Let public on school buses

Paul Sellars of The Weekly Times reported on August 10 that a Victorian Governmnet study of transport options for country residents has found that using the "spare capacity" of the state's school buses could expand public transport options.

Outside of the urban area of Wangaratta, there is no public transport. With the Upper King Valley more than 50 kilometres from town, this is a real problem. There is a community bus that travels to Wangaratta every second Friday but that could hardly be classified as public transport.

Parliamentary Secretary for transport, Carlo carli said one of the aims of the study was to, "confront the reality that we have small and ageing communities and if people don't have transport, they can become very isolated."

Wouldn't it be great for our ageing population to be able to use the buses to visit a doctor when they needed one rather than have to rely on a visiting medico once a week as they have to now. They could even have a choice of doctors - something that has been denied them in the past.

Wouldn't it be nice for visitors and backpackers to be able to use public transport to get beyond Wangaratta or Benalla. The vineyard industry would welcome the extra seasonal workers that such a system would deliver.

The report suggests these buses could also be used during the 'down time' between school runs. This could open the potential for a daily circuit between Wangaratta, Whitfield, Mansfield and Benalla. The people of Mansfield have no public transport to Benalla or Wangaratta either.

Giving these rural communities the options of doing business in neighbouring major towns should be looked at by the economic development groups in the rural cities of Benalla and Wangaratta.

Victorian Community Transport Association chairman Philip Whiting suggested parents might be concerned about their children's safety. In small communities, most of the adult passengers would be known and respected members of the community. The occasional outsider would be obvious and should present no management concerns.

I suggest you Contact Bill Sykes and ask him to take this initiative on board.