A three-stage plan for the return of Brisbane’s ferry services is now in place, beginning with the resumption of Bulimba-Teneriffe cross-river services followed by a temporary West End to Guyatt Park cross-river route by mid-April 2022.
According to the return plan, ferry services for Bulimba to Teneriffe cross-river route will be the first to get back online on 4 April 2022 then a new temporary West End-Guyatt Park route gets activated a week later.
The plan to put cross-river services gradually back into action involves some $20 million worth of repair work to the city’s ferry network.
Each of the 25 terminals across Brisbane has sustained some form of damage due to the recent flooding but some services will already be back online a month after the catastrophic event.
“As the clean-up continues and surveying work is undertaken to search for hidden debris and obstacles, we are prioritising the repair jobs for our ferry terminal network based on those which were least affected by the floods and are safe to work on,” Civic Cabinet Chair for Transport Councillor Ryan Murphy said.
“We are prioritising these two cross river routes based on the need to service these communities with public transport and the speed and ease at which we can make these terminals safe.”
“Cross river services like these usually use small monohull or KittyCat ferries but for the time being a larger CityCat will ferry more passengers back and forth.”
Whilst the restoration of the rest of the ferry network gets underway, an additional temporary ferry replacement bus will service the areas between Apollo Road and the City. The P233 Bus Service will operate from 6.30 am to 8 am and then again from 4 pm to 5.30 pm.
A temporary personalised public transport (PPT) service from Hamilton to Fortitude Valley will also be introduced. The free hail-and-ride service will be provided by Maxi-taxis “which will pick up and drop residents on a loop from Northshore Hamilton to Teneriffe via Bretts Wharf.”
The Hamilton to Fortitude Valley PPT timetable is as follows:
- Monday to Thursday from 5 pm to 10 pm hourly
- Friday from 5 pm to 11 pm every 20 minutes
- Saturday from 6 am to 2 pm hourly
- Saturday evening from 3 pm to 11 pm every 20 minutes
- Sunday from 6 am to 2 pm hourly
- Sunday evening from 3 pm to 10 pm every 20 minutes
Then, services covering the rest of the New Farm and Bulimba peninsulas will also return under stage two of the plan.
Lastly, Stage 3 will bring back the connecting services to the city at Riverside or Howard Smith Wharves; Southbank and Mowbray Park; and Bretts Wharf, Apollo Road and Northshore Hamilton.
“While this work and the repairs at other terminals will take some time, we are in a far better position than we were following the 2011 floods in which seven terminals were completely destroyed and took years to replace,” Cr Murphy said.
“These new terminals worked the way they were designed, which was to deflect heavy impacts from debris and have their gangways swing open when the water reaches significant speed.”