Article: park and ride facility trial to help commuters

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Park and ride facility trial to help commuters
Michelle French
Caloundra Journal
Quest Newspapers July 25, 2011 12:00AM

In a move to meet the growing demand of car-poolers in the region, the Sunshine Coast Council has confirmed it will introduce trial park and ride facilities within the next financial year.
It comes after the Journal first brought parking issues at the Ettamogah Pub to council's attention in March, when commuters who car-pooled to Brisbane were parking in a dirt patch and along Frizzo Rd. The problem has since escalated.

Strategic transport planning principal Jason Deller said council's sustainable transport strategy had identified trial sites with up to 10 car spaces to implement at various locations across the Sunshine Coast.

"It's certainly on our radar,'' he said. ``We'd be looking at allocated spaces and making them well-lit.

"We wouldn't be looking to build multi-storey decks but starting small and slowly building them up as demand increases.''

Civil engineering giant Parsons Brinckerhoff's national placemaking executive Mark Bachels said park and ride facilities work well for the Sunshine Coast.

"Strategies around rail, bus networks and around car pooling can work very well,'' he said.

"I think the Coast would be a really good candidate for that and the location of those would be critical.''

Mr Deller said council was was also trying to encourage residents to make small steps towards adopting public transport already available on the Coast.
"The biggest issue on the Coast from council's point of view that we have to address is people using their cars all the time.

"What we're saying is every now and then if we can start making different trips (using public transport), over time that will change.''

Mr Bachels said there were transport issues that needed to be addressed.

"Clearly public transport is not as good a quality as it could be.

"There's a lot of room to make improvements on the service level, the quality of the service and the priority that it's given, but we could do a lot better for cyclists and pedestrian planning and more based in each of the centres, Caloundra, Maroochydore and Nambour.''

He said marketing the message so locals  understood public transport's importance was critical.

http://www.couriermail.com.au/questnews/sunshine-coast/park-and-ride-facility-trial-to-help-commuters/story-fn8m0yxo-1226099142212