Services to Barton

Started by geoffrah, June 17, 2010, 08:58:21 PM

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geoffrah

I've recently started using the bus to get from a Belconnen suburb to Barton (after losing the car in an accident a month ago).

A few observations I'd make;

- The Xpresso service works well and is well patronised, at least as far as the city. On average, 95% of people exit in Civic, and by the time the bus leaves CIT I'm often the only passenger (seems like overkill running an artic all that extra distance with 1 or 2 people on board). To me this highlights the key factor of free parking - Russell/Barton has it and therefore very little bus usage, city has none and bus usage is much higher.

-Xpresso services end far too early in the morning - for people with school kids etc. they finish running long before 8:30am.

- Sometimes I use one of the 300 series to get to the city and then a Redex on to Barton. Patronage on the 727 is variable, beyond CIT Reid there are usually only a handful of people on them. Interestingly, they often run alongside other services (4 & 5), so you end up with the ridiculous situation of an almost empty Redex service following an almost empty 4 or 5 bus southward to Barton !

- In the afternoon I've found that it is often quicker to get a number 2 bus (which goes west and then over Commonwealth Ave bridge) and then transfer to an Xpresso service home to Belconnen. The Xpresso takes near on 25 minutes to get from Barton to the City, whereas as a number 2 service can get there in 10 minutes !

-Journey time door to door in the morning via car was on average 40-45 minutes, the bus is about 1 hour 10 minutes.  Car journey back in the evening used to be around 30-35 minutes. On the bus back it is around an hour, but almost half an hour of that is spent just getting from Barton to the City.

Also - my hats off to the bus drivers who run the gauntlet of traffic around Kings Avenue at the moment. The latest changes there make it very hard for them to go North / South and they often  just have to push themselves out into the traffic and effectively make a break in the traffic.

smitho

Some interesting observations, Geoffrah. I do Redex as well as normal route services through Barton, so I know what you mean about the disappointing patronage in the Barton area.The same goes for Russell. From my fuzzy recollections, in years gone by, patronage to/from these areas was much better.

This week I was doing morning Redex and some days I'd take good peak period loads through to Barton (mainly from Civic) while other days, such as today, there were very few. My impression is that regular bus punters from Civic will take Redex if it shows up, but they don't rely on it exclusively to get to Barton, or to go to from Barton or Civic. On peak hour Redex, the bulk of the passenger flow seems to be between Gungahlin-Civic-Gungahlin although CIT Reid is surprisingly busy for Redex too.

You're right about the new arrangements at Russell roundabout being a new challenge for drivers - especially going south!