With the University of Tasmania’s move into Hobart’s city centre and Launceston’s Inveresk campus, questions have been raised about what this will mean for traffic congestion in the two cities.
The suburban Sandy Bay campus and Newnham campus see a lot of staff and students driving to get to class.
But new survey results from the university indicate that it is a very different story for the inner-city campuses, which show little impact on traffic congestion and positive increases in active and public transport.
To gauge the success of the university’s two successive five-year sustainable transport strategies (2012–2016 and 2017–2021), travel behaviour surveys of staff and students at its Burnie, Launceston, Hobart and Sydney campuses have been undertaken every two years since 2013, with the 2019 results just released.
Some 10,500 students and 4000 staff have participated in the four surveys.
The good news is that “active transport” has been increasing over the survey periods, although there has been little increase in bike riding, with increased bus use accounting for most of the trend.
Increased use of public transport has been significant due to collaboration between the university and Metro Tasmania to install bus shelters at all university stops across the state, and the implemention of high frequency services and more services direct to campuses rather than having to change buses in the city.
Percentage of students riding a bike
|
|
Total |
Hobart city |
Sandy Bay |
Newnham |
Inveresk |
|
2013 |
6.3% |
5.9% |
6.7% |
6.4% |
22.2% |
|
2015 |
5.5% |
8.4% |
4.9% |
3.6% |
9.9% |
|
2017 |
5.3% |
9.7% |
4.3% |
3.3% |
4.8% |
|
2019 |
5.8% |
7.7% |
5% |
4.7% |
13% |
Students were more enthusiastic adopters of active transport, with staff travel behaviour more likely to reflect the general population, except in the Hobart city centre campuses.
The Hobart city centre campuses were leading the way in Tasmania with 70% of students walking, riding or catching the bus.
There has been little increase in the percentage of students riding over the years, however, there are some pockets of hope with city campuses seeing higher rates than the suburban campuses.
The Hobart city centre campuses have a higher ridership rate at 7.7% and the Inveresk campus had a whopping 13% of students riding.
Staff riding rates are also better for the Hobart city centre campuses than others, with 14.5% riding compared to 6.8% to Sandy Bay and 2.5% in the northern campuses.
Percentage of staff riding a bike
|
|
Total |
Hobart city |
Sandy Bay |
Nth campuses |
|
2013 |
8.1% |
14.2% |
7.1% |
6.8% |
|
2015 |
8.9% |
13.3% |
7.9% |
7.9% |
|
2017 |
11.2% |
14.4% |
10.2% |
10.3% |
|
2019 |
7.5% |
14.5% |
6.8% |
2.5% |
The university’s Sustainability Manager, Corey Peterson, said the high city centre ridership rates for staff reflected the high quality end-of-trip facilities in the university’s city buildings, safer bike routes into the Hobart CBD and the expense and availability of parking.
However, in the past few years the northern campuses have suffered more from thefts which can deter some people from riding, although the university has provided bicycle parking cages and/or lockers at Inveresk and Newnham for an extra layer of security.
Electric bicycles may also be contributing to higher southern ridership, with 17% of staff riding electric bicycles, nearly all of them in the Hobart campuses.
Overall, the percentage of women riding has increased in both the student and staff groups, with women accounting for nearly half of the Hobart city centre riders. For the university’s total ridership it has gone from one female rider to four male riders in 2013 to one female rider to one-and-a-half male riders in 2019.
A general rule of thumb with riding numbers and gender splits is that more women riding often demonstrates better quality infrastructure on routes leading to the destination. The city centre campuses can easily be reached by the separated Intercity Cycleway and Collins Street links the separated Hobart Rivulet Path to the campuses.
Mr Peterson said the university was getting to the limit of what it could provide on campuses to encourage riders and that better infrastructure needed to be built to provide more comfortable, separated routes both to and within the city centres.
