Brisbane has great BRT infrastructure, so it does kind of make sense to me to upgrade the busways with projects like this. But for the eventual cost, surely some sort of Light Rail or Trolleybus solution would have been a better idea.
@@lachd2261 Light Rail was shot down, as even though all our old tracks still exist, just buried, they will all need to be ripped up, and electric infrastructure will need to be installed throughout the whole route, or it could be Newcastle Style with charging at every station, but either way, the building of it would be astronomical in comparison. Trolley Bus unfortunately falls into the category of "ew, I don't want wires everywhere"
Light rail, is nice, until you factor in the cost of the upkeep of the rails, ties and road bed. I live in a railroad town. Busses that can run on roads, is a much better idea. Since roads are easier and quicker and cheaper to maintain.
@@jayfielding1333 That day may or may not eventuate. The main issue now is the construction of enough Busway to merit LR being an option, as well as having enough supporting infrastructure to support continued bus operations during construction of LR infrastructure as no buses will be allowed into huge segments of busway while it is being upgraded. The opportunity to upgrade to LR is quickly fading away
Thank you, a great video. As a daily commuter from Eight Mile Plains to the city, this is a disappointing outcome - it fails to resolve the congestion around the bus stations and the inaccessibility to reliable transport for many.
Hi Rory, in my old city they had these buses but with a engine and deployed them on busy routes at peak times, but they were taken out of service because they were not really meant to be driven through suburbs. Your walk through was like a flash back in time👍
I went to Toowoomba last week, and it was an overwhelmingly prosperous city. It is a shame that the state government has not upgraded the railway network to run a Gold Coast-style commuter service.
@@acde9355As a resident there, it’s becoming urgent that we get our bus services updated and an alternative and effective transportation mode (like fast rail) to Brisbane. Could severely decrease traffic on Ipswich motorway, improve congestion in Toowoomba during peak hours (cuz it sucks rn) and can probably induce more growth up here.
@@FreeSeoul Per-passenger carried they are more expensive. Operational expenditure for rail based systems stems from the cost of maintaining the sheer amount of support infrastructure. But you can carry significantly more people in a tram, train (or an "actual" metro) compared to a bus. Even a bi-articulated model.
@@joshporter5422 Don't think there's ever going to be an ideal solution that ticks all the boxes. Train lines in Sydney require maintenance every second weekend that shuts down the whole line, and if you don't live along the line, you pretty much have to use a car anyway.
@@joshporter5422 Perhaps per-passenger when assuming that each train is completely full, but in SEQ given current usage of public transport it costs the taxpayer approximately $26 per train passenger and $3 per bus passenger. Back in 2014 QUT published a paper (though it is hard to tell precisely how they calculated this figure) that the SEB is believed to run at a profit. I'm sure with 50c fares this isn't the case anymore, and the metro will probably be a bit more expensive to run than your average bus, but I doubt the costs per passenger will blow out to $26 or above.
It’s impressive it’ll be able to reduce the amount of buses during peak hours but they still have a long way to go to improving infrastructure in general.
I like this. It’s than the “bus rapid transit” my city has planned. No bus ways and most routes will be on regular streets with traffic. Other great ideas from my city: when there was a push to get trams an alternative was proposed, use regular busses painted differently that follow lines painted on the road.
BERT is an excellent name for the bus metro. It would make more sense, in the long run, to increase population density in Brisbane and build more rail or dedicated bus routes. Roads encourage more traffic and cause more ecological damage. I lived in Brisbane for five years and used the rail on a daily basis. I infrequently used buses. Greater Brisbane's population is spread over a huge area and is not conducive to efficient public modes of transport, hence the need for cars. Greater Melbourne and Greater Sydney are smaller in area (still large) but both cities have double Brisbane's population. Infrastructure is cheaper to provide to more densely populated cities.
Seen these investing around a month ago when I had an ointment at Royal Brisbane Hospital. What a pity they had to be made overseas. One more sell off of our once great country. When our high wages price us out of everything it should be looked at. Thank you for a great video. One of many transport problems for Brisbane is our narrow gauge rail. Should have been looked at in early 70s when electrification began so we could have double deck trains. Oh well we got what we got, and too late now.
I do find the Brisbane buses my Preferred way to travel over the trains and usually get off at Altandi to ride the BUZ on the busway so looking forward to the new BERT busses
@@electro_sykes The biggest thing as the previous commenter said is that a train station is really only as good as the density surrounding it, the people willing to walk/ride out of their way for it or the buses that will take you there. I will also add that trains are great if you are significant distances away from where you want to go (i.e. >30km) as this is where the strengths of a train's speed and capacity are best utilised. But for Brisbane, where we lack the extremely dense residences of most European cities or even Sydney/Melbourne, there are few who can access a train station easily. This is where a busway supports the flexibility of buses being able to access suburbs while extracting the efficiency of dodging inner-city traffic.
@@electro_sykes Saying trains are better is a stupid oversimplification, you absolutely cannot have trains going everywhere, even japan and china still have busses because of how flexable they are, and the fact they can use existing roads. Busses are great, and trains are great but not everyone lives near a train line
Well, I may have found the city I want to live in. You see I cannot drive. And I live in a place that has Winter. So riding when there is snow and ice on the road, is not easy. We do have a bus system, but its small. Good video by the way.
And the best thing is, the fares are only 50c at the moment. The company I drive for currently does express runs between Redland City and Brisbane at peak times. Eventually they'll only go as far as Eight Mile Plains and Carindale and passengers will change to the Metros there.
Beautiful??? That's a stretch! It's just an ordinary city with city skyscrapers with most of its heritage buildings demolished. Go to a European city and then tell us what's beautiful. Are you a Brisbanite?
It looks like a nice bus, but it still has the bumpiness of a bus judging by your footage. The smooth ride is one of the biggest comfort advantages of trains in my opinion.
might finally get me back ont he bus when the 111 is replaced, currently i have to leave 2 hours early for work just because of the lack of capacity on buses
Metro originate from London's Metropolitan underground rail line that was built in 1863. The modern term of 'Metro' is a light, heavy above and/or below ground rail or bus system.
Thanks for the in depth video. I’m looking forward to riding it and have been taking advantage of the 50c fares to use more of the network to places I’d usually drive . Quick question - does it stop at all stations like a train, or do you still need to press the ‘stop’ button when you want to get off?
The beauty of trams is that they run along streets full of shops and other places to visit. These buses run alongside freeways so they don't connect to the street unfortunately.
True but the intention of the metro is to help deliver people to the high-demand locations quickly and efficiently (i.e. universities, hospitals, CBDs, stadiums, parklands). There are plenty of other bus routes that run through the suburbs and past the bustling shops before embarking onto the busway to finish their route at a major location. The main reason for the busway running alongside the freeway is because this corridor was already reserved, and was a quick, cheap and efficient way to reduce pressure off suburban bus networks as well as traffic on the freeway. Currently some parts of the busway support >20,000 trips per hour during peak, which is roughly equivalent to 10 lanes of freeway. In general most suburbs within a 10km radius of the CBD have some sort of BUZ (every 15 minute bus) that can take them to nearby shops/parks or all the way to the busway and then to other major locations (such as a university) without getting stuck in the inner-city traffic. One thing this metro will hopefully achieve is relieving pressure on existing bus services, allowing for more BUZs to operate beyond this 10km distance.
@@CommissionerManu Its not a "glorified bus." It's simply just a bus. A type of bus (bi-articulated) that have been operating on streets overseas (not just relegated to segregated corridors) for decades.
@CommissionerManu Add it to the long list of Australian transit systems being called something that they’re clearly not. The advent of Sydney’s ‘actual’ Metro and its huge success will set a precedent for other national projects to be named correctly from the beginning.
I would have thought it pertinent to mention that the busway is being extended to Springwood and then i believe Loganholme. Rochedale station is already fully completed though not yet in operation.
Do you think they will deal with all the fare evaders? Even with the 50 cent fares, I still see well over 10% of passengers getting in the back door and just not paying. How are they going to deal with that?
They make it sound like a novelty. But bi-articulated buses have been running in cities overseas for decades now. Perhaps novel by Australian standards.
Nah its def not a novelty, eight mile plains to uq is one of the most used bus network routes, it goes directly past a massive shopping center and directly into a university. Its gonna be heavily used, it even goes pretty close to one massive stadium and is used on event nights to transport people to these events.
Why are so many of the seats pointing backwards, it’s not like the buses are bidirectional? Going backwards already feels worse, doubly so with a bumpy, jerky bus ride.
They saved money on not renaming the project it but it does sound silly to call a bus a metro, I am glad the project actually happened the city was beyond capacity with buses and being stuck traffic jams caused by sheer bus numbers is very annoying as a passenger and driver
Last time I checked, only the Sydney Metro is an actual metro. Adelaide Metro, Brisbane Metro, Canberra Metro, Melbourne Metro (Tunnel) - none are actual metros 😂
its like how we call sporting venues with a fence around them stadiums and how we call basketball courts inside tin sheds super domes or domes.. its a uniquely Aussie thing
Don't forget to leave out 'Metro Tasmania' aswell. Yep. Hobart, Launceston and Burnie also call their bus network 'Metro'. I knew everybody would care to know that 😘.
Thanks Rory, excellent report. I am embarrassed by politicians in QLD. This is the metro ... ends up being a long bus. Also uses existing infrastructure with the same bottlenecks. Asia is just lightyears ahead of us.
@ourjeffie it was supposed to be an underground metro with a budget of 1.54 billion, they then changed it to a long bus in 2017, to drop the budget to 1 billion. www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/lord-mayor-graham-quirk-announces-brisbane-metro-plan-20160131-gmi2xx.html
@@RoryDing There is no way in the infinite existence of humanity that an underground light-rail system (Cultural Centre, Mater Hill and South Bank stations would probably have had to all be put underground) was going to stay under $3B. Even just purchasing 60 3-car trains alone would have cost about $1.2B based on recent projects. Based off the Sydney Metro costs per kilometre (which would actually be an underestimation because most of the Sydney Metro was built through low density areas) the tracks, tunnels, signalling etc. would probably come to about $3B if you replaced only the RBWH to Woolloongabba portion. Assuming we didn't spend another $3B for ECTS2, the maximum capacity per-direction would have been about 6000 (a little bit more than G:Link). To reach the Sydney Metro's capacity of about 17,000 (which is less than the busway already is) you would need 6-car stations and to buy 6-car rolling stock. Sydney Metro paid $3.7B for their 22 rolling stock alone and that is just to run one route. My guess is that by the time it was all done and dusted (about 10 years after the start of construction most likely, with the busway entirely shutdown for that duration) it would have come to roughly $7B. It would have had less capacity and wouldn't have run to all the same stations as the busway does now.
No it will be underground in the city - like a Metro! After going over the Victoria Bridge towards the city, it will go left them enter a tunnel under Adelaide st then go through the underground bus station at King George Sqaure and then Roma St before continuing onto the RBH on the existing busway
Innovation was when I visited china back in 2017 where buses would raise a large metal connection above it to take electricity like a tram and run on that electricity for mobility- in doing so it would turn off their diesel engine. We are certainly behind the times...
Ummm, to me that sounds like a modern trolley bus that have been around for over a 100 years. In fact Brisbane use to have a trolley bus network. More like back to the future.
@@JGrandcourt absolutely you're right, drawback is the electricity can only be drawn when you have the lines above you, but I would say that old tech is better than this
@@warrencramer4516 This is a perfect use of electric busses, the range without charging is like 200km, and each bus only travels about 15km each way, so they can easily do 5 trips up and back, then charge for 20-25 mins then get back and do it again. Or the driver might just swap to another bus
Not to discredit any of this but my home city has had a similar system since 1885, shows you how behind australia is in sense of technology. Sydney acting like a driverless metro is revolutionary when europe has had it since the 80s. Australia needs to start implementing and putting resources into technology since it's the future, rather they prefer to still argue about renewable energy in the parliament lmao,
A similar thing was proposed by the ACT liberals instead of light rail in Canberra, but they lost the election last weekend so unlikely to happen. Also LA has a lot of similar routes its integrating with rail. I think the cheaper upfront costs though are offset by more expensive maintenance and running costs over time. Also a few places have found the roads need extra reinforcement due to the frequent heavy loads running on them. Still any decent "seperated from traffic" public transport solution is good IMO.
Canberra's public transport system is below par at best. Especially in the older southern suburbs, plus Canberra's layout with satellite area's would be very costly for a similar system to Brisbane as we don't have the population to help pay for large infrastructure like that. I'm not holding my breath for the tram to cover all area's as it will take years to complete. It's only ok if you live near the Gungahlin CBD and Civic CBD.
@@stevemcintyre4398 agree mostly, Even the Labor gov has said construction won't start tile 2028 for stage 2B. But my point was using something like Brisbane metro in Canberra, i'm not sure it would have been much cheaper and this integrates into buses and trains as well.
@@stevemcintyre4398 even living one suburb across from Gungahlin, i ended up getting a car after the light rail was introduced forcing me to use it by changing the bus network, commute turned into a 100 minute journey but 15 mins by car. only people that REALLY benefit from the tram are people ON the tram line
The busways are already reinforced up to the capacity needed for a tram, so I imagine they should be alright (though we will have to see). I hear a lot about expensive maintenance and running costs over time with bus vs rail but personally it doesn't check out for me. For instance at the moment about $27B is being spent in the SEQ region all for projects to 'improve reliability and frequency' across the existing train lines. All of these projects are important (signalling, rolling stock, duplication, track straightening), but I don't think there is any way that a busway is more expensive than $27B to maintain.
This is a classic bait and switch. A decade ago, Labor wanted a Light Rail, LNP wanted a Metro. It went to a vote at the Local Elections, people voted LNP and, by association, Metro. Then the lies began to unravel when basic questions about rail based vehicles began being dodged, then the vehicles were beginning procurement and everyone noticed the requirement for rubber tyres, then eventually, we all realised we are getting a BRT, not a Metro, but no one up town wanted to admit to selling Snake Oil, so kept the stupid ass name
The issue with the “Metro” is that it only benefits those on inner city busy lines. It does nothing to solve the many poorer serviced suburbs in outlier areas that have good population, but poor public transport services, or those suburbs that are serviced, improved start & finish times & frequency.
Been waiting for all the detractors for this new transit initiative in Brisbane - and here in the comments they show this weird hatred of buses. This (essentially) BRT "metro" is in fact a metro when measured against the criteria loosely defining such a system . . Get over it boys - just because the state of queensland doesn't want to bankrupt the state by building rail-based transit, but opting for a much more flexible option dors NOT take away its moniker as a "metro". The anti-bus brigade exhibit almost religious lunacy in their "steel over rubber" wheels. When the so-called trackless tram or train gets going in perth, there'll be the same silly carry on. Yet nobody calls the Paris metro trains "just buses" when its carriages run on rubber tyres on concrete track. Good to hear Rory Ding's well presented take on the new metro.
I personally don't care about the name, Adelaide has been calling our whole system as a Metro which I just see as branding so that is the trains, trams and buses so whatever. But I see a system like this as a weird compromise which will in the end get replaced with some kind of dedicated rail system due to the demand, pricing on replacement buses and other infrastructure being too costly as like most gadgetbahn systems you are VERY limited by manufacturers. So while it is cheaper now it will cost more in the long term when it will eventually get replaced by a rail system, buses are great for suburbia and interconnecting services but as a core mode of transport there is a practical limit, this thing in Brisbane is a great stop gap but wont be able to scale much more.
@@SprattyD This will not be replaced by a real metro line in the long term, in all honnesty it will be suplemented by one, the busway is a wonderful idea and it works amazingly. Plus because it is electric the opperational costs are reduced compared to petrol/lng busses
It’s not a metro. It’s a bendy bus. Sydney had long buses back in 2008 and it was called a Metrobus. A metro is what goes from Sydenham to Tullawong via Chatswood.
Very torn on this, even though I don't live in Brisbane lol. The buses themselves are good in design as they are level boarding and flat and seem to have a degree of space and have faster boarding and unboarding times conceptually. However it seems long term it is just better to build the damn railway system. You have dedicated rights of way, the distance and passenger demand so instead of cheaping out on a glorified bus just build a proper rail system that can scale and be more fast, I noticed some bad bumping as well, a rail system if built properly can really avoid this. A road is going to wear out much faster and this will become more of a problem as time goes by.
I doubt rail would be any faster. They are roughly the same sort of speed. For instance a train from Altandi Station (about 15km from the city) takes about 30 minutes, and a bus from the same station takes about 30 minutes too (even though the busway doesn't even start until about 15 minutes into the buses journey). For another comparison, from Boggo Rd station, even though buses have to stop at an additional 3 stations they only take about 5 minutes longer (10 vs 15 minutes). Also for passenger demand, most of the demand comes from the suburban routes instead of just the main dedicated routes (i.e. the services that the metro are replacing). To swap to rails would mean that the majority of passengers would need to switch services, sometimes twice. Take the 139 route as an example. It is one the busiest routes, going from Sunnybank (where a lot of students live) to UQ (a university). If the busway was replaced with rail all those passengers would take the bus to Griffith Station, swap to a train, swap to a new train at Mater Hill Station and then get to UQ Lakes Station. What is typically a 30 minute one-seat journey for 1000s of trips each day has now become a 40 minute three-seat journey.
They look just like trams and seem like a good idea. I find it very ironic, given that buses replaced the trams in the first place and now they are trying to make the buses look like trams again. 🤔
The 169 is only temporary though? It will still run from UQ to RBWH and Roma Street to Eight Mile Plains, they are just running on the 169 as a soft launch since they are still working on the Adelaide Street tunnel
I don't understand why it's not three routes - UQ to North and UQ to South East, and North to South East. It would annoy me coming from Springwood and having to change bus to get to UQ.
@@jayfielding1333 Thats litterally the same system we have now, i come from springwood, change at eight mile plains (the bus comes every like 10 mins) so the change over is generally pretty quick. This will significantly decrease mean time between busses increasing speeds, and since its already faster to use the bus from springwood, this will be even faster to get to uq or the city.
@@imakevideos5377 Personally I hope that in the future they also replace the 169 route with a metro. Once the busway extension to Springwood is open you could have a one-seat journey to UQ Lakes. It wouldn't really add to congestion as there isn't much along the Springwood-Buranda section of the busway. It is also an extremely busy route, so it makes sense?
I find the whole thing funny..... I wonder how screwed up will its be if any of these tunnel on the busways get stuffed up.... wonder if they will divert onto the main roads?
They have driven on roads already before, so in the worst case that we somehow have a tunnel collapse it probably wouldn't be too different at all. Thankfully it isn't like a train where a little bit of rain can mean that all trains have to be halted for 3 hours.
I appreciate your clarity, Rory. Cheers.
Thank you 😊
Great job Rory! as always a very interesting upload. thank you.
Thank you 😊
It’s not a metro… just some fancy buses that identities as a metro! Haha
It's a BRT, but it annoys transit fans to it has my tick of approval
It is the 21st century. It can identify as whatever it thinks it is 😆
When did the word metro mean trains only?
@@dash4177 this is true, france has a few metro lines with rubber tired trains, im not exactly sure why though
Why would you want rail? Expensive and destructive.
Fun fact! Melanie Zanetti is also the voice of Chilli on Bluey! She is amazing and an awesome Queensland artist!
I heard they might be replacing the train announcements with her too
She also voiced the mum in Bluey.
@@electro_sykes Nooo! At least go for Bandit!
It should've been voiced by Darren Lockyer tbh. Who tf is Melanie
@@growdaddy4281 Classic bogan take.
I've loved watching your videos for years now and I just wanted to say Thank-you! So much.
BERT is a great idea Rory!
💯
Great overview once again Rory and we’ll done Brisbane!
Looks cool, great video as always too.
Brisbane has great BRT infrastructure, so it does kind of make sense to me to upgrade the busways with projects like this. But for the eventual cost, surely some sort of Light Rail or Trolleybus solution would have been a better idea.
@@lachd2261 Light Rail was shot down, as even though all our old tracks still exist, just buried, they will all need to be ripped up, and electric infrastructure will need to be installed throughout the whole route, or it could be Newcastle Style with charging at every station, but either way, the building of it would be astronomical in comparison.
Trolley Bus unfortunately falls into the category of "ew, I don't want wires everywhere"
Light rail, is nice, until you factor in the cost of the upkeep of the rails, ties and road bed. I live in a railroad town. Busses that can run on roads, is a much better idea. Since roads are easier and quicker and cheaper to maintain.
@@longrider42 buses also have huge flexibility to use a range of existing infrastructure
The busways will all eventually become light rail. They were always meant to.
@@jayfielding1333 That day may or may not eventuate. The main issue now is the construction of enough Busway to merit LR being an option, as well as having enough supporting infrastructure to support continued bus operations during construction of LR infrastructure as no buses will be allowed into huge segments of busway while it is being upgraded. The opportunity to upgrade to LR is quickly fading away
Good on ya, Rory! That was great! Keep well. Regards, Caleb
Your videos are the best Rory!!!
Thank you 😊
Thanks very much Rory. You are so good with your videos.
Thank you, a great video. As a daily commuter from Eight Mile Plains to the city, this is a disappointing outcome - it fails to resolve the congestion around the bus stations and the inaccessibility to reliable transport for many.
At least they didn't officially call it a trackless tram 😂
😂
"Trackless tram" was the name London gave to its trolleybuses. Ran off overhead powerlines like trams.
Hi Rory, in my old city they had these buses but with a engine and deployed them on busy routes at peak times, but they were taken out of service because they were not really meant to be driven through suburbs. Your walk through was like a flash back in time👍
Great video Rory, good to see this type of innovation. Sadly we live an hour out of Brisbane in the Lockyer Valley and have no bus service at all LOL.
I went to Toowoomba last week, and it was an overwhelmingly prosperous city. It is a shame that the state government has not upgraded the railway network to run a Gold Coast-style commuter service.
There is the 539 that runs between Rosewood Station and Helidon, but it is pretty infrequent and most start and finish at Gatton Station
@@acde9355As a resident there, it’s becoming urgent that we get our bus services updated and an alternative and effective transportation mode (like fast rail) to Brisbane. Could severely decrease traffic on Ipswich motorway, improve congestion in Toowoomba during peak hours (cuz it sucks rn) and can probably induce more growth up here.
Love your suggestion that the service should be called BERT!!
UQ Lakes look great this time of year (:
they reduced capital costs, but in turn they have greatly increased operational costs. well done
You mean by using buses? No buses are not higher operational cost.
you don't run public transport to make a profit
@@FreeSeoul Per-passenger carried they are more expensive. Operational expenditure for rail based systems stems from the cost of maintaining the sheer amount of support infrastructure. But you can carry significantly more people in a tram, train (or an "actual" metro) compared to a bus. Even a bi-articulated model.
@@joshporter5422 Don't think there's ever going to be an ideal solution that ticks all the boxes. Train lines in Sydney require maintenance every second weekend that shuts down the whole line, and if you don't live along the line, you pretty much have to use a car anyway.
@@joshporter5422 Perhaps per-passenger when assuming that each train is completely full, but in SEQ given current usage of public transport it costs the taxpayer approximately $26 per train passenger and $3 per bus passenger. Back in 2014 QUT published a paper (though it is hard to tell precisely how they calculated this figure) that the SEB is believed to run at a profit. I'm sure with 50c fares this isn't the case anymore, and the metro will probably be a bit more expensive to run than your average bus, but I doubt the costs per passenger will blow out to $26 or above.
It’s impressive it’ll be able to reduce the amount of buses during peak hours but they still have a long way to go to improving infrastructure in general.
Hi Rory thank you for the video I enjoyed it.
Yay second great video
Love your videos Rory! 👍
Thank you 😊
I like this. It’s than the “bus rapid transit” my city has planned. No bus ways and most routes will be on regular streets with traffic. Other great ideas from my city: when there was a push to get trams an alternative was proposed, use regular busses painted differently that follow lines painted on the road.
BERT is an excellent name for the bus metro. It would make more sense, in the long run, to increase population density in Brisbane and build more rail or dedicated bus routes. Roads encourage more traffic and cause more ecological damage. I lived in Brisbane for five years and used the rail on a daily basis. I infrequently used buses. Greater Brisbane's population is spread over a huge area and is not conducive to efficient public modes of transport, hence the need for cars.
Greater Melbourne and Greater Sydney are smaller in area (still large) but both cities have double Brisbane's population. Infrastructure is cheaper to provide to more densely populated cities.
what a find in my recommended
Great video mate
Thank you
This is great but Brisbane will need an actual metro like Sydney with the growing population
Brisbane need to fix the youth crime first .
@@anubizz3 Crime is trending downward in QLD the Youth Crime line is LNP Propaganda
Seen these investing around a month ago when I had an ointment at Royal Brisbane Hospital. What a pity they had to be made overseas. One more sell off of our once great country. When our high wages price us out of everything it should be looked at.
Thank you for a great video. One of many transport problems for Brisbane is our narrow gauge rail. Should have been looked at in early 70s when electrification began so we could have double deck trains. Oh well we got what we got, and too late now.
I do find the Brisbane buses my Preferred way to travel over the trains and usually get off at Altandi to ride the BUZ on the busway so looking forward to the new BERT busses
Trains are better bro
@electro_sykes as someone who lives 10 minutes away from the nearest train station, they are only good when they're easily accessible
@@joshuawhelan9358 I live about a 20 minute bike ride from a train station. People say its far but it really isnt as bad as people say.
@@electro_sykes The biggest thing as the previous commenter said is that a train station is really only as good as the density surrounding it, the people willing to walk/ride out of their way for it or the buses that will take you there. I will also add that trains are great if you are significant distances away from where you want to go (i.e. >30km) as this is where the strengths of a train's speed and capacity are best utilised.
But for Brisbane, where we lack the extremely dense residences of most European cities or even Sydney/Melbourne, there are few who can access a train station easily. This is where a busway supports the flexibility of buses being able to access suburbs while extracting the efficiency of dodging inner-city traffic.
@@electro_sykes Saying trains are better is a stupid oversimplification, you absolutely cannot have trains going everywhere, even japan and china still have busses because of how flexable they are, and the fact they can use existing roads. Busses are great, and trains are great but not everyone lives near a train line
Chilli is voicing the metro’s! Coool!~
Well, I may have found the city I want to live in. You see I cannot drive. And I live in a place that has Winter. So riding when there is snow and ice on the road, is not easy. We do have a bus system, but its small. Good video by the way.
And the best thing is, the fares are only 50c at the moment.
The company I drive for currently does express runs between Redland City and Brisbane at peak times. Eventually they'll only go as far as Eight Mile Plains and Carindale and passengers will change to the Metros there.
Brisbane is such a beautiful city
Beautiful??? That's a stretch! It's just an ordinary city with city skyscrapers with most of its heritage buildings demolished. Go to a European city and then tell us what's beautiful. Are you a Brisbanite?
So it's basically a road train with self loading cargo :P
It looks like a nice bus, but it still has the bumpiness of a bus judging by your footage. The smooth ride is one of the biggest comfort advantages of trains in my opinion.
The busway south side is generally pretty smooth.
4:31 is it possible to *not* have transverse seating directly opposite the doors? Ideally, the biggest standing spaces are by the doors
Metro 🚇 buses 🚌 are all is go Green!!😊😊😊
might finally get me back ont he bus when the 111 is replaced, currently i have to leave 2 hours early for work just because of the lack of capacity on buses
Metro originate from London's Metropolitan underground rail line that was built in 1863. The modern term of 'Metro' is a light, heavy above and/or below ground rail or bus system.
Are you coming to Perth for the opening of the Ellenbrook line?
I think this would work really well in Canberra, perhaps instead of the light rail.
Thanks for the in depth video. I’m looking forward to riding it and have been taking advantage of the 50c fares to use more of the network to places I’d usually drive . Quick question - does it stop at all stations like a train, or do you still need to press the ‘stop’ button when you want to get off?
You still need to press the stop button to get off and hail the driver if you want to get on. 😊
@@RoryDing good to know - thanks!
The beauty of trams is that they run along streets full of shops and other places to visit. These buses run alongside freeways so they don't connect to the street unfortunately.
True but the intention of the metro is to help deliver people to the high-demand locations quickly and efficiently (i.e. universities, hospitals, CBDs, stadiums, parklands). There are plenty of other bus routes that run through the suburbs and past the bustling shops before embarking onto the busway to finish their route at a major location.
The main reason for the busway running alongside the freeway is because this corridor was already reserved, and was a quick, cheap and efficient way to reduce pressure off suburban bus networks as well as traffic on the freeway. Currently some parts of the busway support >20,000 trips per hour during peak, which is roughly equivalent to 10 lanes of freeway.
In general most suburbs within a 10km radius of the CBD have some sort of BUZ (every 15 minute bus) that can take them to nearby shops/parks or all the way to the busway and then to other major locations (such as a university) without getting stuck in the inner-city traffic. One thing this metro will hopefully achieve is relieving pressure on existing bus services, allowing for more BUZs to operate beyond this 10km distance.
@@PyroManZIII agree with what you’re saying, but this particular system should have been a light rail, not these glorified busses
@@CommissionerManu Its not a "glorified bus." It's simply just a bus. A type of bus (bi-articulated) that have been operating on streets overseas (not just relegated to segregated corridors) for decades.
@@joshporter5422 exactly, it is just a bi-articulated bus. Not a metro. Calling it a metro is the “glorifying” bit of it.
@CommissionerManu Add it to the long list of Australian transit systems being called something that they’re clearly not. The advent of Sydney’s ‘actual’ Metro and its huge success will set a precedent for other national projects to be named correctly from the beginning.
wow!
I would have thought it pertinent to mention that the busway is being extended to Springwood and then i believe Loganholme. Rochedale station is already fully completed though not yet in operation.
Do you think they will deal with all the fare evaders? Even with the 50 cent fares, I still see well over 10% of passengers getting in the back door and just not paying. How are they going to deal with that?
No one cares
couldnt give two flying fucks, i pay because i loads of money
0:44 Bloke sending it on his bike 😂
Ikr! wonder what speed he was going
Slick. But novelty.
They make it sound like a novelty. But bi-articulated buses have been running in cities overseas for decades now. Perhaps novel by Australian standards.
Nah its def not a novelty, eight mile plains to uq is one of the most used bus network routes, it goes directly past a massive shopping center and directly into a university. Its gonna be heavily used, it even goes pretty close to one massive stadium and is used on event nights to transport people to these events.
I like the BERT idea!!! What was the ride like? Was it bouncy and unpleasant like a suburban bus - or did it feel more like a tram?
Try the Riyadh Metro, it’s now open! Welcome to Riyadh
Hi Rory, what camera do you use? It's very good
It opened by the time I was on my way to work.
Isn’t Perth getting a fleet of these trolley buses for the Perth-Morley-Ellenbrook Metro net ?
It seems like a modern trolley bus.
a trolley bus is constantly connected to electricity like a tram
Rory谢谢你，无论讲解火车还是巴士都那么详细周全，我觉得市政府应该给你工作津贴啊
Similar to the Sydney Liverpool-Parramatta Transit Way but more high tech
Why are so many of the seats pointing backwards, it’s not like the buses are bidirectional? Going backwards already feels worse, doubly so with a bumpy, jerky bus ride.
wait, does the brisbane metro get new infrastructure or do they just use. the same cluttered brt corridors?
How fast does it go?
How fast do they travel at?
They saved money on not renaming the project it but it does sound silly to call a bus a metro, I am glad the project actually happened the city was beyond capacity with buses and being stuck traffic jams caused by sheer bus numbers is
very annoying as a passenger and driver
Last time I checked, only the Sydney Metro is an actual metro. Adelaide Metro, Brisbane Metro, Canberra Metro, Melbourne Metro (Tunnel) - none are actual metros 😂
They are wannabe metros
So true 😅
This is such a weird train nerd thing to say
its like how we call sporting venues with a fence around them stadiums and how we call basketball courts inside tin sheds super domes or domes.. its a uniquely Aussie thing
Don't forget to leave out 'Metro Tasmania' aswell. Yep. Hobart, Launceston and Burnie also call their bus network 'Metro'. I knew everybody would care to know that 😘.
Bom dia rosy legal ônibus drisbone metrô legal gostei
Is it still 50c?
yes
50 cents is here to stay according to the politicians as the election is this saturday.
Hows the bus display panel already have defects on it lol
Thanks Rory, excellent report. I am embarrassed by politicians in QLD. This is the metro ... ends up being a long bus. Also uses existing infrastructure with the same bottlenecks. Asia is just lightyears ahead of us.
It didn't end up being a long bus, it was always going to be a long bus. And you won't find too many bottlenecks on the busways it was designed for.
@ourjeffie it was supposed to be an underground metro with a budget of 1.54 billion, they then changed it to a long bus in 2017, to drop the budget to 1 billion.
www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/lord-mayor-graham-quirk-announces-brisbane-metro-plan-20160131-gmi2xx.html
@@RoryDing There is no way in the infinite existence of humanity that an underground light-rail system (Cultural Centre, Mater Hill and South Bank stations would probably have had to all be put underground) was going to stay under $3B.
Even just purchasing 60 3-car trains alone would have cost about $1.2B based on recent projects. Based off the Sydney Metro costs per kilometre (which would actually be an underestimation because most of the Sydney Metro was built through low density areas) the tracks, tunnels, signalling etc. would probably come to about $3B if you replaced only the RBWH to Woolloongabba portion.
Assuming we didn't spend another $3B for ECTS2, the maximum capacity per-direction would have been about 6000 (a little bit more than G:Link). To reach the Sydney Metro's capacity of about 17,000 (which is less than the busway already is) you would need 6-car stations and to buy 6-car rolling stock. Sydney Metro paid $3.7B for their 22 rolling stock alone and that is just to run one route.
My guess is that by the time it was all done and dusted (about 10 years after the start of construction most likely, with the busway entirely shutdown for that duration) it would have come to roughly $7B. It would have had less capacity and wouldn't have run to all the same stations as the busway does now.
I almost rode it yesterday but I'm too far from it I'll eventually go
That'll be fun in 2032!
Of course, expectations will be low after LA28 😂
Wow nice BENDY BUS
Does it get stuck in traffic jam especially around CBD at all ?
No it will be underground in the city - like a Metro! After going over the Victoria Bridge towards the city, it will go left them enter a tunnel under Adelaide st then go through the underground bus station at King George Sqaure and then Roma St before continuing onto the RBH on the existing busway
@@Courier65 thank I will try it out next time when I am in town.
Innovation was when I visited china back in 2017 where buses would raise a large metal connection above it to take electricity like a tram and run on that electricity for mobility- in doing so it would turn off their diesel engine. We are certainly behind the times...
Ummm, to me that sounds like a modern trolley bus that have been around for over a 100 years. In fact Brisbane use to have a trolley bus network.
More like back to the future.
@@JGrandcourt absolutely you're right, drawback is the electricity can only be drawn when you have the lines above you, but I would say that old tech is better than this
We are so far behind.
@@warrencramer4516 This is a perfect use of electric busses, the range without charging is like 200km, and each bus only travels about 15km each way, so they can easily do 5 trips up and back, then charge for 20-25 mins then get back and do it again. Or the driver might just swap to another bus
Not to discredit any of this but my home city has had a similar system since 1885, shows you how behind australia is in sense of technology.
Sydney acting like a driverless metro is revolutionary when europe has had it since the 80s. Australia needs to start implementing and putting resources into technology since it's the future, rather they prefer to still argue about renewable energy in the parliament lmao,
A similar thing was proposed by the ACT liberals instead of light rail in Canberra, but they lost the election last weekend so unlikely to happen. Also LA has a lot of similar routes its integrating with rail. I think the cheaper upfront costs though are offset by more expensive maintenance and running costs over time. Also a few places have found the roads need extra reinforcement due to the frequent heavy loads running on them.
Still any decent "seperated from traffic" public transport solution is good IMO.
Canberra's public transport system is below par at best. Especially in the older southern suburbs, plus Canberra's layout with satellite area's would be very costly for a similar system to Brisbane as we don't have the population to help pay for large infrastructure like that. I'm not holding my breath for the tram to cover all area's as it will take years to complete. It's only ok if you live near the Gungahlin CBD and Civic CBD.
@@stevemcintyre4398 agree mostly, Even the Labor gov has said construction won't start tile 2028 for stage 2B. But my point was using something like Brisbane metro in Canberra, i'm not sure it would have been much cheaper and this integrates into buses and trains as well.
@@stevemcintyre4398 even living one suburb across from Gungahlin, i ended up getting a car after the light rail was introduced forcing me to use it by changing the bus network, commute turned into a 100 minute journey but 15 mins by car. only people that REALLY benefit from the tram are people ON the tram line
The busways are already reinforced up to the capacity needed for a tram, so I imagine they should be alright (though we will have to see).
I hear a lot about expensive maintenance and running costs over time with bus vs rail but personally it doesn't check out for me. For instance at the moment about $27B is being spent in the SEQ region all for projects to 'improve reliability and frequency' across the existing train lines. All of these projects are important (signalling, rolling stock, duplication, track straightening), but I don't think there is any way that a busway is more expensive than $27B to maintain.
0:49 I saw that on insta
Does it feel like traveling on a tram/light rail? Or just like any other bus?
It feels like travelling on a tram, but the ride is not as smooth as a tram.
It looks like a tram, they call it a metro, but actually it is an extended bus.
Great to see what regional Queensland’s mining royalties are being spent on.
Not for much longer given what LNP wants to do
Only Brisbane could call a bus a metro and think they are on an actual metro 🤪
We will never get a proper metro
None of us think it's an actual metro. Just the ppl in charge.
This is a classic bait and switch. A decade ago, Labor wanted a Light Rail, LNP wanted a Metro. It went to a vote at the Local Elections, people voted LNP and, by association, Metro. Then the lies began to unravel when basic questions about rail based vehicles began being dodged, then the vehicles were beginning procurement and everyone noticed the requirement for rubber tyres, then eventually, we all realised we are getting a BRT, not a Metro, but no one up town wanted to admit to selling Snake Oil, so kept the stupid ass name
And also Perth' Stirling council for calling this "trackless tram"
@@electro_sykes We absolutely will. It's inevitable. A new line is already needed along the river from Indooroopilly to Hamilton.
When I was a young lad growing up in Brisbane my parents bought me a tricycle for my birthday and told me it was a bike
The issue with the “Metro” is that it only benefits those on inner city busy lines.
It does nothing to solve the many poorer serviced suburbs in outlier areas that have good population, but poor public transport services, or those suburbs that are serviced, improved start & finish times & frequency.
Been waiting for all the detractors for this new transit initiative in Brisbane - and here in the comments they show this weird hatred of buses. This (essentially) BRT "metro" is in fact a metro when measured against the criteria loosely defining such a system . . Get over it boys - just because the state of queensland doesn't want to bankrupt the state by building rail-based transit, but opting for a much more flexible option dors NOT take away its moniker as a "metro". The anti-bus brigade exhibit almost religious lunacy in their "steel over rubber" wheels. When the so-called trackless tram or train gets going in perth, there'll be the same silly carry on. Yet nobody calls the Paris metro trains "just buses" when its carriages run on rubber tyres on concrete track. Good to hear Rory Ding's well presented take on the new metro.
I personally don't care about the name, Adelaide has been calling our whole system as a Metro which I just see as branding so that is the trains, trams and buses so whatever.
But I see a system like this as a weird compromise which will in the end get replaced with some kind of dedicated rail system due to the demand, pricing on replacement buses and other infrastructure being too costly as like most gadgetbahn systems you are VERY limited by manufacturers.
So while it is cheaper now it will cost more in the long term when it will eventually get replaced by a rail system, buses are great for suburbia and interconnecting services but as a core mode of transport there is a practical limit, this thing in Brisbane is a great stop gap but wont be able to scale much more.
@@SprattyD This will not be replaced by a real metro line in the long term, in all honnesty it will be suplemented by one, the busway is a wonderful idea and it works amazingly. Plus because it is electric the opperational costs are reduced compared to petrol/lng busses
It’s not a metro. It’s a bendy bus. Sydney had long buses back in 2008 and it was called a Metrobus.
A metro is what goes from Sydenham to Tullawong via Chatswood.
Good one, Rory. It seems that Sydney can take a few lessons from Brisbane when it comes to public transport.
Are you kidding?
Sydney with a frenzy of real metro lines construction be schooled by a glorified bus (however good that is).
😳
Shame they didn't build a rail/train type of system. General Motors/BP or something must have a stranglehold over Brisbane?
Very torn on this, even though I don't live in Brisbane lol.
The buses themselves are good in design as they are level boarding and flat and seem to have a degree of space and have faster boarding and unboarding times conceptually. However it seems long term it is just better to build the damn railway system.
You have dedicated rights of way, the distance and passenger demand so instead of cheaping out on a glorified bus just build a proper rail system that can scale and be more fast, I noticed some bad bumping as well, a rail system if built properly can really avoid this. A road is going to wear out much faster and this will become more of a problem as time goes by.
I doubt rail would be any faster. They are roughly the same sort of speed. For instance a train from Altandi Station (about 15km from the city) takes about 30 minutes, and a bus from the same station takes about 30 minutes too (even though the busway doesn't even start until about 15 minutes into the buses journey). For another comparison, from Boggo Rd station, even though buses have to stop at an additional 3 stations they only take about 5 minutes longer (10 vs 15 minutes).
Also for passenger demand, most of the demand comes from the suburban routes instead of just the main dedicated routes (i.e. the services that the metro are replacing). To swap to rails would mean that the majority of passengers would need to switch services, sometimes twice. Take the 139 route as an example. It is one the busiest routes, going from Sunnybank (where a lot of students live) to UQ (a university). If the busway was replaced with rail all those passengers would take the bus to Griffith Station, swap to a train, swap to a new train at Mater Hill Station and then get to UQ Lakes Station. What is typically a 30 minute one-seat journey for 1000s of trips each day has now become a 40 minute three-seat journey.
first was football to soccer now metro to bus, welcome to bogans land
The Adelaide O-Bahn is more of a "metro" than this.
I thought it was meant to be a city loop not just 2 random routes.
It's NOT a metro, IT'S A BUS
That bike at 00:45 was in a bit of a hurry, I call them Temporary Australians.
They look just like trams and seem like a good idea. I find it very ironic, given that buses replaced the trams in the first place and now they are trying to make the buses look like trams again. 🤔
I'm onboard with BERT (see what I did there 😉)
It was meant to run from eight miles plains and UQ to RBWH. Now Northside completely misses out as all metro is route 169
The 169 is only temporary though? It will still run from UQ to RBWH and Roma Street to Eight Mile Plains, they are just running on the 169 as a soft launch since they are still working on the Adelaide Street tunnel
I don't understand why it's not three routes - UQ to North and UQ to South East, and North to South East. It would annoy me coming from Springwood and having to change bus to get to UQ.
@@jayfielding1333 Thats litterally the same system we have now, i come from springwood, change at eight mile plains (the bus comes every like 10 mins) so the change over is generally pretty quick. This will significantly decrease mean time between busses increasing speeds, and since its already faster to use the bus from springwood, this will be even faster to get to uq or the city.
@@imakevideos5377 Personally I hope that in the future they also replace the 169 route with a metro. Once the busway extension to Springwood is open you could have a one-seat journey to UQ Lakes. It wouldn't really add to congestion as there isn't much along the Springwood-Buranda section of the busway. It is also an extremely busy route, so it makes sense?
Bustro would be a more honest description.
His is a choo choo train without the trail
I find the whole thing funny..... I wonder how screwed up will its be if any of these tunnel on the busways get stuffed up.... wonder if they will divert onto the main roads?
Uhh, that has not happened in YEARS and it wont happen now, the entire route is bus only
They have driven on roads already before, so in the worst case that we somehow have a tunnel collapse it probably wouldn't be too different at all. Thankfully it isn't like a train where a little bit of rain can mean that all trains have to be halted for 3 hours.
A bike never be a boat
A car never be a airplane
A bus never be a metro
😂😂
BERT it is.