Don't Rip Up Our Rail

Dear all, Please take some time to visit the EcoTransit website and start sending this postcard to your local MPs, The Premier, The Minister for Transport, relevant shadow ministers. This is an important piece of legislation that should NOT be allowed to pass.

Here are the email addresses you will need. Please note that you can only send it to two adresses at a time. david@campbell.minister.nsw.gov.au, thepremier@www.nsw.gov.au willoughby@parliament.nsw.gov.au, LOP@parliament.nsw.gov.au (Liberal Transport and opposition leader)

That's just a start. Yrs, Leah Mason

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Sent: 15 September 2009 - 9:59am
From: Leah Mason
Email: lmason@smoothlooming.com.au

Sydney's Long Term Public Transport Plan Meetings

Public meeting details

As you are aware, an Independent Public Inquiry has been established to create the Long Term Public Transport Plan for Sydney to inform decisions by future governments on the priorities over the next 30 years.

Thank your for letting us know you would like further information on the public meetings to be held in the first round of community consultation.

The inquiry is being chaired by Mr Ron Christie, AM, who will attend most of the "town hall meetings" along with several experts assisting him during his information gathering stage. The initial round of meetings is being held before public submissions close on October 8, 2009. A Preliminary Report will be released in December, 2009 for public review. A final report will be released in Autumn, 2010.

Community discussion

Members of the public are invited to attend community meetings to share their thoughts about public transport in their area.

Each meeting will focus on the issues in the local region or strategic corridor after a brief overview of the metropolitan outlook so please choose your venue carefully to reflect your interests. The final meeting of the first round will be held in Central Sydney and will cover transport issues from the grouping of inner suburbs.

The meetings are as follows:


North-west Sydney
Tuesday, September 15, Castle Grand, Cnr Pennant & Castle Streets, Castle Hill. 6.30pm - 8.30pm. This meeting is hosted by the Hills Shire Council.

North-east Sydney
Thursday, September 17, Dee Why RSL, 932 Pittwater Road, Dee Why. 6.30pm - 8.30pm. This meeting is hosted by Warringah Council

South-east Sydney
Monday, September 21, University of NSW, Leighton Hall, Scientia Building, Anzac Parade, Kensington. 6.30pm - 8.30pm.

South-west Sydney
Tuesday, September 22, Casual Powerhouse, 1 Casula Road, Casula. 6.30pm-8.30pm. This meeting is hosted by Liverpool City Council.

Western Sydney corridor
Thursday, September 24, Riverside Theatre, Parramatta. 6.30pm-8.30pm. This meeting is hosted by Parramatta City Council.

Central Sydney
Thursday, October 1, City Recital Hall, Angel Place, Sydney. 6.30pm-8.30pm. This meeting is hosted by City of Sydney.

In addition, two further meetings are being scheduled for Sydney's south (St George area) and Sydney's north (Chatswood/North Ryde area). Dates will be advertised once arrangements are confirmed. Alternatively, please respond to this email and type the word "south" or "north" into the subject line to receive venue details as soon as they are available. The "town hall meetings" are being presented with the assistance of local government, regional government associations and The Sydney Morning Herald.

About the inquiry

The Independent Public Inquiry has been established with the support of The Sydney Morning Herald to create a Long-term public transport Plan. The inquiry is independent of government and the newspaper.

The chair of the inquiry, Mr Ron Christie, AM, is a former chief executive of the Roads & Traffic Authority, chief executive former head of the Olympic Roads & Transport Authority, former Co-ordinator General of Rail in NSW and former Director-General of Public Works and Services.

For the inquiry terms of reference please visit www.transportpublicinquiry.com.au

Connecting With Buses: Reducing transport disadvantage by supporting bus services in Western Sydney

Connecting With Buses - Full Report and Recommendations: click here PDF (974kb)
Executive Summary and Recommendations: click here PDF (218kb)

Western Sydney Community Forum (WSCF) has released their position paper on bus services in Western Sydney. The paper is the culmination of over 1 year of consultation and research and the paper is designed to provoke discussion and advocacy about how to improve the bus services in Western Sydney.

In 2003, a review of bus services in NSW was undertaken by the former Premier of NSW, The Hon Barrie Unsworth. The Review was delivered to the Ministry of Transport in February 2004. Soon after, the Ministry of Transport responded to the Review and commenced implementing the recommendations, with some qualifications as the Ministry saw fit. Now, in 2009, five years after the Unsworth Review was delivered, WSCF believes it is timely to review how the transformation of bus services in Western Sydney is proceeding.

The WSCF report reviews and restates many recommendations of the Unsworth Review and makes 57 new recommendations on how to follow-up and improve on the work which has followed from the Unsworth Review.

In August 2008 WSCF convened a transport forum at Granville Community Centre which was attended by representatives of many key stakeholder groups including bus companies, the Ministry of Transport, local Councils, the RTA and some community service agencies. A paper was prepared for that meeting which canvassed many of the topics discussed in this new position paper. The participants at this meeting provided comments on the topics and these comments have been considered in the writing of this paper. WSCF acknowledges and thanks all the participants at that forum for their contributions.

WSCF believes that by creating this report and provoking discussion and advocacy around how to improve the bus services in Western Sydney they can make a contribution to reducing transport disadvantage and social exclusion in Western Sydney.

WSCF plans to create a website to be able to make this report a living document so that it can grow and react as things change. WSCF welcomes comment and any information about errors or omissions that have been made.
WSCF - Transport Development Project
wscf@wscf.org.au

The WSPTU Met on August 22

The new WSPTU representative committee met for the second time on Saturday August 22. We had representatives from Liverpool, Bankstown, Penrith, Blue Mountains, The Hills and Camden. We recieved reports from transport activities that are happening in each local area.

The WSPTU saw the call for submissions from the Sydney Morning Herald for an inquiry into transport issues in Sydney and decided to put a team of people together to make a submission for the inquiry. If you have any ideas for this submission, please make a comment on this blog below this message or email us as wsbustop@gmail.com .

The meeting decided to create a small Governance Team to work on building the administrative structures of the WSPTU and to keep the representative group of the WSPTU as the main engine of ideas and policy.

If you are part of a local transport action group, or some other group like a resident's action group that is working on local transport issues in your area, and you would like to be part of the WSPTU please contact us so we can include you.

Snap Strike Strands Western Sydney Commuters

Courtesy of ABC Online
Posted 8 hours 41 minutes ago
Updated 8 hours 18 minutes ago


About 130 drivers are taking part in the action. (ABC News: Giulio Saggin, file photo)

About 130 private bus drivers have walked off the job this morning stranding thousands of school children and commuters in western Sydney.

BusWays says drivers at its Blacktown depot called a snap strike over a dispute about the introduction of new timetables.

The Transport Workers Union's Darcy Waller says the drivers are worried that they will not work.

"Theyre'll be a lack of running time, a lack of turn around time, that will affect the connection of buses from one route to another," he said.

"It will also affect the amount of time drivers will spend behind the wheel without a break."

The company says it is seeking a hearing in the Industrial Relations Commission.

BusWays Regional Operations Manager, Brett Thompson, says its services will be off the road until the drivers return to work.

"At our peak in the mornings we have about 80 buses carrying about five or six thousand school kids maybe more probably the same in commuters, " he said.

"It is a very effective strike where it's inconveniencing a lot of people."

Busways can be contacted from their website: www.busways.com.au

WSPTU Comment:

It seems that the Bus Network Review maybe not that popular with drivers, and will be implemented at some point in the very near future. Lets just hope that common sense prevails and that the NSW Ministry of Transport is able to advise school children and bus riders of the change in timetable and routes before they change them.

Were you inconvenienced by todays strike?

Senate Inquiry Into Public Transport - report released

The Senate has brought down their report into Commonwealth investment in public transport.

Click here for the report http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/rrat_ctte/public_transport/index.htm
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Greens Senator for Western Australia has made this release discussing the report from the Commonwealth Senate inquiry into public transport.

The Senate Inquiry into Public Transport has just tabled its report which makes a compelling case for but sadly falls shy of recommending substantial Commonwealth funding for public transport.

We hope that this will be of interest and may stimulate some discussion on the various transport websites, blogs and forums and might subsequently lead to increased public support for federal funding of public transport. So we encourage you to go to town with this info!

We also welcome your feedback on the issue.

The full report and media release is available on the website (www.scottludlam.org.au).
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Well there it is on our WSPTU blog!

Will Bikes Be Allowed On The West Metro?

The West Metro preliminary environmental assessment has been submitted to the NSW Department of Planning. View the assessment here.

http://www.sydneymetro.nsw.gov.au/publications/reports/west_metro_preliminary_ea/

It appears that there has been no allowance made for bikes to be carried on the Metro. It has been suggested to this blog that bike riders need to:

1) register your concern about the lack of integration of Metro with bicycle travel
2) obtain the terms of reference and consultation process for the Blueprint Transport Plan.

Get on your bikes!