Extending the 130 to Loganlea Station

[achiruel]

I was thinking this morning about how the 130 (unlike the 140 and 150) doesn't really have any trip generators or interchanges at its terminus. Maybe it could be extended to Loganlea Station via Illaweena St & the Logan Mwy.

I realise there's a fair bit of motorway running here, but I think we need to accept sometimes that's what is required to make buses viable for passengers time-wise.

It would greatly decrease transport time for residents in the Algester/Calamvale areas to travel to the Gold Coast or southern Logan areas, and also provide access without needing to drive to the Illaweena Street Picnic Area, and Karawatha Forest more generally—there's a couple of trails that start at this location. As an aside, I have noticed that Brisbane does a pretty poor job of providing public transport access to parks and picnic. e.g. the 120 passes through Toohey Forest, but doesn't stop within it, making driving the only realistic option to access the Toohey Picnic Area.

[nathandavid88]

Hmmm... from Stretton to Loganlea Station is quite the hike, adding almost 15 minutes onto a route that is almost an hour long as it is, solely to service a rather far flung station.

If you wanted to anchor that route to a station, I'd run it up Wembley Road to Woodridge Station. It's a shorter extension that also services the new industrial estates along there, services the Logan Entertainment Centre and Logan Art Gallery, and is plugging into the heart of Logan City.

[Gazza]

Yeah, I would have said Woodridge would be the go a well, or run along Juers St rather than the Motorway to get walk up patronage.

For Loganlea, I think the important thing is getting a HF route due north to hook into the SEB, since currently I dont think the connections between the GC line and the SEB are good enough.

[SurfRail]

Certainly think we need more HF services in that part of the world.

I would suggest the 545, 550 and 560 would probably all be justified.

Also a cross-town route along the lines of Wacol, Richlands, Inala, Acacia Ridge, Calamvale, Fruitgrove, (new) Trinder Park and Springwood.  That picks up the busway, 3 existing railway lines, one future railway line and heaps of HF routes.

[nathandavid88]

Having used those three routes extensively, I agree that they would all be great candidates for frequency increases. One thing I would like to see is the 550 route modified through Marsden so that it can service the same main stop on Chambers Flat Road between Marsden Park Shopping Centre and The Queenslander Hotel, rather than have its own set of stops around the corner on Tamarind Street.

As for a cross town route, would there be enough of a draw for locations like Wacol, Richlands, Inala and Acacia Ridge to make it a viable route? In my mind, I always thought a Springwood to Springfield Central route might be the way to go, going via Woodridge and Browns Plains. Something like this:

 

[achiruel]

Hmmm... from Stretton to Loganlea Station is quite the hike, adding almost 15 minutes onto a route that is almost an hour long as it is, solely to service a rather far flung station.

If you wanted to anchor that route to a station, I'd run it up Wembley Road to Woodridge Station. It's a shorter extension that also services the new industrial estates along there, services the Logan Entertainment Centre and Logan Art Gallery, and is plugging into the heart of Logan City.

If only we had 24x7 bus lanes on Mains/Pinelands/Calam Rds, and a mass transit system to feed into at GUBS, I wonder how much shorter this route could become.

(/foam)

As for running it along Wembley Rd, 547 already services that corridor (albeit it rather badly—hourly, 7am-7pm weekdays only, and I'd probably reroute it to serve the industrial estate better), and connections could be made at the existing bus stop on Wembley Rd near Forest Way.

The main reason for preferring Loganlea was access to the Gold Coast. Almost everyone I speak to from anywhere west of the railway line about taking public transport to the Gold Coast mentions the long, indirect access as one of the major reasons why they don't and prefer to drive. Maybe this could help reduce M1 traffic, maybe not. I'm sure TL have go card data, but the point is, but if the service is so subpar, people probably aren't using it anyway.

And with Woodridge vs Loganlea, we're talking about a 5 minute difference each way. Not huge in the overall scheme of things.

But in general, bus connections between north-central Logan, and southern Brisbane suburbs, excluding the busway are pretty bad.

e.g. Woodridge Station to Stretton State College (say for a person working there, starting at 7:30am) would be 1 hr 30 minutes by public transport (not includng walking time from their house to the station, maybe 10 minutes) and requires 2 transfers. Driving 10-20 minutes. I doubt most people, unless they're really dedicated to PT, or have no other option, would not make this journey.

8am start is much better at 29 minutes bus, due to being able to connect with the peak-hour only 153 at Macquarie Way, but the first OB 153 in the afternoon isn't until 5:36 pm, probably far too late for most school workers.

Extending the 130 to either Woodridge or Loganlea would make this trip much shorter. Obviously a lot shorter if connecting to Woodridge, but for someone living in Kingston for e.g. it would make minimal difference, they'd need to take a train to either Woodridge or Loganlea to get on the bus anyway.

[achiruel]

Certainly think we need more HF services in that part of the world.

I would suggest the 545, 550 and 560 would probably all be justified.

Also a cross-town route along the lines of Wacol, Richlands, Inala, Acacia Ridge, Calamvale, Fruitgrove, (new) Trinder Park and Springwood.  That picks up the busway, 3 existing railway lines, one future railway line and heaps of HF routes.

I mostly like this idea, but I'd probably start at Goodna rather than Wacol. Yes, it's a bit longer, but has a lot more bus connections than Wacol (463 only, Goodna has 500, 524 & 527 in addition to 463). I guess you could stop at Wacol as well, and it'd be a bit redunant, but I'm not a fan of forced double transfers in a short distance. Going by the 463 timetable, it'd add about ~4 minutes per trip.

Until the LGCFR project is finished, I'd divert via Kuraby. I think it gas more value than Compton Rd (the parts with any trip generators are already served by 554 or 545), despite being less direct, and due to street geography, current Trinder Park would probably require going to Woodridge.

[nathandavid88]

Given TfB's seeming reluctance to travel too far outside of the Brisbane LGA, I think a trip into Loganlea might just be too far into Logan for them to consider. By comparison, Woodridge Station isn't too much further from the BCC border than Browns Plains is, and so might be more palatable for them, and I do think would be better from an overall connectivity perspective.

A question I would also ask - for how many passengers on the 130 would the travel time from their stop to the Illaweena terminus + 15 minutes to Loganlea, be quicker than catching the 130 back up to Altandi? Would we really be creating a major improvement in rail connectivity for the majority, or would it be six of one, half a dozen of the other?   

[verbatim9]

Yep, unlikely to happen due to council borders and the funding model for Brisbane Transport. The only service that is likely to be extended is the 222 to the Sleeman centre from Carindale Westfield's as it's only a couple of KMs and needed before the Olympics.

Plus you would have a capacity issue on the 130 if extended. It's already quite full halfway through Parkinson in peak.

[nathandavid88]

^^ I do think we could probably get an extension to Woodridge Station if we pushed, but probably not any further.