Page 213 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 15 February 2012
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Transport for Canberra also includes specific incentives and actions to help increase the number of people per vehicle, such as car pooling, including continuing the “three for free” parking scheme in the city and town centres, expanding car pooling across the ACT public service, investing in an expansion of the program to include federal government departments, combining car pooling with workplace travel planning for ACT government facilities, and providing support and templates for community, public and private sector workplace travel planning.
The TAMS and Environment and Sustainable Development directorates are working together to produce a guideline on transit lanes that will include safety, congestion and sustainability goals consistent with our transport for Canberra policy and consistent with the motion of the Assembly.
We are not in a position, and I do not think the Assembly is in a position, to be supporting this ill-timed, piecemeal motion from Mr Coe. The government bases its decisions on informed policies and guidelines. This is what we will do with the transit lanes and bus policy. Indeed, it will be how we approach an integrated transport plan for Canberra, not just singling off 2.2 kilometres of traffic to suit some personal gain.
MS BRESNAN (Brindabella) (4.12): The Greens will not support this motion from Mr Coe. It is an ill-thought approach to transport planning, and I will go to Ms Gallagher’s amendment later, which we will support. This motion does not even seek to investigate the issue of bus and car traffic in Belconnen and the city. It simply asks for the bus lane on Barry Drive to be immediately converted to a T2 lane, which would be a significant change to one of the main transport corridors of our city. The Greens support a strategic and evidence-based approach to transport planning. If we were to support this motion, we would essentially be supporting a whim that has not been properly thought through.
Supporting this motion today would also ignore the previous resolution on T2 lanes that the Assembly passed in November last year—with the support, I would add, of the Canberra Liberals. If we are to have respect for the resolutions made by this Assembly and the processes we agreed to put in place, we should not now support contradictory motions. This motion essentially circumvents the process we agreed on.
As I said, I think this motion is a whim that has had little thought put into it. What would be the result of immediately changing the Barry Drive bus lane into a T2 lane? What would be the impact on bus travel times, for example? Would this change mean that adjustments need to be made to the bus timetable? I do not think the Liberals know the answer to this. In fact, I note that Mr Coe’s knowledge of the relevant bus routes seems to be lacking in this respect.
He said in his media statement that closing the third lane to nothing but buses and buses that are not that frequent is a massive waste and poor planning. Actually, the buses on Barry Drive are frequent. The Blue Rapid line has a frequency of every five to seven minutes. The Blue Rapid line is the key bus line in Canberra, and the Belconnen to city route is one of the most patronised routes in the whole of the city.
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