24 July 2008

What do we think of the new bus shelters?

| johnboy
Join the conversation
30

So bus riders. What do you think of the new shelters? How do they stack up against the old?

Do they keep the wind out? Can you see the bus coming? Are they cleaner? How comfortable are the seats? RiotACT wants to know.

The new bus shelters...

View Results

Loading ... Loading ...

For those who haven’t been paying attention here’s the contrast of old and new:

Join the conversation

30
All Comments
  • All Comments
  • Website Comments
LatestOldest

If we have to have the shelters so be it but what im interetsed in is that Adshel says they will provide 241 shelters both advertising and non advertising – so where are they, how many are installed, when will they be all installed and what is the ratio of non advertising to adveristing?

Sammy said :

Rumour has it the private company are only interested in putting up these busstops/billboards on major roads

It’s not a rumour, its a fact thats built into the supply contract:

“These shelters are being provided by Adshel Street Furniture Pty Ltd under a contract which will involve the installation of a total of 241 new shelters, at no cost to the ACT community, by the end of 2009. Of these, only 133 will include advertising panels.”

Fantastic.

If lux doesn’t like it, I hope he/she has big pockets to pay for advertising free shelters across the city.

The old concrete ones are all accross australia – I don’t know who makes them, but they’re used in the Gold Coast as change rooms. Agreed though – they are showing their age. They are also notoriously poorly placed – often you won’t know that the bus is coming unless you hear it.

Further to previous comment, this means that it’s in Adshel’s interest to focus the advertising version on high-exposure roads, and use the non-advertising versions on arterial roads.

Rumour has it the private company are only interested in putting up these busstops/billboards on major roads

It’s not a rumour, its a fact thats built into the supply contract:

“These shelters are being provided by Adshel Street Furniture Pty Ltd under a contract which will involve the installation of a total of 241 new shelters, at no cost to the ACT community, by the end of 2009. Of these, only 133 will include advertising panels.”

The old ones look like they were designed at a time when random dynamiting of bus shelters was a serious concern.

I noticed as well they started putting seats down at all the stops in palmerston(after 15 yrs??).

Guess time will tell with the new bus shelters.

Personally the old wooden bus shelters in old-Canberra are a favorite of mine.

The orange big posts will now allow those who have more time on there hands than a giraffe to create larger and more beautiful graffiti/tagz-(wigga)- than the old yellow posts and the old-but-not-as-old-as-the-old-yellow-posts steel posts with bolted on yellow signs.

Rumour has it the private company are only interested in putting up these busstops/billboards on major roads.

None around my area yet. As usual, everything gets rolled out in north canberra, and then they change their mind before they get to the outer ‘burbs . . .

Who the hell uses the Calwell playing fields stop? Try not only students, but soccer players on weeknights after training, on weekends for games, as well as me personally when i reffed at those fields. I’m pretty sure they’re utilised for other sports as well when its the soccer off-season, probably cricket in summer. Selfish canberrans always so willing to criticise, and from most of your comments i presume none of you were ever young yourselves.

there’s one right outside calwell playing fields.

Who the hell gets on the bus there? gahhhhhhhhh!

(oh, right, calwell high students, who will do a carney on them. or more..)

But yeah, i guess they’re better. and the seats are more comfy than the older ones, i guess.

At least now the carney can run away.

People will still continue to piss in the new shelters.

Having said that, the new style shelters will do a lot less to cars that slam into them than the old concrete bunkers.

PM said :

Strangely, I saw one of those concrete “bunker” bus stops painted blue located around Liverpool in Sydney over the weekend. I freaked. I thought they were only a Canberra thing… but I was wrong.

maybe it was sick of the cold, and moved…

Strangely, I saw one of those concrete “bunker” bus stops painted blue located around Liverpool in Sydney over the weekend. I freaked. I thought they were only a Canberra thing… but I was wrong.

Crikey said :

Well peterh the deal with the provider is that they maintain and clean the new shelters for free.

And I would suggest that they are more likely to do that compared to how the ACT Government look after their stock of bus shelters.

but, and there is a big but, how weather proof are they? even on a rainy day, the rain coming into the bus shelter, you can stand behind it (the concrete ones), still see the road and not get that wet.

The crucial difference with the new ones is that the government or ACTION dont pay for them
If we waited for ACTION to provide them, we’d wait a long time
So even if they’re useless against the wind and rain, they’re better than nothing

The orange and green are a bit bright, I would have preferred that they spent more money leaving some of the express services on the road. I hate that I have to switch buses at the Belco interchange, and the buses are ALWAYS full during peak hours…

Well peterh the deal with the provider is that they maintain and clean the new shelters for free.

And I would suggest that they are more likely to do that compared to how the ACT Government look after their stock of bus shelters.

toriness said :

i was about to say i preferred the old ones, because they had character but LG and RAGD’s comments ring much truer. and i second crikey’s motion to keep some of the old ones for historical purposes.

but if the new ones stay, how long till the local youth decide to:

pee on the seats
break the glass windows
break the seats
smash the billboards?

at least the old ones were made like a bunker – I remember seeing one that had a car stuffed into it after someone lost control at the end of spalding street and plowed straight in (it was empty). The shelter moved about a foot, but was still ok.

the driver wasn’t.

Gungahlin Al2:26 pm 24 Jul 08

Old, new, we’ll take any we can get out around Gungahlin. Except in the town centre, you get nothing but a good stand in the rain…

i was about to say i preferred the old ones, because they had character but LG and RAGD’s comments ring much truer. and i second crikey’s motion to keep some of the old ones for historical purposes.

They look fine.

But I hope they keep a few of the old concrete ‘bunkers’ for history’s sake so we can show our children how it was in our days.

The new ones seem like they wouldn’t keep the wind totally out like the old ones used to. However they also seem like they wouldn’t stink up as much. People used to pee and vomit and whatever in the old ones and they used to stink. At least they used to when I used to catch buses in the mid 90’s.

Seems that Maccas almost has a monopoly on the advertising.

I think they’re good though.

Seriously, those old concrete things are so 1980’s.
Just like the old yellow bus stop poles were so 1970’s….

Advertising at bus stops was introduced by the Government so they could attract a private operator to maintain the bus stops. They get to make money from advertising while keeping the shelter looking nice an neat.

Saves the Gov from paying for mainenance.

I don’t use buses much, but i pass the shelters all the time, and i will say this – What’s the story with the billboard advertising in Canberra? I was under the impression that it was supposed to be kept to a minimum. I go to Sydney and almost bleed from my eyes because i am unable to look in any direction without seeing giant advertisements. I like the fact that i’m not subjected to this (outdoors) in Canberra unless a bus happens to drive past with an ad on it. But now ads are appearing on bus shelters??! What next – massive billboards on our overpasses and sides of buildings, a la Parramatta Road?

Meh.
I don’t mind them they blend in pretty well, Though they don’t provide as much protection from the wind and cold as the old ones do.

Why did they need to stick the timetable sign there where it blocks everyone’s view and gets in the way of people getting on or off the bus. It is also facing the wrong way so that when you are reading the timetable (whilst being jostled by people getting on or off a bus) you have your back to the approaching busses.

Daily Digest

Want the best Canberra news delivered daily? Every day we package the most popular Riotact stories and send them straight to your inbox. Sign-up now for trusted local news that will never be behind a paywall.

By submitting your email address you are agreeing to Region Group's terms and conditions and privacy policy.