Page 1755 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 15 May 2019
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In the first two weeks of the new network over a million boardings were recorded on bus and light rail services and over 740,000 journeys. These are record figures, and I am particularly pleased to see that Canberrans have been coming out in droves to use public transport on the weekend.
We are now starting to see some of the benefit of the government’s significant investment in the public transport network with better bus and light rail services seven days a week. We certainly understand that some of these changes have been challenging for current users of the system, but there are a number of new users to our bus network.
Madam Speaker, I move the amendment circulated in my name:
Omit all words after “That this Assembly”, substitute:
“(1) notes that:
(a) on 29 April 2019, the new integrated public transport network began operations;
(b) the new network offers 10 rapid routes, including light rail, new local routes and more buses servicing schools across the ACT;
(c) the new network underwent significant consultation during 2018 and, as a result, a number of changes were made to the final network;
(d) community consultation identified that people wanted more direct routes, more frequent and reliable services and increased services during on and off-peak times;
(e) the ACT Government acknowledges that the new network is a big change for some people, particularly where individual journeys are different, and is taking feedback about the new network on board;
(f) to support the transition to the new network an additional 18 Customer Service Assistants have been deployed to interchanges;
(g) Transport Canberra is carefully monitoring performance of the network and giving priority to school-related travel issues, and making adjustments to services, including:
(i) putting on bigger buses for certain services;
(ii) adding additional services past schools where there is high demand;
(iii) adjusting bus stops near schools; and
(iv) adding more light rail services, particularly where some services have proven to be more popular than anticipated;
(h) Transport Canberra continues to talk to schools regularly to ensure families have the information they need to navigate the new network; and
(i) safety across the network continues to be monitored through CCTV cameras on every bus and at all major interchanges, school crossing supervisors at 25 schools, improvements to infrastructure around schools and the additional Customer Service Officers at interchanges;
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