Dear Supporters,

We wanted to update everyone on the progress of our campaign surrounding Keolis Downer's operation of the North Shore and Northern Beaches bus network, as well as our wider efforts surrounding long term solutions for the Northern Beaches public transportation issues. But firstly, thank you for everyone’s support. Together, we are raising awareness about these pressing issues in the northern communities, and more importantly slowly gaining the attention of the state government. Please continue to share this campaign, as the more support we get the more leverage we will have in pushing for greater change towards the State Government, Transport for NSW and Keolis Downer.

Here’s a little bit about what we’ve been up to regarding this campaign:

• John Graham (Transport Minister), Chris Minns (Premier), Howard Collins (Chief at TFNSW), Josh Murray (Transport Secretary) and all local state members spanning the LNS and NB have been contacted regarding our pain points and this campaigns mission. We relayed all of the main arguments outlined in the campaign with evidence to them, in a bid to raise their awareness about the issues, and presented them solutions. This occurred around one week before the announcement of the 60 new buses, and whilst all parties acknowledged receipt of our message, only a media correspondent for Michael Regan (Minister for Wakehurst) responded acknowledging the issues and citing the new announcement for the 60 new buses.
• Thank you to those who have contacted us with concerns about their local bus losses. As reported, due to the lack of bendy busses in the area many local bus services were cut, and people have been citing concerns regarding if there services will ever return even when the bendy buses are back. We are actively in contact with TFNSW regarding this, and they are maintaining their case that the route network will revert to normal once the bendy buses are back.
• Also thank you to the many who commute through the new Victoria Cross metro station in North Sydney and have been in touch with us citing the major concerns regarding how short the trains stop for at the platform there during peak hours, and the lack of action by the operator MTS to rectify this. We have been in touch with the operator (who has not yet responded to our concerns) and TFNSW who have said they are investigating the issue and why the operator has been ignoring these concerns.

In addition to voicing the concerns above, we have been putting together a case to advocate for better long term transport solutions in the North Shore and Northern Beaches Area:

• The Spit Bridge bottleneck and its vulnerability to incidents is a major long-term issue to solve.  The only alternative mass transit system north of it that does not rely on it are the Manly Ferry services, of which have been plagued by reliability issues recently and are nearing capacity during peak. With both the spit bridge and manly ferry at capacity during peak travel times, the local economy will begin to see negative implications in the next 10 years or so as employment opportunities in the city become less viable for residents due to travel times, which are set to worsen under the modelling with new development approvals and rezoning. The most viable solution to this considering construction cost to benefits would be a mass rapid transit system such as a metro extension as detailed below.
• As trained transport planners ourselves, we have been modelling what the benefits of a Northern Beaches metro line may entail, using industry softwares. Our latest modelling reveals that a short service running along the existing line between Central and Victoria Cross, before branching off towards Neutral Bay Junction, Spit Junction, Balgowlah, Brookvale and finally Dee Why, would reduce the commute time from Dee Why to Martin Place to a mere 15 minutes compared to the current 1-2 hours depending on time of day. Furthermore, our annual ridership forecast for the line, based on housing data in the area, would estimate annual ridership of around 20 Million passengers annually. This would put ridership of the line just shy of the 25 Million on the current line, and well above the estimated 12 Million on the Metro line currently under construction towards Parramatta, all whilst being shorter and therefore probably cheaper to construct. The main benefit of this is to provide fast connections to the city to allow for employment opportunities, and alleviate growing strain on the Spit Bridge and Manly Ferry.
• As many observant people may have noticed, the Military Rd bus lane in the AM peak serves little benefit due to the narrowness of the lane, as buses do not have enough space to move past trucks making the bus lane negligible in its effect. The long term solution to this is getting trucks off of Military Road, which would require either a peak hour ban on trucks which would negatively effect the local economy, or to get the alternative Beaches Link tunnel back on track.

Short term solutions that we have identified are needed whilst we work towards long term ones:

• Increase in Manly Ferry Services and contingency plans such as sacrificing other services when things go wrong to support the MF service until current mechanical issues are permanently solved, considering the lack of alternative transport in the Northern Beaches and unavailability of replacement buses.
• Work with Sydney Ferries operator Transdev to cut the fare’s on Ferry services to be equivalent to that of the buses, especially whilst the bus network struggles and local services have been cut, particularly in the Lower North Shore.
• Permanently remove parking along on Military and Spit Road to alleviate traffic

All of these solutions work towards creating an inviting, fast, efficient and future proof public transport solution for the Northern Beaches, encouraging ridership and thus reducing strain on the road networks.

Once again thank you for all your support, as we continue to press for fixes to these issues. The greatest way you can help is to spread awareness and get more people behind the campaign, so please share it around. Additionally, if you have anything to add or share with us, such as solutions, feedback, service complaints or enquiries, please shoot us a message, as the more opinions and material we gather the stronger the campaign becomes. We will be in touch again soon regarding further developments and action.