taxi trips would cost about the same (and in many cases less) out to the suburbs from their nearest town centre.

You would think so; but I figure that ACTION/TAMS have already looked at the feasiblity, and unfortunately it’s just not cost effective. Don’t get me wrong, as a bus rider I would love buses to run later on Sundays- but there simply isn’t enough patronage at the moment. And no, “if we build it they will come” won’t work here. The fact that the patronage on the Deans’ late night bus runs during summer was pretty low attests to this. It’s a vicious circle- patrons won’t use the services, and ACTION won’t schedule services because there aren’t any customers to ride them.

Cost effectiveness shouldn`t come in to it. Buses are a public service not a source of revenue. ACTION is already heavily subsidised. Don`t get me wrong they need to try and recover some of their costs but a few extra buses on a sunday night would hardly break their bottom line.

eily said :

Agreed. Running just the 900 Belconnen to Tuggeranong til late (10-11pm) would be a good idea. It’s about $20-25 by taxi from Belconnen to Charnwood but $50-70 from Woden. I image taxi trips would cost about the same (and in many cases less) out to the suburbs from their nearest town centre.

You would think so; but I figure that ACTION/TAMS have already looked at the feasiblity, and unfortunately it’s just not cost effective. Don’t get me wrong, as a bus rider I would love buses to run later on Sundays- but there simply isn’t enough patronage at the moment. And no, “if we build it they will come” won’t work here. The fact that the patronage on the Deans’ late night bus runs during summer was pretty low attests to this. It’s a vicious circle- patrons won’t use the services, and ACTION won’t schedule services because there aren’t any customers to ride them.

keepitup said :

Stevian said :

Solidarity said :

Simple – They should buy a car.

If they can’t drive a car, they should hire a cab.

When you consider that the Taxi service in Canberra is a abysmal as the bus service (if not more so), that hardly a helpful suggestion. Would you suggest that those you do/cannot drive just stay home and not go anywhere

Stevian sounds like those people that catch a cab once a year . . on New Years Eve . . and then complain that the service is hopeless because they had to wait a while.

Don’t presume to know me, Unlike you have enough sense to that venturing out on New Years Eve is crass stupidity. I’ve called cabs occasionally when a bus is not viable, wait half an hour, it doesn’t show up call again, “It’s on it way” wait half an hour, call again “it showed up you weren’t there” I never moved, lies excuse, bullshit thats the local Taxi service.

Stevian said :

Solidarity said :

Simple – They should buy a car.

If they can’t drive a car, they should hire a cab.

When you consider that the Taxi service in Canberra is a abysmal as the bus service (if not more so), that hardly a helpful suggestion. Would you suggest that those you do/cannot drive just stay home and not go anywhere

Stevian sounds like those people that catch a cab once a year . . on New Years Eve . . and then complain that the service is hopeless because they had to wait a while.

Innovation said :

Surely it wouldn’t cost much to run a bus from Civic to Woden and the Tuggeranong (and not necessarily out to the suburbs) at half hour or even hourly intervals for around three hours on a Sunday night?

I don’t know the cost of taxi fare these days but, even with the flag fall, wouldn’t it be cheaper to get a taxi from Woden or Tuggeranong to the suburb destination than all the way from civic? And why was a bus going to Belco at that time of night if there wasn’t one heading out to the Southside any more?

Agreed. Running just the 900 Belconnen to Tuggeranong til late (10-11pm) would be a good idea. It’s about $20-25 by taxi from Belconnen to Charnwood but $50-70 from Woden. I image taxi trips would cost about the same (and in many cases less) out to the suburbs from their nearest town centre.

Even if ACTION only allowed cash fares, $4 added to the taxi fare would still come in a lot cheaper. Even $10 would be cheaper.

And if ACTION ran it half-hourly or even hourly Friday and Saturday nights as well until 4-5am in the morning or when ever Civic shuts down (if ever) might help stop some of the behaviour problems there now.

Could even be a win win for everybody too: The buses get more patronage. The taxis; while they wouldn’t get as many large fares, would probably get two or three short ones in in the same time and wouldn’t have to make empty runs back to Civic to pick up their next fare.

And people wouldn’t have to hang around in taxi queues waiting, they would know when the bus was leaving. Many would undoubted get home earlier than they do now or (Heaven forbid) they could stay out longer because they know they don’t have an hours plus wait in the taxi queue to look forward to, dodging drunken idiots spoiling for fights.

I would have thought that there are hidden costs associate with putting a bus on the road, that make it a really poor use of money.

-Interchange supervisors
-On call security
-Back end admin
-Workshop staff etc
-Petrol
Not to mention the hourly wage of bus drivers which on a sunday night is a minimum of $52 and hour (assuming double time loading).

All this for 2- 3 people who sometimes make awkward interstate travel plans? Hmmmm.

Surely it wouldn’t cost much to run a bus from Civic to Woden and the Tuggeranong (and not necessarily out to the suburbs) at half hour or even hourly intervals for around three hours on a Sunday night?

I don’t know the cost of taxi fare these days but, even with the flag fall, wouldn’t it be cheaper to get a taxi from Woden or Tuggeranong to the suburb destination than all the way from civic? And why was a bus going to Belco at that time of night if there wasn’t one heading out to the Southside any more?

madscientist1:47 pm 10 May 11

Solidarity said :

Simple – They should buy a car.

If they can’t drive a car, they should hire a cab.

And moreover, given how expensive cabs are, it’s not really a viable on-going solution.

Solidarity said :

Simple – They should buy a car.

If they can’t drive a car, they should hire a cab.

Last Sunday, I returned the rental car I drove from Sydney to Canberra after an overseas holiday to the airport (no Civic rental car offices open on Sundays). I had to hire a car because the bus and plane connections from Sydney to Canberra were far and few between on a Saturday evening.

Anywho, cost me $46 for a cab from the airport to Watson. I paid $90 to rent a car for a day! It only cost me $29 to fill up the car with petrol after driving from Sydney to Canberra!

I commend you for walking that far! I walked from Civic to Narrabundah late one night on ill-fitting shoes because the taxi queue was half a kilometer long (and I’d had enough of vomiting teenagers by then).

On Sundays the last 900 from Civic to Woden and Tuggeranong leaves at 1926. The last one from Civic to Belconnen leaves at 1955.

Conan, the mechanics have lifted their overtime ban after reaching an in-principle agreement with management.

Just checked. Last bus out of Woden on Sunday night is 6:50pm for that part of Kambah, so work backwards for departure for Civic. Not much of a plus for the bus there.

Ridiculous, isn’t it? I got caught by this many, many years ago. On a bus coming back from Sydney that was delayed due to being in an accident. We got back around about the same time as you, and no services out to Kambah. After being on holiday in Qld for a week, the taxi fair to Kambah was not appreciated.

Gawd, just realised that was 23 years ago. Nothing much has changed with availability, he says, not having actually looked up the timetable to check.

I think you have to prioritise these things mate.

It sucks that the bus didnt come on time- but it would be pretty expensive to run a service after 8pm on a Sunday in this country town- on the odd chance that someone might turn up.

Action is poorly used by Canberrans as it is- and you are suggesting that we keep that poor use going at the least used time of the week, with all the loadings that that involves.

I think it is more reasonable to get a taxi.

ConanOfCooma11:21 am 10 May 11

I thought they were striking on weekends?

Solidarity said :

Simple – They should buy a car.

If they can’t drive a car, they should hire a cab.

When you consider that the Taxi service in Canberra is a abysmal as the bus service (if not more so), that hardly a helpful suggestion. Would you suggest that those you do/cannot drive just stay home and not go anywhere

“In light of this I am wondering if the ACT government is serious about public transport.”

Nope.

Simple – They should buy a car.

If they can’t drive a car, they should hire a cab.

madscientist10:50 am 10 May 11

That is pretty poor. There should be a 900 service til 11.30pm or so at least on Sunday nights – sure it’ll be poorly patronised, but it shouldn’t be forgotten that there are members of the community who can’t drive, (can’t afford a car, poor eyesight etc. etc.)

Wouldn’t really take much either, probably 3-4 buses for a 30-min service… (although I do get super annoyed with the 30-minute Sunday night service of trams in melbourne!)

Sure, a lot of people are at home on Sunday nights, but what about folk who might be visiting, or need to go to Sunday evening church or something?

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