Transport in Brisbane

Transport in Brisbane, the capital and largest city of Queensland, Australia, is provided by rail, river ferry, sea and air.

Transport around Brisbane is managed by both the Brisbane City Council and the Government of Queensland, which owns Queensland Rail. Public commuter rail transport is by Citytrain, an electric train system operated by Queensland Rail. Road transport is via the standard managed by Brisbane City Council and the connecting freeway system which is managed by Queensland Main Roads. The public bus transport system is operated by the Brisbane City Council, and utilises the road network as well as dedicated bus lanes and busways. Public transport on and across the Brisbane River is provided by the Cityferry (inner city) and CityCat services run by the Brisbane City Council.

Transport in and out of Brisbane is managed by both public and private enterprises. Queensland Rail manages a freight and passenger service inter-city and interstate. Queensland Main Roads manages the Queensland road network. Port of Brisbane is a private company that provides bulk sea freighter facilities. Brisbane Airport Corporation Limited manages the Brisbane Airport which has both domestic and international terminals with both freight and passenger services.

Mass transit

Brisbane's mass transit system is provided by rail, buses, ferries and taxis. A large tram system closed in 1969, to be replaced by buses (see Trams in Brisbane). A smaller trolley-bus system closed at the same time.

The rail services are operated by Citytrain, a division of Queensland Rail. The bus system, and the high-speed CityCat as well as the cross-river Cityferry are operated by Brisbane Transport, a business arm of the Brisbane City Council. Buses that serve the regional areas outside the Brisbane boundaries are operated by private-sector companies contracted by the State Government.

After some years of decline, Brisbane's public transport system is gradually being revitalised, with significant investment in railway station upgrades, busways, bus tunnels and new buses. However, patronage remains the lowest of all Australian capital cities, a far cry from public transport's heyday in the 1940s, when the tram system alone carried 160,000,000 annually. By comparison, Brisbane's publicly owned bus service carried 53,000,000 passengers in 2005, although Brisbane's population has doubled since the 1940s.

The CBD serves as the central hub for all public transport services, with Queen Street Bus Station for buses, Roma Street and Central stations for trains, and North Quay for ferries. Various smaller transfer hubs, such as the Cultural Centre Busway Station, are located at various strategically placed points of public importance and public interest in the city, including the Queensland Cultural Centre, South Bank Parklands and shopping malls, which are usually within dense population centres.

An integrated ticketing system for public transport services exists in Brisbane, and is known as TransLink. TransLink is a State Government agency responsible for ticketing and the co-ordination of public transport services in the South-East Queensland region. Under the TransLink system, passengers pay common fares on all modes of public transport. TransLink tickets are accepted on both government- and privately owned buses, trains, and ferries. In 2007, Translink will also be introducing a smartcard-based ticketing system, which is currently being tested throughout the city.

In December 2005, TransLink began all-night public transport services on Friday and Saturday nights, under the name of NightLink. For further information about this service, and also about the Free Loop bus service for the CBD, see the TransLink (South East Queensland) services page.

Buses

To deliver workable public transport to areas outside of the metropolitan train lines, the Busways were established to deliver unrestricted bus travel throughout the northern, eastern, and southern corridors of the city, by installing road systems where only buses are permitted. Two busways have opened in recent years in Brisbane operated by the translink authority — the South-East Busway and the Inner-Northern Busway — with three more busways (Northern, Eastern, Boggo Road) and new rail lines planned. Public transport has been the primary infrastructure that Brisbane has typically always improved and maintained, especially as it struggles to keep up with rapid population growth.

Services to the northern and eastern suburbs are good quality while the south region continues to lag behind in services and on time standards as well as a lack of total capacity that leads to peak time overcrowding issues.Buses operate on a 5am to midnight timetable generally throughout the week with some Friday and Saturday night 24 hour services operated by Brisbane city council buses. However lack of early morning services for shift workers ( 2-4am) means brisbane is behind the southern capitals of melbourne and sydney. Also some outlying areas with rapidly growing populations are lacking services outside of the 6am to 6pm timeframes. Promises of improvements have been coming for several years and the translink authority are after 6 year delays rolling out the much awaited and hyped smartcard ticketing system

Rail

The large Citytrain urban rail network consists of seven suburban lines and covers mostly the south-west, north, and outer east sides of the city. It also provides the route for an Airtrain service between the City and Brisbane Airport (the Airtrain, itself, is owned by a private company). While Citytrain services also cover interurban services to both coasts, the southern part of the rail network does not enter through any major suburbs or districts.

CityCat and CityFerry

:"Main articles" CityCat / Cityferry

Taxis

Two major cab companies operate in Brisbane: Yellow Cabs (whose vehicles are painted orange), and Black and White Cabs. Both companies offer same rate service (regulated by the government and Taxi Council) and pick up passengers from anywhere in the metropolitan and regional areas of Brisbane via bookings or permanent cab ranks. As well as standard taxis, both provide Maxi-Taxis designed to fit up to 10 people with disability access, as well as luxury vehicles (Silver Service for Yellow, Business Class for Black and White). All cabs now are also fitted with GPS systems for driver location and EFTPOS debit/credit card facilities.

Roads

Brisbane's road system was planned around large, spacious suburban areas. Dense suburbs now rely on several main road corridors that split through and between these areas and provide the only link to the CBD and other areas of Brisbane. Logan Road, Moggill Road, Old Cleveland Road and Gympie Road are but a few of these multi-lane corridors that come out of the CBD and snake through the suburbs. As a result, traffic congestion has become a major problem and it was the promise of a new underground road system, nicknamed TransApex, that helped current Lord Mayor Campbell Newman to win the 2004 local government election.

Bypasses such as the very successful Inner City Bypass, the future Airport Link and North-South Bypass Tunnel (NSBT) are intended to help to circulate traffic away from the inner-city areas and main roads via limited-access roads above the ground, and tunnels below that have higher speed limits and exits to particular suburbs. Existing high speed cross-suburban motorways such as the Western Freeway, Centenary Freeway, Pacific Motorway and Gateway Motorway provide alternative routes to main roads and connect up to main highways and other arterial roads. Other tunnels are also being planned to link all the various motorways in Brisbane together as part of TransApex, but only two have been scheduled for completion within the next decade.

In total, the twisting Brisbane River is crossed by seven road bridges, three railway bridges, one pedestrian bridge and a dedicated bus, cycle and pedestrian bridge.Route signage is achieved by means of a system of Metroads, consisting of the most important arterial roads in metropolitan Brisbane including most motorways, and less important State Routes. Multiple freeways connect Brisbane to other cities, including the Pacific Motorway, the Bruce Highway and the Ipswich Motorway, all of which are part of the National Highway System. Brisbane is approximately 1000 km away from Sydney, the closest major capital city.

Airports

Brisbane Airport, owned by the Brisbane Airport Corporation Limited and located north-east of the city, is the biggest airport in Australia in terms of land size. Brisbane Airport is the third busiest airport in the country behind Sydney and Melbourne Airports respectively. Separated into domestic and international terminals, Brisbane Airport has frequent passenger and freight flights, providing direct flights to every capital city in Australia as well as most destinations in Asia, Oceania, and the Middle East. Virgin Blue, the second largest airline in Australia, is headquartered in Brisbane, while other major airlines Qantas and Jetstar both fly from Brisbane Airport.

The Airtrain provides a link between the Domestic and International Terminals at Brisbane Airport and the city, taking approximately 20 minutes to travel from Central Station to the Airport stations.

Archerfield Airport is located in Brisbane's southern suburbs, and is used only by light aircraft and general aviation. Other local airports can be found at Caboolture and Redcliffe.

eaports

The Port of Brisbane is on the lower reaches of the Brisbane River and on Fisherman's Island at the river's mouth; it is the 3rd most important port in Australia for value of goods. [ [http://www.btre.gov.au/statistics/maritime/aust_sea_freight.aspx Australian Sea Freight] "Australian Department of Transport and Regional Services"] Container freight, sugar, grain, coal and bulk liquids are the major exports. Most of the port facilities are less than three decades old, and some are built on reclaimed mangroves and wetlands. Historically, Brisbane's port facilities were located as far upstream as the central business district.

The economic region near the river's mouth including the port, airport and refineries is known as the Australia TradeCoast.

Future infrastructure

Brisbane's population growth has seen great strains placed upon South East Queensland's transport system. The State Government and Brisbane City Council have responded with infrastructure plans and increased funding for transportation projects, such as the South East Queensland Infrastructure Plan and Program. Most of the focus has been placed on expanding current road infrastructure, particularly tunnels and bypasses, as well as improving the public transport system.

See also

* Brisbane Transport
* CityCat
* Citytrain
* Railways in Brisbane
* TransLink

References