Dick
Fleming - Principal Public Transport Planner, Parsons Brinckerhoff
Australia, Sydney Australia
George Pund - Manager, Bus and Ferry
Reform, Transport Co-ordination Authority of NSW, Sydney Australia
Transport planners seeking to develop
attractive and effective public transport alternatives face a
wide range of difficult and diverse problems in cities across
the world. These have been well covered in literature and studies
in recent years. The public transport market environment varies
greatly but (in broad terms) from a service development perspective
can be categorised by:-
» Land use – low to high intensity
» Trip patterns – dispersed to concentrated
The position on these continuums requires
a different service response and it is this response that drives
the form of infrastructure and level of investment required to
deliver effective public transport systems.
This paper discusses the basic requirements
of effective services, drawing on research into the factors that
attract and sustain patronage, particularly where the car is the
dominant mode. It then seeks to address different forms of response
to market needs in delivering services, drawing on examples from
successful systems in Australia and touching on some overseas
systems. Combining these two aspects together it then seeks to
highlight the nexus between delivering effective and responsive
services and the design of infrastructure.
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