Tuesday, 30 May 2023

Western Metropolitan Region bus services

Moira DEEMING (Western Metropolitan) (18:15): (249) My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Public Transport. When will the government actually deliver the missing link for public transport services in the Western Metro Region, which is of course a world-class bus network, one that is frequent and direct and lines up with train timetables. The western suburbs have some of the fastest growing populations in Australia and yet we are constantly expected to put up with less by this government.

As stated in the research paper ‘Better buses for Melbourne’s west’ by the University of Melbourne, most of Melbourne’s west – unlike inner and middle suburbs elsewhere in the city – does not have tram networks and thus the benefit of the relatively dense network of frequent trams well suited to local trips. Our current system in the west is so inefficient and disjointed that using public transport is either far too painful or completely unrealistic. Standard waiting time for bus services in the west is a whopping 40 minutes. Countless experts, analysts and local councils have demonstrated the benefits to the environment, the community and the cost of living that would be achieved by the simple act of investing in and restructuring bus routes into grid networks of simple, frequent and direct services.

In the west we are sick of the promises and the endless business cases that go out of date and the projects that never start construction. I call on the government to make public transport truly accessible for people in the west by fixing our broken bus system.