Labor government public transport announcement underwhelms Liberal MP Gordon Rich-Phillips
The government is promising to better connect the people of Melbourne’s south east with improved bus services, but is it enough?
South East
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Commuters in Melbourne’s south east growth corridor are getting a much-needed multimillion-dollar upgrade of bus services linking schools and workers at Casey Business Park.
Cranbourne state Labor MP Pauline Richards said the upgrade, which would put more bus routes between Cranbourne West and Hampton Park, would take between nine months to a year to complete.
“The extension of this route means that our community can easily get from here to Lynbrook, Lyndhurst and as far as Cranbourne West,” she said.
“That makes a huge difference, especially for the several schools and workplaces along the route — people want to go to and from work quickly and safely. This connection is really important.”
Public Transport Minister Ben Carroll said the upgrade was part of a $109m boost to bus routes across the state.
“Buses have been the most resilient form of public transport throughout Covid, with patronage increasing, while tram and train patronage decreased,” he said.
“We understand that people are moving in and around their local communities much more than ever before, so buses are not a third run of public transport – they need the investment.”
But Mr Carrol said the government had not finished its planing for the transport upgrade, with final costing yet to be determined.
Gordon Rich-Phillips, South Eastern Metropolitan Region Liberal MP, said the upgrades were no where near enough to cater for the area’s growing population.
“Unfortunately, these things never keep up with the growth — we get the growth of the population before we get the funding — it’s pretty easy to estimate the growth, the areas are just being underfunded,’’ he said.
