Sydney and Melbourne have pretty good public transport. Unfortunately they’re compensating for everywhere else, which has some truly fucking awful public transport. Looking at Adelaide in particular but I know others are also shit.
As with anything it’s even more “it depends”. Melbourne busses are slow an unreliable, the vast majority of tram routes share roads with cars and get stuck behind them making them painful in busy periods, and the train network is primary built around the idea of getting white collar workers from the suburbs to the city in the morning and back out again in the evening.
For example, without a car the 10-15 minute trip to drop the kiddo off with their grandparents would be over 90 minutes. It’s less than 10km but because we’re on different train lines it’s require either going all the way to the city and out again, or a train and a bus that runs 3 times a hour with no timing connection to the train.
Definitely not in Brisbane. Our public transport feels completely forgotten about. The only form I have access to is a bus and the closest bus stop I would have to walk to is over 2km away. I don’t live in the middle of the city or anything but the area is well established and there is basically no infrastructure to provide basic public transport to people.
This whole fuel shit show will likely be awful and probably expensive.
Australia is big, but Sidney, when I was there a million years ago had very good public transportation with a single card that got you access to buses, ferries etc…
I used to be an avid user/defender of public transportation (in Canada). Used it for 15 years (11 of which I actually had a car but did not use for daily commute)
But then it was ruined… literally a 13 Km commute (less than 10 miles if you are American) would mean 1.5 hours in a bus EACH WAY, vs 45 mins by car (which is still a travesty for such a short commute)
Now I am lucky to work from home most of the time and commute with an eScooter when the weather allows me to
no, Ottawa area… buses were terrible leading up to the LRT opening and after the LRT opening was a disaster (one that they are still recovering from) the buses became unusable
Ah, I didn’t use the buses on my visit to Ottawa. We did use the VIA Rail from Montreal and made sure to have a Beavertail before we left your fine city though.
Ooh, thanks for the tip re free PT! I used it heavily while it was free over Chrissie, and then avoided it when Myki fares went up in February. Looks like I’ll be doing a lot of daytripping this month!
I also ditched car ownership over a decade ago. Plenty of trains/trams/buses to get me places, my neighbourhood is very walkable (groceries and other retail store, GP, post office, library, laundromat, restaurants and cafes, even a cinema within walking distance), and there’s car share services for the odd occasion where I need it.
is public transportation actually good in Australia? as in, you can actually do your daily living with it? (work, school, shopping, etc)?
In capital cities, it’s…reasonable. Takes too long to get from A to B, but you can do it, usually.
In regional areas, generally not great.
Australia is heavily car centric for the most part.
Sydney and Melbourne have pretty good public transport. Unfortunately they’re compensating for everywhere else, which has some truly fucking awful public transport. Looking at Adelaide in particular but I know others are also shit.
As with anything it’s even more “it depends”. Melbourne busses are slow an unreliable, the vast majority of tram routes share roads with cars and get stuck behind them making them painful in busy periods, and the train network is primary built around the idea of getting white collar workers from the suburbs to the city in the morning and back out again in the evening.
For example, without a car the 10-15 minute trip to drop the kiddo off with their grandparents would be over 90 minutes. It’s less than 10km but because we’re on different train lines it’s require either going all the way to the city and out again, or a train and a bus that runs 3 times a hour with no timing connection to the train.
Definitely not in Brisbane. Our public transport feels completely forgotten about. The only form I have access to is a bus and the closest bus stop I would have to walk to is over 2km away. I don’t live in the middle of the city or anything but the area is well established and there is basically no infrastructure to provide basic public transport to people.
This whole fuel shit show will likely be awful and probably expensive.
Australia is big, but Sidney, when I was there a million years ago had very good public transportation with a single card that got you access to buses, ferries etc…
…good to know!
I used to be an avid user/defender of public transportation (in Canada). Used it for 15 years (11 of which I actually had a car but did not use for daily commute)
But then it was ruined… literally a 13 Km commute (less than 10 miles if you are American) would mean 1.5 hours in a bus EACH WAY, vs 45 mins by car (which is still a travesty for such a short commute)
Now I am lucky to work from home most of the time and commute with an eScooter when the weather allows me to
Were you on the Scarborough line before it was dismantled?
no, Ottawa area… buses were terrible leading up to the LRT opening and after the LRT opening was a disaster (one that they are still recovering from) the buses became unusable
Ah, I didn’t use the buses on my visit to Ottawa. We did use the VIA Rail from Montreal and made sure to have a Beavertail before we left your fine city though.
*Sydney
Hah, whoops… I blame my phone
I’ve been living in Melbourne for ~10 years and don’t own a car. The public transport and bike infrastructure around where I live is pretty good.
If I need to move house or something like that there’s a car share service that has vans you can hire by the hour.
Interestingly the State Government here has made all public transport free for the month of April. They only announced it late last week. LINK.
Ooh, thanks for the tip re free PT! I used it heavily while it was free over Chrissie, and then avoided it when Myki fares went up in February. Looks like I’ll be doing a lot of daytripping this month!
I also ditched car ownership over a decade ago. Plenty of trains/trams/buses to get me places, my neighbourhood is very walkable (groceries and other retail store, GP, post office, library, laundromat, restaurants and cafes, even a cinema within walking distance), and there’s car share services for the odd occasion where I need it.
that sounds pretty amazing!
IIRC, Melbourne is one of the very few cities in the world that didn’t demolish its streetcar network in the 1950s, so there’s that.