Faulty go cards, inconsistency ...

[ozbob]

This video highlights a wider issue, go cards that don't work, among other issues.  Now in some cases it may just be because the card may be in debit, or expired.  In other cases it could be a faulty go card.  The difficulty is of course inconsistency as shown in the video on how it is handled.  It is a gray area, not really clarified in the go card user guide either.  http://translink.com.au/resources/tickets-and-fares/go-card/130107-user-guide-part-1.pdf

A real problem for some passengers, the only money they have is on their go card, go card doesn't work and they are denied travel. Hardly fair is it?

There is also continuing confusion on the rail substitution buses as observed over the weekend again.  Many passengers are not sure of changed procedures when on the substitute buses, that is they are not to touch off at the rail station when leaving the train to join the bus and so forth.  Complete change from the normal procedures and many get rattled.

There are many things that are less than customer focussed with the go card system.

[SurfRail]

I always make a point of touching off when leaving a station during rail replacement.  Woe betide the transit officer who wants to argue about it with me.

[HappyTrainGuy]

I feel sorry for those that have to actually go to the station/platform to touch on and then walk back again to where the bus stop is. Like Virginia. The rail replacment stop is usually on Toombul Road 150m from the station with the GoCard machines located at the top of the stairs on the overpass. Zillmere is the same. The rail bus stop is 200m away on Murphy road and the nearest GoCard reader is on the platform overpass IIRC. Toombul is the same aswell with the interchange at the shopping centre being closer than the rail replacment bus stop is located (the stop is at the intersection in the middle between the station entrance intersection and the Airport Line) and I'm pretty sure the nearest gocard reader is also on the overpass. Northgate is another with its closest GoCard reader located on the overpass as too might be Bald Hill. Just stupid. Rail replacment services should be free until a time where GoCard readers on the replacment buses properly function.

Bob/whoever, If anyone wants to do a media relase in the future about about touching on/off on the rail replacment buses and the extra effort involved to access the readers give me a heads up and I'll double check the stations/readers/bus stop locations to confirm.

[ozbob]

Thanks HTG, please do.  It is a problem at many stations the walk, particularly after hours with deserted railway stations. Also often stations are actually closed off for works, which means fixed fares and the issues that raises ..

Fairly contemptible actually the way passengers are treated with this issue. 

A customer focussed jurisdiction would waive the ticketing requirement and sort out readers for the buses.  They could issue mobile readers to the drivers, these can be used as touch devices ...   

All too hard, just screw the pax around ...

[SurfRail]

Railbuses should be free full stop.  Shutting down an entire line is a massive inconvenience and imposition on the public - asking to be paid for it is ridiculous.

Rule should be touch off when you leave the rail network no matter what.  It's something I stick to.

[HappyTrainGuy]

Stopped in at a few stations on the way home this morning. There are indeed no GoCard machines on the ground level at Toombul, Northgate, Virginia and Zillmere. Tag on/off facilities are either located on the overpass or on the platforms themselves. Really feel sorry for those that have to climb the stairs just to 'tag on and off'.

Toombul and Virginia.

[ozbob]

Thanks HTG,  highlights the issues well.

It might be worthwhile if TL looked at position of readers and maybe placing a few more that are more accessible from entry points and the like.

[SurfRail]

Bob - can I confirm that somebody has actually told you that the following needs to happen?

Eg

Enter station and touch-on at Sandgate
Exit station and board railbus to Bowen Hills
Enter station and board train to Roma Street
Touch off at Roma Street

Touch on and board train at Nerang
Exit train at Yeerongpilly (no touch-off) and board railbus
Railbus from Yeerongpilly to South Bank
Enter station and touch-off

This is ignoring situations where you would have to enter a gated station just to touch off...

This is what I would do in both circumstances.

Do not touch on at Sandgate
Railbus to Bowen Hills
Touch on at Bowen Hills and touch off at Roma Street

Touch on at Nerang
Touch off at Yeerongpilly
Railbus to South Bank - walk straight off bus and that's it.

Is there any evidence whatsoever that the above is incorrect?

[ozbob]

" Just like any other TransLink service, you'll need a valid go card or paper ticket to travel on a bus replacement service during a track closure. If you're using a go card, please touch on and touch off as normal at your station. If you're unable to touch on and touch off due to restricted access to ticketing facilities, you'll need to contact our call centre on 13 12 30 to request a fare adjustment. "

http://translink.com.au/travel-information/network-information/track-closures accessed 5th June 2012

[SurfRail]

That is profoundly stupid and should be changed.

[HappyTrainGuy]

Wasn't it only just recently changed (as in the wording rather than the policy changing)?

[Mr X]

what if you were going bus > train > bus but your journey became bus > train > replacement bus (free) > bus. in scenario 1, you pay one fare, but under scenario 2, you're slugged again for the final bus trip. it might end up costing you more.

[ozbob]

Wasn't it only just recently changed (as in the wording rather than the policy changing)?

Thanks,  does appear to be updated now

http://translink.com.au/travel-information/network-information/track-closures  accessed 24th April 2013

What does this mean for me if I need to travel during a closure?

We understand that no one likes to be disrupted and we try to keep this to a minimum.

Track closures are usually scheduled overnight or for weekends, when less people are travelling.

Wherever possible during the closure, buses are used to replace trains in both directions.

TransLink is working towards providing you with more access to go card ready buses during planned works. We realise not all rail replacement buses enable you to use your go card as you normally would.

While you normally need to travel with a go card that has been touched on or with a paper ticket, there may be circumstances where you are unable to use your go card or purchase a paper ticket during a track closure and it's not always reasonable for you to access and use the fare machines or go card readers located on the platform.

For example, if you're a parent or caregiver travelling with small children or prams, a person with a disability, elderly or where the go card readers are situated on platforms that need to be accessed by stairs or overhead bridges.

If you're able to access station ticketing facilities during a track closure you should use your go card or purchase a paper ticket for travel.

We encourage you to plan ahead by checking our website for upcoming scheduled track closures and allow for extra travel time if the closure will affect your planned journey. These closures can add up to approximately 60 minutes to your travel time.

[ozbob]

Ooo  the grey area just got bigger!   

[somebody]

So they reaffirm that one needs to touch on at the platform if the reader is available there. 

[HappyTrainGuy]

Ooo  the grey area just got bigger!   

I see a new section in the Translink Public Transport Puzzle Book!

[SurfRail]

As far as I'm concerned, my journey is broken when I leave the rail network.  End of story.

[Get_a_Wriggle_On]

Some people might not be aware that bus zone rules are not the same as rail zone rules.

When a replacement bus service is used where rail lines are closed due to planned
or unplanned line outage, then depending on how this replacement service covers the
affected rail lines then it's possible a different fare might be charged for what
for the commuter is the same effective journey but on the gocard system is logically
a different journey. Pity every commuter who tries to use the call centre to sort that out.

Perhaps simple solutions are best.

As a courtesy to commuters for inconvenience suffered;

- turn the bus gocard equipment off, so the bus section is free
  If a commuter's journey only covers the bus part then great they get a free journey

- Bus contractors get agreed $ amounts for providing a train replacement service,
  so counting heads or touching cards would be nulled as an issue.

- if rail equipment is depowered or otherwise inaccessible at a rail station where
  commuters are getting off trains after having touched on elsewhere, then rail station
  staff or revenue protection officers should already be posted there with handheld readers.

- if rail equipment is depowered or otherwise inaccessible at a rail station where
  commuters are getting on trains and on arrival at destination having to touch off to exit,
  then rail station staff or revenue protection officers should already be posted back where
  commuters are getting on, again with handheld readers.

If the cost to Translink for such a simple approach seems a bit on the high side then yay,
that might encourage better management to keep outages of any sort to a minimum.

[ozbob]

Welcome! Yes, could well be inconsistencies with go fares on the substitute buses if go enabled, but I would expect the rail bus go card setup would be as for rail fares, that is not programmed the same as route buses so that should not be an issue.

I agree though they could make more use of mobile go card readers, particularly for use at stations not accessible etc. in the meanwhile.

[Get_a_Wriggle_On]

For better or for worse, unfortunately on the Brisbane public transport system a journey is not a
journey! Some might not understand this, so a simple comparative example;

If I catch a train at Oxley (Ipswich line) in zone 3, and travel to Geebung (Caboolture line) in zone 3,
do I pay a one zone fare? No.

I pay a three zone fare. How does the system know that? I guess the data on QR gocard equipment
includes additional information, probably in the form of an all_stations x all_stations square matrix)
that allows the reader to process your gocard touch on information determining you boarded at Oxley,
therefore had to traverse the city (zone 1) and got off at Geebung.

So the lowest zone along your journey was a zone 1 and the highest was a zone 3, so you pay a three
zone fare, get it? That seems reasonable, because you've utilized QR resources to get all the way from
a southern suburb to a northern suburb.


If I could catch one bus (or ferry!) at Oxley in zone 3, and travel to Geebung in zone 3, do I pay a one
zone fare? Yes!

That's because the bus equipment and data (ferries use the same) handling seems to be simpler. It does
not appear to utilize that matrix. It therefore presumably cannot use bus/ferry stop specific
information about where the bus was when you boarded or where you alighted, it seems only to take the
zone info from your touch on and the zone info when you touch off.

You can show this to yourself - pick a route that is "circular" and goes through a few zones; touch on,
fall asleep up the back... arrive back at a different stop in the original zone, touch off. An
experienced driver possibly would not let you do this. They'd get to the end of say an inbound journey,
get you to touch off, then at least get you to touch on again for the matching outbound journey.

---

That example segues neatly into what I think prevents buses ever being loaded with QR data, besides the
likelihood that the supplier's withered hand would come out for a lot of money to achieve such a thing!

If you've ever sat behind a frustrated driver who has had to reboot their bus equipment, you might
notice when the driver's gocard console box starts up there's a Windows CE 4 start up screen. CE 4 is
about 10 years old, prehistoric by todays standards. It implies the brain and storage capacity of the
box is approximately the size of a dehydrated pea! There are possibly school kid's calculators today
that have more processing grunt and storage space than these driver consoles.

Possible scenarios;
- an unplanned rail outage, allocated buses only have that bus operator's data on them. Too bad, bus
  would first have to return to depot to get fresh data. Buses get it via secure wifi, you can see the
  wifi base station IDs it uses around any depot if you have any wifi enabled device while going past.

- it follows that, if one bus gets QR data, then so would all buses at that depot - perhaps not a
  nice situation for the bus operator to find themself in!


- Okay, could all buses carry both QR and bus data, and the driver switch between data sets when
  necessary? From the above example, the QR data is big, so unlikely that the bus equipment has the
  capacity to store two lots of data, or to have enough memory space to switch between them, let alone
  process the QR data once it was loaded.

- keep in mind the actual gocard readers would also need to be loaded with different data and possibly
  different software. You would know that bus/ferry readers display different messages than those
  displayed on QR readers! 

- Okay, could the bus equipment carry a cut down set of QR data? Unlikely. Too many permutations of
  possible rail outage scenarios.

- Okay, simplify (read rationalize, read reduce) and merge bus/ferry and QR data so that a journey IS a
  journey? After all, this is supposed to be an "integrated" ticketing system, right? Well, I guess we've
  learned from history; there are distance based systems and zone based systems. For better or worse
  the Brisbane system is zone based. To change to distance based - do ya see that withered hand come out
  again? The "other" system is flat fare - I would guess some form of exquisite political suicide lies
  down that path!

- We actually appear to have a hybrid of zone and flat fare. Think of the Airport line. It doesn't fit
  into the zones pattern. It's possibly set up in system data as a "special" zone. Anyway, I digress.
  getting back to the replacement service buses; the simple solution appears best; turn the gocard
  gear off (hey, that's a flat fare of $0 for the bus part of the journey), so that's an operational
  solution that does not carry the likely hefty commercial consequences of more supplier system development. 
   

[Otto]

For better or for worse, unfortunately on the Brisbane public transport system a journey is not a
journey! Some might not understand this, so a simple comparative example;

If I catch a train at Oxley (Ipswich line) in zone 3, and travel to Geebung (Caboolture line) in zone 3,
do I pay a one zone fare? No.

I pay a three zone fare.

Take a train from Cleveland to R.S. and change to Ippy to go to Toowong..
Is the gocard fare charged a 6 zone ?
No
Charges a 5 zone of $5.84

[somebody]

Get_a_Wriggle_On, I don't understand your point or problem?

If you go from Oxley to Geebung, you've travelled through zones 1-3 and rightly pay 3 zones.  If you use a clockwise GCL from Sherwood to Hamilton you only enter 2 zones and that's all you pay for.

[HappyTrainGuy]

Although it sucks when its a faster trip to go multiple zones than it is to stay in the one zone ie Strathpine to Sandgate/Brighton

What would be interesting to know is could there be a situation where rail buses have a tag on/off option and what happens if the user forgets to tag off at the station/tags on at the station. Would they get a fixed fare if they tag on the railbus or could they be allowed to board without tagging on/off but then have to tag off at the train station they intend to go to. Perhaps even using the bus as a station tag off without even going to the station?

Roma Street (tag on) - Northgate (no tag off)
Board railbus at Northgate (no tag on) - Zillmere (tag off on railbus)

Roma Street (tag on) - Northgate (no tag off)
Board rail bus at Northgate (no tag on) - Petrie (no tag off)
Board train at Petrie (no tag on) - Caboolture tag off

Roma Street (tag on) - Northgate (no tag off)
Board rail bus at Northgate (tag on - fixed fare) - Petrie (tag off)
Petrie (tag on) - Caboolture (tag off)

[SurfRail]

Mr Wriggle - I don't think you actually understand how the bus consoles are programmed.  The data is based on the particular stops, which all have values attributed to them.  The system is perfectly capable of recognising if you have gone through zone 1 and come out the other side, but in practice there are not that many bus routes which actually operate this way.

A trip on from say Greenslopes to Windsor on the 77 is a 2 zone journey as it passes through zone 1 and 2 (even though there are no stops in zone 1 on this service).  I am actually unaware of any other bus routes which pass through zone 1 and out the other side.  The only similar routes in Brisbane would be some of the cross-town services like the 598 and 599, but these operate without any apparent fare zone problems.

The consoles appear to be perfectly capable of understanding and doing whatever it is that you are suggesting.

The REAL problem is the grandfathering arrangements which artificially place train stations and adjacent bus stops in different fare zones altogether.  Those need to be fixed, and it's an easy job.

[somebody]

A trip on from say Greenslopes to Windsor on the 77 is a 2 zone journey as it passes through zone 1 and 2 (even though there are no stops in zone 1 on this service).  I am actually unaware of any other bus routes which pass through zone 1 and out the other side.  The only similar routes in Brisbane would be some of the cross-town services like the 598 and 599, but these operate without any apparent fare zone problems.

If they've fixed the bug which forgets to charge for zone 1.

P88 is another route.

GCL does a similar thing with zone 2.  Zone 4 too but in the other direction.

[longboi]

What would be interesting to know is could there be a situation where rail buses have a tag on/off option and what happens if the user forgets to tag off at the station/tags on at the station. Would they get a fixed fare if they tag on the railbus or could they be allowed to board without tagging on/off but then have to tag off at the train station they intend to go to. Perhaps even using the bus as a station tag off without even going to the station?

Roma Street (tag on) - Northgate (no tag off)
Board railbus at Northgate (no tag on) - Zillmere (tag off on railbus)

Roma Street (tag on) - Northgate (no tag off)
Board rail bus at Northgate (no tag on) - Petrie (no tag off)
Board train at Petrie (no tag on) - Caboolture tag off

Roma Street (tag on) - Northgate (no tag off)
Board rail bus at Northgate (tag on - fixed fare) - Petrie (tag off)
Petrie (tag on) - Caboolture (tag off)

That situation wouldn't occur unless the bus driver programmed a dummy stop on the DCU because they wouldn't be performing a predefined route.

However, assuming that did happen, someone touching on at a station (Northgate) and then off on a bus (Petrie) would result in 2 fixed fares:

1) Forced exit from train station and forced entry onto bus
2) Forced exit from bus after 6 hours (unless you used the card again before then)

So essentially the system would assume you forgot to touch off at Petrie station and then transferred to a bus and touched on. But because you were actually touching off the bus, after 6 hours (maximum journey time) the system would then assume you didn't touch off the bus and issue another fixed fare.

Bus stops and train stations are completely separate stops.

[Get_a_Wriggle_On]

For Otto's journey from Cleveland (zone 6) to Toowong (Zone boundary 1/2), woo hoo! looks
like Otto's found one of two possible defects (Translink's Journey Planner shows 6 zone fare).

- Either the matrix data loaded on the machines everywhere is wrong, or

- The machine(s) Otto is using to touch off at Toowong does not have the data or is not
  processing it properly. Either way, bank error in Otto's favour!

---

For Simon;

Describing my example as a "circular" bus journey was a bad choice. Without drawing
pictures... what I meant to say was (gee, now I feel like Bob Hawke if I do this on rail;

Oxley(3) -> City(1) -> Geebung(3) then that's a 3 zone fare, tick.

If I could do the same journey on a hypothetical rail replacement bus
Oxley(3) -> City(-) -> Geebung(3) then that's a 1 zone fare, cross.

My point being that the way the system data works now, the bus journey is not the same as the
train journey. So if I can explain the problem clearly then we can perhaps see what options
there are to making train replacement bus fares behave like rail fares.

---

For HappyTrainGuy and Nikko who are right;
I think because the bus data now has no overlap with the rail data, then as soon as you change
modes without having properly touched on/off the previous mode, then you'll get hit with a
nominal fare. What this implies is that a bus stop at a rail station is not the same logical
location in the gocard system as the rail station itself.

---

Which segues neatly into the 'forever to fix' problem SurfRail mentions, that the bus stop
outside the rail station can be in a different zone. For transfer rules and fares to work
the commuter changing modes wants the two stops (bus and rail at this physical location) to
be in the same zone. I wonder if this problem only exists at zone boundary stations?
Probably not, because there'd be a heap of zone boundary bus stops as well.

Hypothetical e.g; Toowong rail station is a zone 1/2 location, so if commuter is coming out
from city by train then they've touched on say at Central(1) and off at Toowong(1), but when
they board the bus and touch on the bus logic is saying sorry buster this is zone 2, new
journey for you!

(btw, SurfRail, I think you're right, the majority of bus trips seem to be linear [e.g. zone
start in 3, through 4, end in 5] if taken in one direction, say inbound. I was thinking that
if the driver were to let you stay on and go outbound again and eventually touch off back in
zone 3 (say one stop short of where you first got on) then there's no way the system can tell
you've travelled through zones 4 and 5 so you'd only be charged a one zone fare].

---

So if it was easy to fix, why hasn't it been done? Put aside commercial issues like that
withered claw, then is there a technical barrier to fixing mode transfers at these colocated
stops?

- One seemingly simple way could be to dispense with any stops being on a zone boundary, say
  Toowong rail station is either in zone 1 or zone 2, not on the boundary. And the colocated
  bus stops are placed in the same zone. See the problem? Either the commuters who only use
  the bus, or only use the rail are going to be upset. Putting the station right on the zone
  boundary is how Translink implement their bestfare policy. It just doen't work well with
  their transfer rules.

- Another way could be to dispense with transfers so there are only journeys, not trips within
  journeys, and rebalance fares to compensate. Just disallowing transfers WOULD be a simple
  data fix.

- I thought transfers applied whether you were transferring in the same zone or an adjacent
  zone. If that's the case then being on a zone boundary shouldn't matter. Is it the case that
  the bus stop outside the station is zoned more than one logical zone away form the one the
  rail station is in? That's gotta be a simple data error (read GIGO problem).

[somebody]

Describing my example as a "circular" bus journey was a bad choice. Without drawing
pictures... what I meant to say was (gee, now I feel like Bob Hawke if I do this on rail;

Oxley(3) -> City(1) -> Geebung(3) then that's a 3 zone fare, tick.

If I could do the same journey on a hypothetical rail replacement bus
Oxley(3) -> City(-) -> Geebung(3) then that's a 1 zone fare, cross.

My point being that the way the system data works now, the bus journey is not the same as the
train journey. So if I can explain the problem clearly then we can perhaps see what options
there are to making train replacement bus fares behave like rail fares.

Actually both journeys would charge only for one zone I believe but that is a bug.  It's supposed to charge for 3 zones in both cases.

[SurfRail]

The system does not charge you a one zone fare for a zone 3-2-1-2-3 journey.  It charges you a 3 zone fare.  Bus or rail or both.

If there are bugs, then they can be fixed fairly simply (and I thought they had been by now).

End of story.

[somebody]

If there are bugs, then they can be fixed fairly simply (and I thought they had been by now).

I'm not aware that they have been fixed.  Been a long time since I've done such a journey, but the bus had been in place for a long time.

[Golliwog]

If there are bugs, then they can be fixed fairly simply (and I thought they had been by now).

I'm not aware that they have been fixed.  Been a long time since I've done such a journey, but the bus had been in place for a long time.

They fixed the issue I had with Park Rd where a trip FG to Park Rd was 3 zones in one direction and 2 zones in the other. Still haven't got an explanation from them on that one.

[longboi]

This rail replacement bus hypothetical doesn't even warrant discussion because you don't touch on/off rail replacement buses.

That's why pax. are encouraged to touch on/off at stations where fares are correctly calculated (at least most of the time it seems).

Eventually there will need to be a fix put in place where special rail replacement routes are loaded into the system for buses to use which replicate the train stations. How they are attached to a GPS location could be a challenge and whether or not the ability exists to simply create bus stops which act as train stations I wouldn't know (but nothing a grossly overpriced software fix from Cubic couldn't fix )

[ozbob]

Eventually there will need to be a fix put in place where special rail replacement routes are loaded into the system for buses to use which replicate the train stations. How they are attached to a GPS location could be a challenge and whether or not the ability exists to simply create bus stops which act as train stations I wouldn't know (but nothing a grossly overpriced software fix from Cubic couldn't fix )

Yes, be good if the rail replacement  buses could be go card enabled, at least it would keep go card use consistent.   I would expect the programming of the stations as stops would have the GPS area a bit larger than the normal bus route stops, to allow for the variation that occurs from time to time with rail replacement stops depending on the nature of works.

[#Metro]

In Melbourne, the myki bus readers are disabled and travel is free on rail replacement services.

[ozbob]

In Melbourne, the myki bus readers are disabled and travel is free on rail replacement services.

LOL  not in SEQ land ...

[longboi]

Eventually there will need to be a fix put in place where special rail replacement routes are loaded into the system for buses to use which replicate the train stations. How they are attached to a GPS location could be a challenge and whether or not the ability exists to simply create bus stops which act as train stations I wouldn't know (but nothing a grossly overpriced software fix from Cubic couldn't fix )

Yes, be good if the rail replacement  buses could be go card enabled, at least it would keep go card use consistent.   I would expect the programming of the stations as stops would have the GPS area a bit larger than the normal bus route stops, to allow for the variation that occurs from time to time with rail replacement stops depending on the nature of works.

Exactly.

Although another issue that would need to be to formalise contractual arrangements so that Operators must roster on buses that have go card equipment and are DDA compliant where possible. Logan Coaches would be the biggest hurdle in achieving this.

[HappyTrainGuy]

Eventually there will need to be a fix put in place where special rail replacement routes are loaded into the system for buses to use which replicate the train stations. How they are attached to a GPS location could be a challenge and whether or not the ability exists to simply create bus stops which act as train stations I wouldn't know (but nothing a grossly overpriced software fix from Cubic couldn't fix )

Yes, be good if the rail replacement  buses could be go card enabled, at least it would keep go card use consistent.   I would expect the programming of the stations as stops would have the GPS area a bit larger than the normal bus route stops, to allow for the variation that occurs from time to time with rail replacement stops depending on the nature of works.

Exactly.

Although another issue that would need to be to formalise contractual arrangements so that Operators must roster on buses that have go card equipment and are DDA compliant where possible. Logan Coaches would be the biggest hurdle in achieving this.

Thompsons, KBL and Caboolture buses too. They use their charter/school buses and so they have the GoCard equipment but they aren't DDA compliant as they don't use their low floor buses. That's also why its handy to contact QR prior to travelling and arrange/schedulle for a DDA compliant service to transport you between stations. KBL usually provide a couple of their own Toyota maxi cabs which have wheelchair lifts to get around it.

[longboi]

Eventually there will need to be a fix put in place where special rail replacement routes are loaded into the system for buses to use which replicate the train stations. How they are attached to a GPS location could be a challenge and whether or not the ability exists to simply create bus stops which act as train stations I wouldn't know (but nothing a grossly overpriced software fix from Cubic couldn't fix )

Yes, be good if the rail replacement  buses could be go card enabled, at least it would keep go card use consistent.   I would expect the programming of the stations as stops would have the GPS area a bit larger than the normal bus route stops, to allow for the variation that occurs from time to time with rail replacement stops depending on the nature of works.

Exactly.

Although another issue that would need to be to formalise contractual arrangements so that Operators must roster on buses that have go card equipment and are DDA compliant where possible. Logan Coaches would be the biggest hurdle in achieving this.

Thompsons, KBL and Caboolture buses too. They use their charter/school buses and so they have the GoCard equipment but they aren't DDA compliant as they don't use their low floor buses. That's also why its handy to contact QR prior to travelling and arrange/schedulle for a DDA compliant service to transport you between stations. KBL usually provide a couple of their own Toyota maxi cabs which have wheelchair lifts to get around it.

I was more referring to Logan Coaches and lack of go card equipment (since they technically aren't a TransLink operator).

DDA buses are always put on as required for rail replacement.

[SurfRail]

It's an interesting issue, because frankly I wouldn't want to be riding a low-floor express from Park Road to Nerang (and they aren't really built for it mechanically or otherwise).  KBL 01 did very nicely for me on the weekend.  They always have standby accessible buses for when needed.

For local services in the metropolitan area, particularly closer to the city, proper urban buses should be in use.