Promises galore in new transport plan but will the govt deliver?

Yesterday the NSW government released its long awaited draft Transport Masterplan with more roads, a second harbour crossing and the North West Rail Link spruiked as key projects.

But while these big projects take the limelight, the government also has a huge raft of bus and tram initiatives to deliver shorter-term improvements to public transport movements around our cities.

Initiatives flagged include:

• Bus priority for Sydney’s bus network – including enhancing bus priority on clearways
• A bus network redesign to focus more on cross regional services and less on radial services only going into the city
• Changes to the CBD network to reduce congestion and the number of through CBD services – looking at bus termini on the near side of the CBD for services coming into the city
• A new tram service to run up George St and provide some of the through services (incidentally we have been assured this won’t affect bus driver jobs)
• The possibility of Northern Beaches Bus Rapid Transit and new CBD bus exchanges
• 313 more buses

All good initiatives and all things bus drivers have been saying should be done for years – and nothing has happened.

The reality of this 370-page plan is there are a lot of ideas, but very little information about funding these initiatives or about how or when these initiatives will be rolled out.

After the lack of action from previous governments public transport commuters and workers have a right to be cynical about the release of yet another transport document.

This government says it wants to deliver the world-class public transport system NSW deserves. But it must show how it will translate the Masterplan into action on the ground if it is to deliver it.

You can read the full draft Transport Masterplan here.