Anger over bus services on rise
Sydney Morning Herald
Saturday June 20, 2009
THE number of complaints about Sydney bus services has risen in the past 12 months, taking the gloss off the NSW Government'spurchase new buses to serve Sydney's north-western suburbs.The budget papers released this week reveal that complaints have risen to 18.86 per 100,000 passengers a new high from 16.52 two years ago. The Government had forecast a fall from last year's figure of 18.62 per 100,000 passengers, to 17.70, but dissatisfaction with the system continues to rise.Passenger compliments about the bus service have also risen, however, up 0.92 per 100,000 two years ago, to 1.22 in the last financial year.The steadily increasing anger about the bus system is attributed to the ever-longer journey times, due to sharp increases in traffic that can slow bus commuting to a crawl. Recently released figures showed the average speed on Sydney's roads was 30 kilometres an hour.A spokesman for Action for Public Transport, Jim Donovan, said buses had "gotten a raw deal from traffic", adding: "They are constantly competing with the private car for road space."He said metropolitan Sydney had only three transitways dedicated to buses Parramatta to Liverpool, Parramatta to the Rouse Hill town centre, and Blacktown to Parklea.Professor David Hensher, the director of the Institute for Transport and Logistics Studies at the University of Sydney, advocates the construction of more bus transitways for the underserviced suburbs of outer Sydney and more dedicated bus lanes, with priority at traffic lines for the middle-ring suburbs.'On Thursday, the first of 113 "growth buses" were put into service in the Hills district, made up of Liberal electorates that have no rail service.The buses will be run by Hillsbus a private operator run by the former head of the Ministry of Transport, Jim Glasson along the M2 motorway between Dural and the city. "The growth buses will mean new routes in some regions and higher frequencies of popular services across the board," the Transport Minister, David Campbell, said.
© 2009 Sydney Morning Herald