With the current state of the world, anything to provide relief by getting people onto public transport is a win. Possibly the easiest, cheapest way is to get some paint and:
- replace some parking and traffic lanes with bus lanes
- extend some existing bus lane times to beyond just peak, like the B1 route
- actually enforce them
Making buses faster removes one of the biggest issues people have with them – they're slow. More services could be run by a single bus in a shift, since less time is wasted in traffic.
Most cars in Sydney have just one person in them. Buses can move 50, 60 or more. A big saving on fuel.
During COVID the City of Sydney took the opportunity to create some bike lanes which have since become permanent. Never waste a good crisis!
Posted by Sydney_Stations
17 Comments
Yes, they should have bus lanes on every major road where there are frequent busses. At the very least during peak hours.
Like fuck it is!
I spend a lot of time in the US and I don’t have any of the anxiety about finding a parking space over there like I do here. Even LA, a town of 30 million has easier access to parking literally in the middle of the city than Sydney does.
The last thing Sydney needs is to replace parking with bus lanes.
Aren’t they planning on adding a bike lane to King St for the delivery drivers?
to add, start clearway times at 2pm, before school finishes
I would love to see more BRTs like the B1. Just such a quick and cheap way to make functional infrastructure. We got one. It improved the quality of transport and commute times on the northern beaches fantastically and reduced car use in the area. Then we didn’t get any more.
It should be a must along all the routes where a metro is proposed until that metro is built.
Actually enforcing them is a big point.
The Bus Lane and particularly the T3 heading into the city from the Northern Beaches can get pretty clogged up with people illegally using them.
Surely the price of cameras for enforcement has dropped enough that they would pay for themselves in the first month of operation.
Otherwise maybe we need police that are dedicated to patrolling bus and transit lanes, and they just do a random part of Sydney each day.
No more like more bike lanes and seating much like marrickville road. We need less cars in general on these roads though.
Drove buses for 25 years in Sydney, in that time the biggest improvement they made was implementing B lights to give priority to buses at intersections but even they can be made useless quiet easily by a clueless motorist sitting in a bus only lane refusing to move when given the B light.
One of the problems is how upset businesses get when people cannot park near them and lobby their local member for this type of thing not to happen citing they could go out of business as a valid reason not to do it.
now is the time for more evs
Cant wait for more electric buses in the city, diesel buses are so fucking loud
King St should have had its on street parking converted to 24 hour bus lanes years ago. Some of the dilapidated buildings could be converted to off street parking lots.
The problem is the businesses who benefit from the status quo will lobby hard against it. It is not an easy change.
What’s the point? They can’t keep enough drivers for the busses they’ve got to manage to keep timetables – adding more would just mean more missed services and pissed off people.
For enforcement. Just put dash cams on the buses. And have it so if the driver takes a still with it. It’s instantly sent to NSW Police to issue a fine
How are more bus lanes going to help? Outside of peak hours (what is peak hour ion Sydney these days? The roads are constantly busy) most buses are near empty. Bus lanes don’t make them faster, especially out of peak hour. They’re big and heavy and slow by nature. Now add the fact that they’re regular stopping and waiting for people to get on and off and when near capacity have people standing. They simply can’t go any faster.
They’re also not convenient for a lot of people and the fact is if they’re not more convenient than alternatives then you’re never going to increase up take. I could take public transport but it literally takes twice as long as driving. I have to walk to the metro, take that past my destination, change to the heavy rail and come back then walk to work. Takes a little over an hour. Alternatively I can drive, be assured of a seat, have AC and takes 30min at most. Why would I give up an hour of my day?
Whilst I agree more bus lanes would be ideal, in my wildest fantasy we would instead have light rail running full length down King st/Enmore Road, all the way up into Central. Also all the way along Parramatta Road
If anyone regularly takes trips under 10KM on their own they should really be looking at an eBike as a potential option.
They very quickly pay for themselves, are faster than the bus, have no timetable, and a lot more fun.
It’s amazing how much you can get done on an eBike with a basket on the back. Work commute, shopping trips, appointments, random errands.
**They’re not the solution for everyone**, but more people on bikes means less people in cars and more road space for people who actually need to drive: tradies, couriers, public services etc
I’ll support more bike lanes before more bus lanes. Given how ebikes are heading it’s more logical to expect more people to drop the a subsequent household car for an E-Bike.