Canberra has long been sold as a "20-minute city", with daily commutes generally free of the traffic jams and tolls seen in other Australian capitals. But as the ACT's population and suburban sprawl has grown, so too has the pressure on transport infrastructure. Approaches to transport policy have become a key point of difference between the major parties in the coming ACT election. So will more buses, light rail routes or roads really make a difference?
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00:00Electric vehicle owner York Stanham reckons getting the bus from his home in Belconnen
00:07to his office in Fishwick takes far too long.
00:10I can get to work much quicker driving.
00:13To put that to the test, I took the same journey by bus.
00:18He starts work at 8am, so I needed to leave a lot earlier.
00:23While I was waiting for the bus, at home, York is starting his day.
00:30The first bus arrived while York's making his breakfast.
00:33The bus was bound for the Belconnen town centre.
00:36There I had to change buses.
00:43I was inside the Parliamentary Triangle around the time York starts his journey to work.
00:49Traffic isn't too bad at this time of the morning.
00:52My bus ride ends on Canberra Avenue, and then I had to walk for around a kilometre
00:57to get to York's office, and I was still walking as he arrives.
01:04The bus ride was pretty relaxed.
01:06I only had to change one time, but there was a pretty long walk at the end of it, and obviously
01:10it took a lot longer.
01:11But it's not just the time that it takes that has many Canberrans second-guessing using
01:16public transport.
01:17You can't leave the office easily during the day.
01:20If I had something on after work, an appointment somewhere, if I had to get the bus there and
01:24then get the bus home afterwards, you're looking to get home at 7, 8pm.
01:29Public transport proponents point to lower costs and a healthier lifestyle, not to mention
01:34the reduced environmental impact.
01:37But the ACT is the leading Australian jurisdiction for uptake of electric vehicles.
01:42And for the near future, the car is expected to remain king.
01:47Many of the trips that occur on our roads are for business purposes, there's people
01:50delivering goods and services, and therefore they need a car, and families rely on their
01:56car to get kids to school and home, to do the shopping.
01:59Sawmore rose the solution to speeding up and simplifying journeys.
02:04Economists who've studied the road system in the United States say no.
02:09Research has found duplicating or building new roads just creates new drivers, and congestion
02:15remains unchanged.
02:16And we saw that when you added highways, then in pretty short order you saw the increase
02:21in traffic.
02:22And this has already happened in Canberra.
02:24Several major Gungahlin roads have been duplicated in the past few years, but many drivers say
02:30getting in or out of their suburbs can be a major headache.
02:34During peak hour is pretty locked down, yeah, it's pretty hard, it adds about 20 minutes
02:40to my commute.
02:41Roads are not wide enough, the traffic doesn't flow, it's horrendous.
02:45It doesn't bother me, I've been in other cities where the traffic is much worse.
02:51Public transport is often spruced as a congestion buster.
02:54The Climate Council says just over 3% of journeys in Canberra are by shared transport like buses,
03:01the lowest rate of any capital city in the country.
03:04If elected, the ACT's major parties are all promising more buses to provide more frequent
03:10services.
03:11With Labor and the Greens also committed to extending light rail to Woden, a route liberals
03:16say will be too costly and result in a slower journey.
03:21Professor Turner says the US study found additional public transport has the same impact on congestion
03:28as building more roads.
03:29If you take some people off the roads to ride bus rapid transit or a light rail system,
03:36that's just like freeing up capacity and so you expect the same sort of response.
03:41Professor Turner says the only proven solution to congestion is charging congestion fees
03:46for people to drive in certain areas of cities.
03:49But reducing the need for travel in the first place by providing office space and services
03:54in suburban areas is another option to ease or eliminate daily commutes.
04:00We estimated that if you double the density that people live and work at, you decrease
04:05the amount that each person drives by about a twelfth.
04:08But you pack twice as many people in each space so you have a lot more travel going
04:12on in those little spaces.
04:15Transport policies intrinsically linked to planning when considering the future of getting
04:19around the city.