Brisbane Councillor Ryan Murphy’s stunning admission after Metro debacle

Brisbane City Council has apologised following confusion and criticism surrounding the $1.5bn Metro service, with a former state government minister now weighing in.

• Explained: What is Brisbane Metro
• Timeline: Eight years of Metro

Brisbane City Councillor Ryan Murphy has apologised for potentially misleading residents over its communication of its $1.5bn Metro trial.

It comes as former transport minister Bart Mellish says the former state government was never told it was a trial.

Brisbane Metro has been taken off the road just four weeks after launching, with council now in negotiations with the new state government amid ongoing teething issues with the divisive $1.5bn transport project.

Brisbane City Council made the shock announcement at the weekend that the double-length electric vehicles’ use of route 169 would end, not resuming until possibly next year.

In an interview with Peter Fegan on 4BC Breakfast on Tuesday, Cr Murphy acknowledged the council got its language wrong regarding the launch of the Metro service, but rejected the notion that services were cancelled.

“We had a successful preview phase of Brisbane Metro on the 169 and we’ve now returned that route to the regular bus fleet, the suggestion that Metro services were cancelled is a false one,” Cr Murphy said.

“I said on the day to a crowded pack of media that this would be a four-week trial, and perhaps we’ve failed in communicating that clearly.

“I accept that, and I apologise to anyone who feels that they’ve been misled over this, but our intention was always to use this as a bit of a beta test with real customers.”

Brisbane City Council’s Ryan Murphy. Picture Lachie Millard

But Mr Mellish on Tuesday said he was never told the 169 route was just a trial, despite signing a heads of agreement with Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner and Mr Murphy.

“In July it was agreed between the State Government and Brisbane City Council that Brisbane Metro vehicles would commence on the 169 route from October - not trialled or previewed, commenced,” he said.

“This was the basis of our funding arrangement. David Crisafulli and the LNP must step in and ensure Metro can operate.”

But Mr Schrinner hit back at council’s Tuesday meeting, tabling an August 23 service proposal change by TransLink which said the service would be a one-month trial.

The TransLink document read: “Metro vehicles will be deployed onto route 169 from mid-October 2024 as part of an early customer services trial prior to full implementation.

“Early implementation will also assist in providing additional capacity to the service in support of the 50c fares initiative.”

“The former government did everything it could to delay and slow down Metro,” Mr Schrinner said.

“Why? Because it wasn’t their idea.

“But by the dying days of the government they finally realised that this was a great project.”

Mr Schrinner said the government changed its tune because it eventually realised Metro had the best chance of being delivered in time for the 2032 Games of any mass transit project (such as Cross River Rail).”

He said he was pleased former premier Steven Miles now accepted it was “a great project “.

He said the service was always timed to coincide with the end of the University of Queensland semester on November 16.

He said it had been a “raging success” with 90,000 to 100,000 passengers.

“We’ve had fantastic feedback from riders,” he said.

But on Monday, Cr Murphy said teething issues needed to be ironed out after public feedback, with regular buses replacing the electric Metro buses.

They included making announcements louder and raising the height of overhead bars which taller customers complained were too low.

This morning, he added that the council wanted to run a trial before doing a full-scale launch.

“We wanted to be supremely confident in the quality of our product, and we don’t want to let people down once we introduce services,” he said.

“So, you know, lots of big companies will deploy things as a trial or a beta, we’re doing the same with these buses.”

Brisbane Metro starts the busy 169 bus route between Eight Mile Plains and UQ with Luci Loumeau takes its first passengers. Picture: Glenn Campbell

Cr Murphy said it was critical to ensure that the Metro service works for Brisbane.

“People are frustrated, they’re waiting for public transport improvements to the city, and they feel that those are long overdue. I accept that, but we don’t want to launch something that is not perfect,” he said.

“We need this to work for Brisbane, and we need Brisbane residents to go, wow.”

Cr Murphy said feedback provided by passengers will be used to improve the service ahead of a return to the road.

“You can imagine that the first ever one of these vehicles in Australia and a vehicle that we’ve made thousands of changes to bring it into Australian design rules and things like that, there were always going to be some things that we couldn’t quite figure out until we had real life passengers to give us that feedback,” he said.

“So taking it off will be able to save the money that we’re going to use to fund the service to reinvest that in things like replacing the speaker system.

“It’s not as simple as turning the volume up.”

Cr Murphy trumpeted in July that the long delayed and over-budget electric bus and tunnel project could open early after a bus funding deal. There was no mention of a trial on Cr Murphy’s social media posts.

Signs went up at the University of Queensland stop on Sunday and TransLink issued an alert on Friday afternoon.

Council said Mr Murphy stated at the launch that it was initially to be a trial.

The new Minister for Transport and Main Roads Brent Mickelberg. Picture Annette Dew

A spokeswoman said the timing coincided with the end of the university semester. Students were among the biggest users.

She said Cr Murphy had met new Transport Minister Brent Mickelberg but an announcement on when the service would resume depended on negotiations, which also included new routes for regular buses.

In July, Cr Murphy trumpeted that a deal with the then Labor government on supporting bus services would allow Metro to open earlier than planned.

Premier David Crisafulli said the state government would continue to work with council on the rollout of Brisbane Metro.

He said Brisbane City Council had “basically gone it alone for a long time” on the project.

“The former state government did everything in its power not to give council the opportunity to deliver it, and I just don’t understand that,” he said.

“Because ultimately, we’re all serving the same people. We look forward to resetting that relationship with local governments across the state, including Brisbane City Council.”

What is Brisbane Metro?

Boiled down to basics, it is 60 very big (24.4m), bendy, three-compartment, Swiss-made electric buses costing about $3m each.

They will stop at 18 stations over 21km of busway.

The fleet will be powered by 15, Australia-first overhead 600kW fast chargers capable of doing the job in six minutes, plus 60 slow, overnight chargers, all connected to 1MW of solar panels at the Rochedale depot.

How much has been spent on Metro

The project, first announced in 2016, has blown out from $944m to about $1.52bn with long delays and squabbling with the former Labor government on funding and the design of the Cultural Centre station.

Mr Murphy's post in July announcing the early launch.

Labor Council Leader Jared Cassidy said Brisbane’s newest transport offering was “in turmoil’’.

Ratepayers would have to pick up the $147,000 cost of the Metro Community Day celebrations marking the opening of the 169 service.

“If the launch of the Metro buses and their cancellation just four weeks later is a ‘preview’ of the Metro, we should be worried,’’ Cr Cassidy said.

“(Lord Mayor) Adrian Schrinner and his LNP regime said the launch of the 169 service was the start of Metro services.

“They said their bus funding deal was so good it would see the early start of Metro services, well that didn’t last long.

“This project has been plagued by mismanagement by the LNP from day one.’’

State Labor Leader Steven Miles said he was a “big fan’’ of Metro and the new connections it would offer for the southeast.

“That’s why I stepped in to get the Metro project off the ground for Brisbane,’’ he said.

“It’s now up to (Premier) David Crisafulli to work with the LNP council to make sure this important rapid transit project has the funding it needs to deliver for Brisbane.’’

Independent councillor for Tennyson ward, Nicole Johnston, said she was unaware of any trial and said that had definitely not been made clear by council.

She criticised the large cost of the Metro launch party, money she said could have been spent on more pressing projects.

Why has the project been paused?

Cr Murphy said in a radio interview this morning that: “One of the things we did say (at the launch) is that this would be a limited preview of the service that would last for approximately a month, from October 21 through to November 17,’’ he said.

“That would be to gather the final piece of the puzzle for us, feedback from customers on what they liked about the Metro and what they didn’t like so we could make those changes ahead of the full launch of services later this year or early next year.’’

He said more than 85 per cent were satisfied or very satisfied, although comfort marked down.

What have been the issues?

Some people have posted on social media that the buses bounced up and down, resulting in an uncomfortable sensation and that stop announcements were not loud enough.

Others also did not like backwards seats but they liked the big information screens.

Some said doors got stuck in rainy weather.

“A lot of little things like that that we wouldn’t have been able to fix unless we had the time between the review service and a full launch,’’ he said.

“We don’t have a date yet. It will very much be a joint decision between council and the state.’’