This Australian city's free public transport experiment
Вставка
- Опубліковано 30 лип 2024
- People have been calling for public transport to be made free for decades - and this Australian city went ahead and did it (at least for a month)!
But should they make it permanent? And should other cities do the same?
Support me on KoFi! ko-fi.com/citymoose
What affect does free public transport have on how many people use it? Well the city of Perth in Western Australia gave it a try, to some pretty promising results. But can free public transport get people to ditch theirs cars in favour of trains, metros, buses, trams etc...? In this video, I look at how free mass transit in Perth worked out, as well as how it (and reduced fare prices) worked out in other parts of the world including Tasmania and Victoria. - Наука та технологія
Living in Melbourne, it's pretty clear that making public transport free converts pedestrians into public transport riders - the free tram zone in the CBD is always packed with people making journeys of only a few hundred metres. Most of them clear out once the free tram zone ends.
Also means a lot of people on the outside of the zone tend to cheat the system
And a flat rate of $5 discourages inner city (but outside free CBD) users, or converts them into cheaters.
@@oldherlSo true. $10 per day when I live less than 10km from the Melbourne CBD. So I have been cycling to work.
Came here to make this exact comment.
The FTZ has made a complete mess of any routes going through the CBD. Adds about 10 mins per journey if crossing the city.
City workers seem to be so inherently lazy they’d rather stand and wait for a tram in order to travel a block or two, rather than walk and enjoy the city on foot, which is almost always faster.
Wonder how many pedestrian/car incidents this has reduced
In Queensland the highway/motorway between the Sunshine Coast and the Gold Coast is perpetually being upgraded at astronomical cost and yet it can all grind to a halt in peak hours. Public transport on the other hand has seen no upgrade or improvement or frequency. Even with traffic jams the bus/train takes much longer. It is quicker to travel between London and Amsterdam than to travel between Maroochydore and Surfers Paradise!
Look at there difference between fuel excise recovery and public transport fares recovery and come back to me.
@@xr6lad Either I wasn't clear or perhaps you have a comprehension problem. I was pointing out the lack of investment in public transit infrastructure. If there was a high speed rail connection from the Sunshine and Gold Coasts to Brisbane many cars would be taken off the M1 as many more regular workers would use public transit for their daily commute.
A good example of everything that is wrong with public transport in Queensland is the "Northern Transitway" which is being built along Gympie Road (a very congested Stroad that heads to a number of big trip generators including Chermside shopping center, the biggest in the state and the 3rd biggest in the country). The project involves adding dedicated bus lanes in both direction which is a great idea as I have sat on many buses on Gympie Road to/from Chermside that take 3 or more cycles of traffic lights to get through.
The problem is that the government has (for reasons I don't understand) bowed down to the wishes of a few car yards and other businesses along the route and decided to make the bus lanes peak hours only (despite the traffic problems I mentioned occurring at all times of the day/week) so that the aforementioned businesses get to keep their on-street parking.
If we actually had a government that cared about public transport over cars, they would make the lanes bus only 24/7 and tell the car yards and other businesses to "get stuffed"
@@jfwfreo The guy who posts "Not Just Bikes" would have plenty of comments about the all the stroads covering SE Queensland. The large SUV's and american style Pick Ups are just adding even more to the mess!
@@jfwfreoyep totally agree - Gympie road is a massive corridor and it’s fixable. But requires resumptions and to get rid of many points of vehicle access (both traffic lights and driveways)…
I think there’s simply not the political will to do it and they’d rather look at spending 10x more building a tunnel to bypass the problem
Remember, Perth has a big tax on parking in the city. So people pay extra for parking and that pays for the free CAT bus services that run through the city all year. Basically within 1-2km from the city. Also, if you get on any public transport free in a inner city zone.
Perth has decided recently that all students get free transit this year from the 5th of Feb, and that every Sunday is free, which means I only have to pay on Saturdays which is great as I'm a train nerd who loves this city
Free for you which is great for you. But guess who pays? Or do you think nobody does? 😮
@@Design_no free Transit is good though? And especially WA has the money to do it, we had a 3(?) Billion surplus last budget, we have the money
@@Design_no every mode of transportation eats into govt revenue. I would rather have our tax money go into free public transportation.
@@Design_no the mining companies.
I’m a student in perth aswell and I travel 2 zones to the CBD every morning and I love that its free! Especically in the holidays its also free 😊
Transperth also removed the excessive amount of zone as well so you are only capped at a 2 Zone Fare no matter where you go in the Metro Area and our Airport Line is inline with the normal fare structure not charging the silly amounts that Sydney and Brisbane do
It would be cool if you did a video on Regional Queensland Public transport. It is an absolute mess, infrequent service, long winding routes, cash only tickets, no real-time information, frequently cancelled services and alot of suburbs in our regional city's have no public transport at all. I am in Toowoomba, less than 150km's from Brisbane and our public bus network has not had any major upgrades or overhaul in almost 20 years. We don't even have public transport to connect us to Brisbane, it's Private RPT only.
I really wish the Go cards would be rolled out statewide, getting coins these days is getting harder.
@@axipont8383 it would be a good start to making it more efficient.
If City Moose did highlight that state's transport woes, it might get the attention of the government there and embarrass their transport department into doing something.
If you get the standard "There is nothing wrong with our tranport system" mantra from their transport minister, then there is no hope for the commuters there, meaning, they simply don't care.
i am a toowoomba citizen too and find it absolutely ridiculous we still use a railway from the 1800s. we should have at least a frequent rail service to brisbane (and lockyer valley population centres) as well as a frequent and proper bus service😭😭
and its no wonder every main arterial/distributor ends up being a carpark during school pickup times…for a small city
There is no reason (other than a lack of willingness to invest in it and build the infrastructure) that you couldn't have a train service to Toowoomba as part of the SEQ network (being able to use Go Card, part of the same zone and fare system, turn up and board the train without needing to book in advance like the existing services etc) that's at least as frequent as the service to Nambour.
Yeah but. The free transit time in Perth did have another purpose. This was that the free transit was only using a Smartrider (card system run by Transperth to pay for rides).. The idea was to increase the use of Smartrider and, hopefully, public transport. Loved the video, am a Perthite, and looking forward to the Metronet one :). Keep it up!
As as elderly Toowoomba resident I would love there to be a frequent rapid train service to Brisbane to enable me to visit relatives and friends. I expect the enormous cost of re-engineering the Toowoomba Range for modern fast trains makes that idea a pipe dream.
Hey I'm Andrew Reeson, a council candidate, former engineer and big railway fan. The short answer for why we don't have fast passenger trains is exactly what you think. The 500-600m drop down the range is too much for trains so they have to take the current long winding route, or the government (or some wealthy airport owning family) digs a tunnel. The Gowrie to Helidon section of the inland rail (which includes a 6km tunnel) was costed at $1.35 billion. That's a lot of money to connect a town of our size. The best case scenario is the government will see the value of electric passenger trains and build it into the freight line.
The other short answer is a lack of political will. There's too much money and power invested in keeping the oil and automotive industry happy.
Toowoomba has had a rail connection to Brisbane since 1867. But the only service that runs on it at present is the Westlander, twice weekly, which means the line is very underutilised. There's no basic reason why a a regular passenger service could not operate between Brisbane and Toowoomba, and as at November 2023 the Qld Dept of Main Roads and Transport were preparing a business case to make it happen.
@@damonroberts7372 I've taken a steam train from Toowoomba to Helidon and I don't think that route will ever be viable for public transport. Even on the Westlander, it takes 1.5 hours to reach Helidon and about 4 hours to reach Brisbane.
I'd love to be proved wrong though. We need trains. The rest of the world is way ahead of us.
@@AndrewReesonLeather: As I said, TMR are actively looking into the business case at present, there is potentially Federal and State funding available for such a project. I'd send you a link, but UA-cam routinely blocks comments with embedded links.
@@damonroberts7372 Found it. Thanks for the tip. It looks like they're trying to add passenger capacity to the inland freight rail and upgrade the existing passenger rail along the way. I'm skeptical of it actually happening but the federal government has allocated $15 million so that's a pretty good reason to be optimistic.
I may contact the project managers to get an update. It's something that I get asked about all the time.
The frequency of trains in Melbourne is a travesty. Loved living there, but clearly resting on its laurels of Most Livable City accolades last decade. Hopefully they’re just holding all improvements until Metro tunnel opens .
I was shocked when I saw that Transperth trains generally manages higher frequency than Metro Trains Melbourne does
Melbourne has just got too big for its infrastructure. The citizens then suffer. A smarter government move would have been to develop regional towns such as Geelong and Ballarat etc. This would share the population around the state and would have reduced the size of Melbourne by at least a million.
Not sure where you are but every 15-20 minutes isn’t bad.
@@illiiilli24601 Why would that be a shock. Depends on routes and journey surely. Perth will ultimately have some limits as there are only 2 tracks one in and one out. So basically only one track is able to have express routes. Also on some tracks in Perth the stations are 5 km apart.
@@xr6lad Out of peak 15-20 min is fine. It depends on the demand really. For buses you need more because the buses are smaller.
Some public transport advocates aren't keen on free PT. They say that it discourages investment, but surely running a ticketing system and hiring ticket cops would cost more than any revenue actually collected.
I wonder how many tickets they needed to sell to pay for the Myki and Tcard/Opal messes.
The cost of policing fares isn't significant compared to the return. Remember that the government isn't actually evil, if they were losing money trying to implement a fare, they just wouldn't implement a fare.
Really free fares isn't conceptually that different the current status quo given how heavily subsidised public transport it. We've already established a 'social good' case for making pt viable despite it running at a loss, making it free is just dialing that up to 11.
The main issue is really opportunity cost in various forms. The most obvious being that it's going to cost you even more tax payer dollars to run the network for free, which means less funds for other stuff. So there is a bit of a cost benefit issue there. Will the benefits of free public transport outweighs the benefits of whatever else you could spend that money on?
Then it's worth taking a closer look at the social good case. It's undeniably true that there are groups who would greatly benefit from free PT and desperately need the help, but a blanket free PT policy is also giving that lifeline to people who arguably don't need it. For example I am a young professional who catches the bus to the city for work. I can very comfortably afford my transport budget, it doesn't impede my ability to live my life in anyway. As nice as it would be for me, personally, to have that expensed wiped out, the money the government spends footing my pt bill could be better spent footing the pt bill of someone worse off.
These aren't meant to be silver bullet arguments against free PT. The points I am making have their own flaws, and I'm not really presenting them with the purpose of 'debunking' free PT. I mainly mean to highlight that it's a pretty nuanced topic, and any course of action taken on the issue presents a range of positive and negative consequences.
@@91Caesar I'll admit, I don't have the numbers on hand, so I'm likely exaggerating the cost of administration, and underestimating the revenue from fares. If the returns are worth the cost, then the current system works perfectly.
With that being said, I'm generally biased against means testing in most cases, because means-tested programs don't become "institutions" and are therefore easier to half-arse and cut than universal ones.
@@bigdude101ohyeah- in Queensland the cost of the recent ticketing system upgrade was more than yearly revenue from fares. The cost of enforcement (state police, Translink officers, private security), ongoing IT costs, etc is not known. The government made the maintenance contract a secret.
Then add passengers time wasted queueing for the gates, and longer journeys caused by touching on and off every time when using the bus, instead of just boarding the bus using any of the 3 to 5 doors, which is a standard in Europe.
I caught trains in Perth during free public transport period. Every other day there were ticketing staff checking peoples Smartriders, even though the ride was free. There were cases of people being chucked off the train. Not sure why those people weren't given different roles or holidays in January. Might have saved some money.
Ticket inspectors usually make the city more than they are paid, both from fines and decreased cheating.
One disadvantage of free PT is like the video mentioned, people taking it for short distances instead of walking.
Another I would say is that homeless people will ride the bus the whole day as accommodation, this surely would not go well with passengers
This free travel month was great. I live in the CBD so I don't have to commute, but it was great to get around with my SmartRider balance staying at $23.00 for a whole month. If I lived in the suburbs and commuted into the CBD each day, this free month would have saved me quite a bit of cash. I don't own a car (my apartment building has a parking space for me, but I rent it out) as I enjoy walking or taking public transport so transport generally doesn't cost me much.
For me, the primary purpose of public transit is to increase mobility for everyone, increase access for those who need it and, in doing so, reduce congestion and pollution and can stimulate economic growth by increasing access to opportunity (such as getting to jobs, education, shopping, medical care, etc) for those who may not have it now. Providing transit for free lowers the barrier for the poorest, increases options for all, and can be offset by the increase in economic activity and, as you mentioned, lowered congestion and pollution.
In Perth the major shopping centres and hubs don't usually have the trains going to them. Its just expensive for the tunnelling. Its because the centres were built before the rail lines were built. But it means that ultimately a missed opportunity for decentralisation as this hubs have employees that can easily travel by buses, but would just tend to drive.
By Making it free you will not have the budget to create another one ... I rather pay if its mean I get better public transport.
@@anubizz3 In Perth the public transport is great. Considering sprawl and low density its as regular as it can be really. Its so much quicker to get around even in most places at peak hour, so govt needs other levers. Making parking expensive does help.
@@BDub2024 there is no question Perth have great public transport even 10 years ago when my cousin study there but now it already get taking over by Sydney and Melbourne maybe that's the reason why public transport in Perth did not grow much, You need to go to TOD hub like Chatswood and Parramatta to understand how great TOD are.. Making PT free make your ability to improve PT diminished as no money to create a new route and even if you have because you have plenty of mine tax, government will reluctant to make another as it will cost more the bigger the pt network..
I am PT advocate myself, I deliberately move to TOD suburbs for a reason. But car is not our enemy here making parking more expensive will not subsidies free PT, and its and opposite of giving people choice... If you have great public transport people will automatically choose it over cars.. And in order to create that public transport we need money...
A big part of the reason the G:Link tram on the Gold Coast has been so successful is how high the frequency is.
Apart from active transport, all modes have user fees attached to travel. And these user fees never come close to covering the cost.
However, in the case of private cars, we do everything we can to push people towards large, infrequent payments that is easier for drivers to forget about on the daily.
Public transport pasengers, on the other hand, are encouraged (or even outright required) to pay for travel journey, by journey, by journey. This makes the fare impossible to ignore and makes passengers stop and consider before every trip.
I think public transport could learn from this example. By default, public transport should be paid for in a single annual payment that gets you unlimited travel for the next year. Trip by trip payments or tourist passes could also be available, but the system should be set up to make annual payment the simplest option and make it the cheapest option for regular travellers.
Because people grumble about a big bill when it comes in, but once it's paid, people forget and start to treat the bus as something they are entitled to and something they would be stupid not to use.
Infrequent payments on cars? Come back to me when you’ve bothered to include fuel excise which is a defacto per klm charge in that essay. PT never covers costs.
@@xr6lad- the taxes in petrol don't even cover the costs of the roads, and the costs of pollution, injuries, people killed, noise etc are not even calculated. Car owners pay for petrol once a week on average, and once a month for EVs charged at home.
@xr6lad States collect rego. Commonwealth collects fuel excise, and roads are funded by.. (checks notes) council rates. Not only does fuel excise not cover the cost of the roads you drive on, it isn't even used to contribute to the cost of building or maintaining roads. Your fuel excise goes into consolidated revenue and gets used to fund politically motivated tinkering with the IR system, or whatever else the Federal Government does.
@@p1masonummm roads ARE not funded by council rates EXCEPT residential streets and some C roads. Which yea, research, are generally built by the developer in the first case then maintained by council. Highways and freeways ARE built by the states and federal government. Does no one know the division of powers? And I am talking about Australia.
@@tandraszoh and if we are getting to the level of pollution injuries etc we have entered a new level of stupidity. Period. Shall we add up the deaths of when trains used asbestos interiors and brake pads if you want to go to those levels.
Brisbane has a system where if you do 5 round trips on your go card you can get one free ride. We also used to have free travel Sundays. Edit: soon it will be just 50 cent fares statewide!!!! Come August for 6 month trial. I hope it stays at 50 cents but I have doubts over it. Suspiciously the trial is taking place around election time.
Fares were already capped in Perth down to the price of a 2-zone fare. You get 10% discount for using a card and another 10% for using a bank card automatic top up.
50c public transport soon though
There's Montpellier in the South of France that has recently switched to free public transportation for locals.
It covers tram, proper busway BRT and regular bus lines. You still need a pass but it's free if you live in the metro area of the city.
And on the side of increasing ridership by improving the service and reach : the ridership forecast for the Grand Paris Express are really high and were recently revised from 2 to at least 3 million daily rides on the new GPE lines alone.
Every time there's an improvement, the ridership increase goes beyond the predictions.
The demand is so high anyway.
There was also an increase in ridership after the introduction of new trains with better comfort and capacity. And of course when lines are converted to automation and high frequencies can then be offered at virtually any time and without costing much more, thanks to the driverless and unattended train operations.
Many currently "car-ridden" people are eagerly awaiting for the lines and extensions to open so they can ditch their cars and ride transit happily ever after...
Great video!
to me that seems like such a good idea for a city, you get locals building the infrastructure (money stays in the economy) and locals using the infrastructure + tourists. So instead of importing fuel, and cars you can keep a majority of the money in the local area, which seems like a really good idea. Building a road just to populate it with overseas imports seems pretty wasteful not to mention the other benifits of using public transport.
Given how public transport is already subsidised by the public, I think switching to making it free would be far more beneficial than keeping it at its current price or lowering that price. Aside from just reducing operating costs through no requirement for ticketing hardware and software, and ticketing inspectors, it would greatly encourage public transport use, and get more people invested in properly funding public transport.
A major limitation of these trials is that they run for a small period of time only, meaning people simply do not have time to adjust their habits and methods of getting around. This is likely the reason why a lot of people who walked took public transport in the trials, as they were already not using a car, and were used to taking public transport. If free public transportation is run for longer, more people would have time to learn about public transport options in their area, and as time progressed would become more likely to use it.
Then say good bye on the dream of new and better public transport, the bigger the network the higher the cost, so government just let the public transport rot away and priorities on someone that pay like a dreaded new toll road? isn't this defeat on the purpose promoting public transport? if you want something better you need to be willing to pay for it, not just demand it.
The colony model of Australia's government, where a small regional unit has a high degree of control over the state's infrastructure & services, facilitates free transport by allowing state governments to do bread & circuses the train fares.
Perth also has the Perth Parking Management Act which charges a levy for parking spaces in the City of Perth area. This money goes to the government. This could be increased to offset the cost of public transport. Perth is such a widespread city that walking is not an option for most people.
Roads are so good and clear, that people have lived their whole lives never taking transport. Its just so much quicker and easier by cars. Exception is now the Mandurah and Joondalup lines in peak each day. But then again when you consider the time to actually get to the stations and park and ride, then driving is still the same or quicker.
I’ve always supported free public transport but I do agree better frequency is what really matters.
Loving your videos, great to see someone cover Perth topics and actually use a lot of nice footage from Perth. Definitely keen for a metronet video!
The difference with Perth is that Western Australia has a very good economic at the moment with billions of dollars in surplus. They have recently opened the airport line, removed all level crossings on the Armadale line, extended the northern line, opened a new line from the Armadale line thru to the Mandurah line, and opened another new line to the north east suburbs.
They are still removing the crossings on the Armadale line but are on time. I hope they stay on time as it takes ages on the bus and some of the bus drivers are well not great drivers.
The Mirrabooka to Fremantle example is actually not the best route. You would take the 362 down to Perth Busport, walk a few mins across to the central train station and board the Fremantle train line. Takes about 70 mins. 45 mins by driving if not congested.
Great video mate!
Free public transport, but taxes should go up to cover the lost revenue from fares. That means two things:
1) Low income earners would be subsidised by high income earners, which recognises that public transport is a form of welfare
2) It encourages people to take public transport because you're not missing out on something that's free, you're missing out on something that you paid for
Money does talk in the end. Extra charges for parking are good.
meanwhile, NYC is rising fare price on subways
A marginal increase only though?
In the UK, we decided that because British Rail was never profitable, we should privatize the railways after cutting the service. It would never occur to people here that enabling more people to travel would provide economic benefits, even if you made it free at the point of use-unless you are talking about roads that are built to maximize private car access, in that case they will lecture you about all the benefits of having free to use infrastructure, but why not privatize the road and expect it to turn a direct profit? They must surely be in favour of private ownership of roads too?
We had it in Newcastle for a while, a fare free zone from Newcastle to Hamilton. It was very popular while it ran.
There is another factor to take into account, how many people are willing to pay for public transport for there's close to 30% of people who just jump on a bus,train or tram and don't give a bleep about paying for it and there's some connection points that people can bypass ticket gates for example 'getting off a train at a station just outside the city and grabbing a tram or bus into the city' a number of people don't even have a ticket or use their travel pass on their phone
Yeah it's very easy to jump on and not give a toss about paying. For example on the Midland line.
Get on at Ashfield, security are never there.
Get off at Claisebrook, security are rarely there.
Catch YellowCat bus to Perth.
Free trip.
Big challenge is how to service East Wanneroo, Darch Gnangara in the future... By train there is talk there could be a spur off the new Ellenbrook line at Malaga. But would then lead to four lines running through the Bayswater to Perth section and could cause scheduling chaos in primetime. Or do you go via Reid Hwy in Balcatta and work up from Mirrabooka. Or somehow use Reid hwy and tunnelling to connect with the major hub of Morley (won't happen). Then light rail prospect is dead in Perth now. Local govt looking to trackless trams. How do the universities Curtin and UWA get serviced better. How can Fremantle better connect to Mandurah line and Curtin. How can Southern Fremantle better connect to Fremantle and Mandurah line... What is the longest possible journey for light rail or trackless trams. Can it go 20km on roads from Perth to Darch for instance... or is that not suitable.
Light rail is still a possibility for future routes. A consortium of many LGAs have already come together to plan out routes.
@@thevannmann Glendalough to Scarborough is the main one. I reckon they need to instead look at major routes north to East Wanneroo area. I reckon Great East Hwy through Belmont... Canning Hwy or Leach Hwy to Connect Freo to Mandurah line and Curtin Uni. Morley is well service by buses, but disappointing that they couldn't tunnel the Ellenbrook line through there. Mirrabooka can develop a better office hub, but need rail in some form. But would require via Reid Hwy... Karrinyup is massive but only really accessible by car.
@@thevannmann I've never heard of Marmion Ave being option and density isn't high, but I wonder if Karrinyup Rd to Hillarys or Whitfords is ever an option.
In NSW for the elderly at least buses and trains are capped at 2.50. I think it would help if this where expanded. In Newcastle tapping on appears optional, it's rampant.
Many people do seem wedded to the car and won't consider any other options .
I was enjoying taking all the free transportation during this time. Then just as it was coming to an end I lost my SmartRider card. It had about $40 on it. It wasn’t registered so my free month cost me anyway 😂 looking forward to your Metronet video. You do impressive work.
Los Angeles Metro instituted a new pricing structure in 2023. They changed to a capped fare system.
It's a maximum of $5 a day or $18 a week. It costs $1.75 for a one-way ride with a 2 hour window for free transfers. So after the 3rd ride, the rest are free. So tourists can really benefit from it especially for the week. $18 for unlimited rides is a great deal considering how expensive parking is many areas.
For Seniors and disabled, it costs 75 cents per ride during peak times and 35 cents during off peak
Low income households get 20 free rides per month
Lastly, K-12 and Community College students can ride for free.
All these fare prices are applicable to subway, light rail, BRT, and regular bus routes. LA Metro saw ridership increases for every month in 2023.
We got a capped fare in Perth near the end of Covid.
Could you have a look at The Hunter Valley and Newcastle? It is perfect for creating a secondary hub city to the north and west like they do in Europe, everything shouldn’t be based around Sydney only as the Hub city
wasnt the free thing in perth due to compensation of the closure of lines etc for the metronet works ?.... I think in relation to WA with the mining companies and the under table deals that are done that they could partially fund this
You're wrong about the family of four. Perth's system has the FamilyRider which is $10.30, for a whole day, available on weekends and school holidays (applicable though all of January)
I live in a country where public transit very cheap and most of the time works well so I never even thought about buying a car.
In Perth everyone drives. Many people just never take public transport and don't know anything about it. They've always driven to and from school and that continues into adulthood where they drive or take taxi uber.
@@BDub2024 sucks to be them, imagine the cost savings when you compare public transport to an uber lol, i mean uber is quite expensive.
@@imakevideos5377 yeah i actually like catching public transport. anyway.
Wow where did you get all those amazing bird's-eye shots of Perth? This is a good video and I never thought about the massive costs of allowing car usage.
The example you provided of Mirrabooka to Fremantle is not that great though as there are a couple of high frequency fast bus services from there to the CBD and then the Fremantle Rail Line to get all the way to Fremantle, so that journey is not really a good example of a bad one.
If you didn't know Perth has now announced public transport to be free for all students all year every day except Saturday, and for everyone on all Sundays.
I'm surprised Google maps suggested that route in his screenshot at all, was the Fremantle line down that day or something?
@@illiiilli24601 Trains to Freo every 12 min from city. The quickest way to drive is via Charles st, Freeway and Canning Hwy.
Metronet stage 2 needs to focus on light rail connections.
@@thevannmann I reckon light rail is dead now. Remember in the late 1990s onwards they had feasibility studies completed for Subiaco, UWA, Curtin... and the Libs went to election with route through Alexander Dr to Mirrabooka. A TAFE course through TAFE Balga was even being discussed. Mining bust and then the GST Cwlth grant rip off, meant insufficient funds to continue. Then future governments cancelled it. Since then the biggest advocates like Professor Newman has moved to Trackless trams. Currently being trialled by City of Stirling.
@@thevannmann I doubt it will ever happen now. Certainly an intermediary service to UWA Curtin Vic Park Canning bridge stn to Fremantle Gt Eastern Hwy eastwards, Alexander Dr to Gnangara etc... would all be possible.
It depends if an election is due. Obviously if an election is due in the year then it becomes appealing. Perth has a lot of people that never take public transport. I think this is beneficial as they can see that public transport actually isn't that bad after all. So you lose money in January for sure. But you may actually pick up some extra users later in the year. Perth is a summer based place which comes alive in summer. But ultimately beaches and rivers are still not a place that people would take transport to. Everyone drives. So that's a challenge and consideration of how to encourage people to use public transport for recreational purposes, and how can keep the service going all year when its empty... Food for thought for the planners and how to promote public transport routes. People are remarkably ignorant about bus routes or instance, despite Perth have a wonderful and comprehensive bus network. As people don't take transport they have no idea.
That's also a major benefit of including free public transit with the cost of tickets to major events like football matches, giving people who wouldn't normally use public transport a reason to experience the system.
@@matthewparker9276 Massive change occurred in Perth with Perth Stadium being built. Formerly most people would drive to watch footy or cricket. Now you've got over 80% taking public transport. The public was shocked when told of that as the stadium as being built, but have really brought into the free buses that go from the stadium in all directions on routes after the match. Then there are trains that go direct to various locations after the match. Pity so many people rely on uber and taxis, but its been a resounding success. So in Perth in particular, its been massive and certainly made people take public transport
@@BDub2024 the only time my dad will take the bus or train is to go to the footy in brisbane because it is free or on new years eve, he needs his car because he is a plumber which i completely understand, i have tried to convince my sister to use the bus but she never liked it. Its quite annoying because I can easily beat her to the city on a good day with moderate traffic
@@imakevideos5377 Perth and LA are the. ultimate car rules cities. The govts have trains doing 120kph down the middle of the freeway on Joondalup and Mandurah lines which helps spread the message. The buses ar really efficient. But the city does sprawl which makes it hard to cover everywhere. But people as you say only drive and they refuse to change. In Perth its only certain routes that get congested anyway. Usually it is quicker to drive. Also in Perth people are used to sunny weather so if its raining they definitely drive.
It was a great initiative by the government, but it still is crap on my end as i live in the suburb affected by the train closure (part of the metronet expansion)
In Victoria, we have a provincial Premier who thinks that because Melbourne public transport is more frequent than Bendigo's, it doesn't need to be even more frequent.
Up here in Darwin, an all-day ticket on our buses is only $3 and people over 65 with a Seniors Card (like me) ride free. In my satellite city - Palmerston - there’s a good carpark and interchange, for the express bus into the Darwin CBD (30 min). Local buses are frequent and popular - though 90% of the passengers are Aboriginal or TSi (they’re 30% of our population).
thats a really nice way to do it, i like the idea of parknrides because it helps people to ditch the car more and more, my city (brisbane) is building 1 new train line, upgrading the southern busway to accomidate larger and more frequent busses, and upgrading stations all throughout the network which is really good and should increase ridership even if by a small amount i rekon 10-15%
Free public transport is a very vexed issue and there is no perfect solution. One of the problems with it is that, because it is free, people don't place much value on it (you tend to appreciate things more if you have to pay for them). More pragmatically, the Melbourne experience with free trams in the CBD has not been an all out success. CBD trams are often overcrowded with passengers only travelling one or two stops - a distance they could easily have walked. And, beyond the boundary of free travel, there is almost an 'unofficial free tram zone' that extends one or two stops further, so revenue is being lost through people gambling on a lack of fare enforcement. Another problem with the free tram zone is that encourages people to drive to the city and then move around on free trams for their 'last mile'. I'm not saying it's all bad news, but free transport is not a panacea to transport problems and, as with everything in life, the law of unintended consequences will always apply.
Transperth/Metronet are leagues ahead of other parts of Australia.
Agreed. I think the bus network has been particularly strong for 50 years at least. Then in last 30 years all these extra rail lines have extended up the northern and souther corridors. I would like to see stations closer than 5km apart, but I understand that would make the train journey slower and that there is no scope for express rail tracks.
The inter-connectivity is the strongest in Perth amongst different modes.
@@thevannmann has been for at least 50 years... There could be some improvement though in other areas. More stations on Joondalup and Mandurah lines. Investigate tunnelling to enable major hubs to get heavy rail. Too late for Morley. Mirrabooka while smaller has potential via Reid Hwy. Is light rail absolutely dead and buried and can it service routes like Alexander Dr to Darch... or Great Eastern Hwy... I think it is dead. How can the areas outside Fremantle be serviced in quick ways that connect to other lines and the city. Can East Wanneroo every be service by train? The option presented of a spur off Malaga on the Ellenbrook new line isn't perfect.
Trams in Melbourne’s CBD are free, on the City Circle Route (Kym in Darwin)
Here in Victoria, you can travel all day anywhere in the state for $10.60. It's even cheaper on weekends and public holidays and if you are entitled to concession travel.
The problem is that if you only need to travel a short distance to work, the cost is the same.
@@kippen64 The idea was to put rural people on the same cost structure as metropolitan people.
@@gold3084 I moved to Melbourne from the Latrobe Valley and it's galling to be paying the same in inner Melbourne as I did back then. So I mostly ride my bike.
Even if 50% reduction in fare say aud 100 or 4 weeks will be a win win situation for both, travellers n govt. Anything giving free is not fare. But increasing public transport is a must because atleast in melb, buses run empty or 4-5 passengers at d cost of bus, driver salary, petrol, maintenance, wear n tear which pains a lot. So if made free, atleast per passenger cost will come down drastically.
Let us see what happens in brisbane from 4th aug making even state transport free for 6 mths.
Perth now has students travel free and free travel sundays
I don't know how it is in Australia, but here the problem is that an annual pass for parking near the city centre is cheaper than an annual public transport ticket. In our case, the first step should be to set the same prices.
I'm an Australian living in Tallinn and I'd argue that it's not comparable to an urban Australian situation. Firstly, Tallinn roads are practically traffic free all the time (at least compared to Australian cities), and secondly, there is an abundance of parking practically everywhere. Tallinn just hasn't reached a high enough population for free public transport to lure people away from the convenience of cars.
This guy looks like Errol Flynn and David Niven. Both popular ladies men.
In Sydney, public transport is free if you don’t tap on.
I believe if fares are raised concurrently with substantial increases in frequency I believe ridership increases substantially.
I don't know. People just like cars. If its hot or wet, then the traffic is always a lot more congested. People just don't take buses or trains.
@@BDub2024I’d say that people are much more likely to switch from car to rail transport like train or tram, but almost never to taking a bus.
@@szymex22 That's what they say... but Joondalup and Mandurah lines work so well because of freeway being alongside train lines cruising along. A lot of people though are fearful of trains. Trams its arguable and depends on where. Trams does certainly lay the track and help people that just don't know or like transport get their mind around the concept. I think that's the biggest thing. Even though for us a bus route is absolutely obvious, for a transport phobic or someone that's ignorant seeing a track makes them more comfortable. Its as if people that don't like transport, think bus services keep changing journeys or routes etc. They don't quite get it, that bus routes have stayed the same for 40 years.
Free public transport in Melbourne would be awesome. I am currently bicycling to work because public transport is too expensive. Even if fares were reduced, that would help.
I agree, if the public transit is not frequent, and reliable, people may still choose to drive.
Luxemburg (2020) and the island of Malta (2022) have nationwide free transport.
Hope all major cities on the planet implement the same policy
Mirrabooka to Fremantle? Bus to Warwick station then train direct to Perth, change to Fremantle line at Underground station Murray Street. Too easy! take care beautiful x
Public transport doesn't need to be free in big cities but it could be made cheaper. In Buenos Aires, it's so cheap (< 20c per trip) that I never saw anyone not pay and their economy is not good for locals. Contrast that with commuter towns around London where people are paying GBP35 a day to get into the city. In regional areas, making PT cheap, frequent and well routed would help so much.
Meanwhile in Melbourne 😢😢
Meanwhile in Melbourne it’s a flat $10 all Victoria fare. So stop the whining. That recovers no costs and is unsustainable.
yeah im amazed people complain about the cost of PT here in Melbourne. Go overseas (or even interstate) and compare their fares and you will realise how affordable $10 (or $5 for concession/student) is to travel anywhere in the state for the day. @@xr6lad
Melbourne has grown too big for its infrastructure. That was a govt decision not to spread the population out around Victoria and the country.
Free public transport is a crazy idea, but it's not that crazy once you think about it.
I think states should adopt a 1:1 policy fir transport infrastructure: For every $ spent on new road infrastructure/upgrades, a $ must be spent on permanent public transport infrastructure.
5:45 idk why google showed you that route but it is awful. It is a good 43mins faster to take the half-hourly 67 Bus from Mirrabooka Bus Station to Perth Busport and then the Fremantle Line to Fremantle.
Free = Vandalism. Many years ago, Melbourne's scratchy ticketing system permitted people to stay on the trains all day and this corresponded to a huge increase in vandalism on the rolling stock and network.
A bit like a scratch-and-win ticket, the perpetrators only had to quickly scratch their ticket to expose the current start-time if inspectors boarded the train or when they got off the train for the night.
Buses in Brisbane are full now!! I can't imagine them if they were free!!
uh no they are not, some are full but not many of them.see a bus at 11:15 am, they are nowhere near full, plus we are soon introducing the brisbane "metro" which will use high frequency large busses which means hopefully more spread between busses thus lowering the individual capacity but increasing the average usage of busses
The outer periferies of Sydney's public transport system should be free or at least very cheap. Travelling a few km and paying $4 is a complete ripoff when to travel by car would cost about 15 cents of petrol.
In Melbourne they’d be saving on having to pay ticket inspectors
"In Melbourne, waits [for trains] can be up to 20 minutes during off-peak"
Wow, must be nice! Here waits are over 30 minutes on-peak!
The thing is that Perth doesn't have a smog or pollution problem. So it's not possible to link environment with car use and public transport in Perth. You can only argue of the benefits to industry when trucks and servicemen can travel around the metro area quicker saving time and money. But then again through public transport, people will get to work later and leave earlier, and therefore be less productive at work.
They would leave their homes earlier and would come home later…!
Why should they come in later and leave early ?
That make no sense…
@@aoilpe No they wouldn't. They'd spend less time at work. I'm not talking about people working 7.5 hours. I'm referring to the majority of office workers who do 9 hour days. If they're going to get home in the dark then they won't stay beyond 5.30. With a car they stay at least an hour later... Same with the morning. They don't want to leave in the dark and cold. Its just human behaviour. My point being that taking public transport has negative aspects as well on productivity. My point being if you're looking at indirect positives, then people should look at indirect negatives. Women are particularly motivated by safety and comfort.
queensland is making public transport 50c for six months! i really hope it works! im definetly going to use the bus more
i probably drive mostly with a few bus trips every now and then but i really should be using busses more anyway
You've taken the wrong way to Fremantle. Its 70 min. Bus then train. You've gone bus, train, bus. The train does go from Perth to Fremantle, you don't have to go to Canning and then take a long bus journey. This is one of the quickest way by car.
Perth mentioned
By making it free you will not have the budget to create another one ... I rather pay if its mean I get better public transport infrastructure, I do agree to make public transport cheaper in less busy time is a good thing like in the weekend so people can learn that public transport is not bad after all .
if you really public transport advocate and not just car hater you will not support free public transport, some Sydney public transport already overcrowded.
The reason why I take public transport not because it will safe the planet , to get healthy like you , I take it because its still the most cost effective and the fastest by a big margin, I believe the majority of the people have same reason, the only thing that can beat public transport constantly is motorcycle both in term of time and cost, but of cause it come with danger.
At certain times I find walking is easier, rather than riding a train on a loop that operates in the direction you don't need to go...
Free public transport for metropolitan buses, trains and trams would also work really well in Melbourne as long as they can raise taxes a bit to compensate while also keeping up the huge investments in the network so it can handle the demand and keep a large number of cars off the road! :)
Perth needs to stop building rail in freeway medians. It restricts access.
in athens transport is effectively free as checks are rare and you can avoid getting checked very easily. Also, even if you buy a ticket its among the cheapest in europe. I like athens' ticket policy
If you were to add up costs saved, roads, accidents, climate change etc, the money lost is peanuts. Also, getting people more mobile will encourage them to spend more. There is more to public transport than inner city CBD zones.
My question is how can all of the employees involved be paid if the transport is free?
And it's a dumb question.
👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍
free pays for itself in less traffic
Governments main responsibility is to protect the public in any and every way possible. To protect the public from economic hardship should be one of the primary responsibilities of the government. Therefore, public transportation should be much widely available and most frequently run. As well as much cheaper, better yet, transportation should be free.
Perth was only free for those who had a smartrider
Then get a smartrider?
Exactly..they don't mention that bit
@@debuthunter5389 yes but that's not the point. It's actually just "cheaper"...not free ..prove me wrong
@@ACDZ123 - Not gonna bother trying to prove you wrong. I haven't lived in Perth (or Australia) since 2013, so am out of touch.
which everyone does have one... But bizarrely we still have inspectors checking everyone's tickets and cars despite being free. Maybe they were trying to reduce the use of cash and tickets. So that might have been the motive too.
Love these videos. Just a tip, you could frame the picture of yourself a little better.
Has to be said, worst moustache🕺
He's quite sexy 😏
@@haydencooper_ ngl I’d probably go there too, but he lowkey looks like the pied piper from shrek with a squiggly line above his lip. My nan can grow a better moustache around her pussy lips🥱
Little of topic. But it there really a bike lane on the highway in the stock footage at 7:19?
That’s a horrible bikelane. I rode on some bad infrastructure but this no thanks I would stay away from this.
No one is going to extensive tunnelling from Mirrabooka. Even major centres like Morley don't have a direct train line due to extensive costs, instead the new train line to Ellenbrook has a Morley station that is actually 2km from the Morley shopping centre and hub. No one wants to spend billions on tunnelling. Perth has Metronet project which has extensive work on Armadale, new Airport line, new Ellenbrook line and new Thornlie to Cockburn Central. After that, there will be a pause. Certainly one day they can consider trains through Reid Hwy, but that's 20 yars minimum.
We need better mental health services before pt is free. IYKYK…
Mirrabooka to Fremantle for work would be 70 minutes. By car 45 min. Bus into city then train from Perth to Freo... all high frequency 5-10 min. In the map you've taken the wrong railway line (Mandurah line instead of Fremantle line). Fact is that people would rather be 20 min quicker and pay $12 parking in Freo. You can go circle routes in a single journey on Morley Dr, Stirling train, western suburbs to Freo, but that takes longer.
Western Australia is one of the most polluting places in the world , they can pay for that because of their mining industry
The places where people can afford to live now are not near good public transport
Just walking to and from the train station every day I walk 60km a month. Not really helping me lose weight but 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
ai going crazy
Yeah, lets make everything free. After all, nobody pays for it in the end do they? 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
Trying to watch and listen... But cannot take that moustache seriously.
No because everything here is for sale.
Fighting climate change but also still allowing new gas projects
There's no such thing as "free".
I appreciate the video and content you do but to my eye it's jarring to see you use your video voice and then switch to your face and still use your video voice as it doesn't look natural. This is nothing to do with you personally and more a personal taste for me I guess so I don't think you should change what you do simply for 1 person but just something I wanted to note for you. Enjoy your videos nonetheless!
The open air prisons begins, next digital check points.
what lol?
wake up your asleep.@@Tiogar60
Maybe you touch grass for once instead, conspiramonger.
This guy's videos are ai generated
With the music and backgrounds I can see how you might think so if you didn't watch until his head pops up. He appears to be a real human.
Why it is so monotone though is like because many of these urbanist channels are just idealogues drinking from the same well.
When his face pops up you can see it's a still photo that has been animated using some kind of software similar to the Wombo app
@@favorirate657 Which images? The Australian ones look exactly like the places they are supposed to look like. Can't comment on other places though.
The speaking to camera parts look like HeyGen
@@favorirate657 I just want to know which images were fake. Plenty of UA-camrs don't want to speak on their videos.
It’s NOT free. Someone pays for it and usually it’s everyone’s taxes go up. Even those that can least afford to have them go up. And it rarely increases anything as those that want to use PT use it and those that don’t won’t use it.
You know that's not what he meant by free, he meant free at point of use. There are people who don't mind public transport but would be discouraged by cost at point of use, or only use it occasionally for the same reason. The video even mentions ridership goes up when it's free (at point of use).
@@axipont8383ridership goes up? Or we use common sense and now it’s ’ free’ people use it instead of walking. PT is already inherently cheaper than using a car over a certain distance anyway. So if people are not using it now then it doesn’t suit their needs. Trams are ‘free’ in the CBD of Melbourne. Once they were not. Ridership shot up and trams are now crowded. Not because it got people out of cars - people that would walk two stops now get a tram. Context mate , context.
@@xr6lad How about the transport ads communicate the true cost of driving everywhere. Petrol, wear and tear on vehicle... start people thinking of hidden costs.
Perth has mining money from being in a State that is huge and resource rich. They could do anything and still be ahead really. A bit like rich Arabic countries or northern European countries with oil/weapons exports. Take any positive result with a grain of salt, but due to the huge extra money they can try new things.
@@xr6lad The CBD isn't representative of the rest of Melbourne because it's dense and walkable. Of course you're not going to replace car trips there, because there were hardly any trips entirely within the CBD to begin with. Try making it free for the suburbs and see what happens. Also PT isn't inherently cheaper than driving if you're in a group or family since the price scales per rider while the cost to the operator stays constant.