Transport in Brisbane, the capital and largest city of Queensland, Australia, is provided by road, rail, river and bay ferries, footpaths, bikepaths, sea and air.
Transport around Brisbane is managed by both the Brisbane City Council and the Government of Queensland, which owns Queensland Rail. Public commuter rail transport is by Citytrain, an electric train system operated by Queensland Rail. Road transport is via the standard residential street network managed by Brisbane City Council and the connecting arterial road network which is managed by Queensland Main Roads. The public bus transport system is operated by the Brisbane City Council, and utilises the road network as well as dedicated bus lanes and busways. Public transport on and across the Brisbane River is provided by the Cityferry (inner city) and CityCat services run by the Brisbane City Council.
Transport in and out of Brisbane is managed by both public and private enterprises. Queensland Rail manages a freight and passenger service inter-city and interstate. Queensland Main Roads manages the Queensland road network. Port of Brisbane is a private company that provides bulk sea freighter facilities. Brisbane Airport Corporation Limited manages the Brisbane Airport which has both domestic and international terminals with both freight and passenger services.
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Transport information can be obtained from TransLink, by visiting the Transit window of the Queen Street Mall information centre, or the Transport Information Centre just off King George Square. Brisbane City Council also has an interactive mapping feature on their website showing cycle routes and bikeways.
Brisbane is constructing a number of cycle routes and dedicated, off-road bikeways. The South-East Bikeway is a bicycle only bikeway running adjacent to the South East Freeway. It empties onto the Goodwill Bridge at South Bank, which in turn, connects with the Bicentennial Bikeway underneath the Riverside Expressway. The Bicentennial Bikeway continues along the Brisbane River to Toowong.
A limited number of buses carry cycle racks on the front. Bicycles are easy to transport on the CityCats, and many stops have bicycle racks. During peak hour, bicycles on Queensland Rail (QR) Citytrains are restricted to counter-peak-flow services (i.e. You have to be travelling away from the city in the morning, and to the city in the afternoon). Exceptions to this are relatively uncommon such as fold up bicycles fitting within certain dimensions. Riding a bicycle on QR property is always forbidden.
A bike station in the King George Square busway station offers many amenities including showers and locker rooms for members.[1] Subscriptions for a Velib style community bike hire scheme called citycycle by JCDecaux for Brisbane started on the 1 September 2010 with bikes available from 1 October 2010 at 150 stations from the University of Queensland to Tenerrife.[2]
Brisbane's public transport system is provided by rail, buses, ferries and taxis. A large tram system closed in 1969, to be replaced by buses. A smaller trolley-bus system closed at the same time.
TransLink is a Queensland Government agency managing planning, co-ordination, integrated ticketing and zoning for public transport services covering Brisbane and South East Queensland. public transport services in the South-East Queensland region. Under the TransLink system, passengers pay common fares on all modes of public transport. TransLink tickets are accepted on both government- and privately owned buses, trains, and ferries. In 2007, Translink introduced a smartcard-based ticketing system, the go card. Paper tickets are still available. In most cases, travelling using the go Card costs at least 30% less than buying a paper ticket.
The rail services are operated by Citytrain, a division of Queensland Rail. The bus system, and the high-speed CityCat as well as the cross-river Cityferry are operated by Brisbane Transport, a business arm of the Brisbane City Council. Buses that serve the regional areas outside the Brisbane boundaries are operated by private-sector companies contracted by the State Government.
After some years of decline, Brisbane's public transport system is gradually being revitalised, with significant investment in railway station upgrades, busways, bus tunnels and new buses. However, patronage remains the lowest of all Australian capital cities, a far cry from public transport's heyday in the 1940s, when the tram system alone carried 160 million annually. By comparison, Brisbane's publicly owned bus service carried 53 million passengers in 2005, although Brisbane's population has doubled since the 1940s. This figure climbed to 77 million in 2010.[3]
The CBD serves as the central hub for all public transport services, with Queen Street bus station for buses, Roma Street and Central stations for trains, and North Quay for ferries. Various smaller transfer hubs, such as the Cultural Centre busway station, are located at various strategically placed points of public importance and public interest in the city, including the Queensland Cultural Centre, South Bank Parklands and shopping malls, which are usually within dense population centres. Many busway stations are co-located with train stations, allowing easy transfers. (e.g. Roma St Station, South Bank).
In December 2005, TransLink began all-night public transport services on Friday and Saturday nights, under the name of NightLink. These buses are prefixed with the letter 'N' and often carry security guards for extra safety. A limited number of lines (Beenleigh, Ipswich, Caboolture) also run trains into the early morning hours.
Busways have been established to provide public transport to areas outside the reach of the metropolitan train lines. They permit unrestricted bus travel throughout the northern, eastern, and southern corridors of the city, providing road systems where only buses are permitted. Two busways have opened in recent years in Brisbane operated by Translink. These are the South East Busway and the Inner-Northern Busway. The Northern Busway and Eastern Busway are partially complete.
Services to the northern and western suburbs are good quality while the southern and eastern region continues to lag behind in services and on time standards as well as a lack of total capacity that leads to peak time overcrowding issues. Buses operate on a 5am to midnight timetable generally throughout the week with some Friday and Saturday night 24 hour services operated by Brisbane city council buses. However lack of early morning services for shift workers (2-4am) and some outlying areas with rapidly growing populations are lacking services outside of the 6am to 6pm timeframes.
BUZ (Bus Upgrade Zones) are high frequency routes, pioneered by Brisbane City Council, and provide services at least every 15 minutes on any day of the week from 6am-11pm.[4]
BUZ services include
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Not all buses observe each stop. Most buses in Brisbane are 'Express' and don't observe minor stops. During peak hours, 'Rocket' buses omit most intermediate stops, while 'Bullets'(such as Browns Plains 142) don't stop until reaching their final destination. It is very important to know where the bus stops, as visitors and people unfamiliar with Brisbane's buses can find themselves very far from the city very quickly, or puzzled as to why multiple buses are passing their stop, despite hailing. Some pre-paid buses prefixed with a 'P' don't accept cash, only pre-purchased tickets or go cards. Information can be found by contacting TransLink.
The Great Circle Line, Routes 598 (anti-clockwise), 599 (clockwise) runs a gigantic loop around Brisbane's outer suburbs, and can be used to travel between suburbs without needing to go to the CBD first.
The 'CitySights' bus is a hop-on, hop-off service that loops around Brisbane's landmarks, including the popular Mt Coot-tha. Bus 471 also travels to the Mt Coo-tha botanical gardens and lookout. During matches at The Gabba or Suncorp Stadiums, often buses are provided free. During Christmas a special 'Christmas Lights' service operates (tickets must be pre-purchased), and many buses have tinsel or other decorations affixed internally. A free City Loop service operates in the CBD. After 9pm buses generally can set down anywhere, as long as it is safe to do so and the driver agrees.
The mass transit 'CityGlider' service began operation between Newstead from the Teneriffe ferry wharf through the CBD to West End on 11 April 2010. This service is a limited stops and prepaid only service, running every 5 minutes in peak hours and every 10–15 minutes outside of peak hours.[5]
The large Citytrain urban rail network consists of seven suburban lines and covers mostly the south-west, north, and outer east sides of the city. It also provides the route for the Airtrain service between the City and Brisbane Airport (the Airtrain route, itself, is owned by a private company). While Citytrain services also cover interurban services to both coasts, the southern part of the rail network does not pass through any major suburbs or districts.
On 24 March 2010, Queensland Premier Anna Bligh announced in Parliament that a new 19 km Cross River Rail tunnel connecting Salisbury to Wooloowin is under consideration.[6] The project has been delayed for two years due to the cost of rebuilding after the 2010-2011 Queensland floods.
CityFerry and CityCat are ferry services operated on the Brisbane River by TransdevTSL Brisbane Ferries, a joint venture of Brisbane City Council and French company, Transdev. CityCat uses catamarans, while the area covered by the CityFerry service differs in that it is smaller with stops spaced closer together, and is operated with 12 monohull ferries, varying slightly in appearance from one another.
Unusually, the CityCat's busiest day is actually Sunday. Many people and visitors use it as a very inexpensive way to sightsee.
Two cab companies operate in Brisbane: Yellow Cabs (whose vehicles are painted orange), and Black and White Cabs. Both companies offer same rate service (regulated by the government) and pick up passengers from anywhere in the metropolitan and regional areas of Brisbane via bookings or permanent cab ranks. As well as standard taxis, both provide Maxi-Taxis designed to fit up to 10 people, and also have disability access, as well as luxury vehicles (Silver Service for Yellow, Business Class for Black and White). All cabs now are also fitted with GPS tracking systems for driver location and EFTPOS debit/credit card facilities.
Brisbane's road system was planned around large, spacious suburban areas. Dense suburbs now rely on several main road corridors that split through and between these areas and provide the only link to the CBD and other areas of Brisbane. Logan Road, Moggill Road, Old Cleveland Road and Gympie Road are but a few of these multi-lane corridors that come out of the CBD and snake through the suburbs. As a result, traffic congestion has become a major problem and it was the promise of a new underground road system, nicknamed TransApex, that helped former Lord Mayor Campbell Newman win the 2004 local government election.
Bypasses such as the Inner City Bypass, Clem Jones Tunnel, and the future Airport Link are intended to help to circulate traffic away from the inner-city areas and main roads via limited-access roads above the ground, and tunnels below that have higher speed limits and exits to particular suburbs. Existing high speed cross-suburban motorways such as the Western Freeway, Centenary Freeway, Pacific Motorway and Gateway Motorway provide alternative routes to main roads and connect up to main highways and other arterial roads. Other tunnels are also being planned to link all the various motorways in Brisbane together as part of TransApex, but only two have been scheduled for completion within the next decade.
In total, the twisting Brisbane River is crossed by seven road bridges, a road tunnel, three railway bridges, three pedestrian bridges and a dedicated bus, cycle and pedestrian bridge. Route signage is achieved by means of a system of Metroads, consisting of the most important arterial roads in metropolitan Brisbane including most motorways, and less important State Routes. Multiple freeways connect Brisbane to other cities, including the Pacific Motorway, the Bruce Highway and the Ipswich Motorway, all of which are part of the National Highway System. Brisbane is approximately 1,000 km away from Sydney, the closest major capital city.
Brisbane Airport, owned by the Brisbane Airport Corporation Limited and located north-east of the city, is the biggest airport in Australia in terms of land size. Brisbane Airport is the third busiest airport in the country behind Sydney and Melbourne Airports respectively. Separated into domestic and international terminals, Brisbane Airport has frequent passenger and freight flights, providing direct flights to every capital city in Australia as well as most destinations in Asia, Oceania, and the Middle East. Virgin Australia, the second largest airline in Australia, is headquartered in Brisbane, while other major airlines Qantas and Jetstar Airways both fly from Brisbane Airport.
The Airtrain provides a link between the Domestic and International Terminals at Brisbane Airport and the city, taking approximately 20 minutes to travel from Central Station to the Airport stations.
Archerfield Airport, located in Brisbane's southern suburbs, caters to general aviation. Other local airports can be found at Caboolture and Redcliffe.
The Port of Brisbane is on the lower reaches of the Brisbane River and on Fisherman's Island at the river's mouth; it is the 3rd most important port in Australia for value of goods.[7] Container freight, sugar, grain, coal and bulk liquids are the major exports. Most of the port facilities are less than three decades old, and some are built on reclaimed mangroves and wetlands. Historically, Brisbane's port facilities were located as far upstream as the central business district.
The economic region near the river's mouth including the port, airport and refineries is known as the Australia TradeCoast.
Brisbane's population growth has seen great strains placed upon South East Queensland's transport system. The State Government and Brisbane City Council have responded with infrastructure plans and increased funding for transportation projects, such as the South East Queensland Infrastructure Plan and Program. Most of the focus has been placed on expanding current road infrastructure, particularly tunnels and bypasses, as well as improving the public transport system.