SCATTERING BUS STOPS? WE KNOW IT DOESN’T WORK

IN regards to the story “New calls to move troubled bus stop” (GA 30/9) Mr Votsaris seems to overlook the fact that having bus stops scattered throughout the Geelong CBD has been tried before without any success.

In fact, there was a substantial drop in people coming to the Geelong CBD by bus during this period, which would have negatively impacted on business in the Geelong CBD.

That is apart from the inconvenience to passengers being dropped at locations that were not centrally located, e.g. in Little Malop St behind the Officeworks building, and having to traverse several city blocks by foot to access a connecting service. This would be difficult enough for a relatively fit and active person, but for those with disabilities or the elderly and infirm it would be an insurmountable barrier.

The best solution would be to have individual bus stops for routes spread along Moorabool St similar to other bus interchanges at Chadstone, Oakleigh and Box Hill, rather than the current “one bus stop will service all routes” solution.

With more frequent services this would possibly encourage more people out of their cars and on to public transport, which would go a long way to solving Geelong CBD’s traffic congestion issues and parking problems.

Security measures such as CCTV cameras and the regular ongoing presence of the police and PSOs would go a long way to improving the public perception of the Interchange as a safe place to use. Gini McLellan, Norlane