Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

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triplethree
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Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by triplethree »

Not sure if this has ever been asked before, I searched it but couldn't find it ... but I'm curious as to, what is the longest journey one can take in Australia solely by public route bus services?

My guess is Noosa QLD to Macksville NSW, using the following services:

630 Noosa to Nambour (Sunbus)
649 Nambour to Caboolture (Kangaroo Bus Lines)
660 Nambour to Rothwell (Kangaroo Bus Lines)
680 Rothwell to Chermside (Hornibrook Bus Lines)
77 Chermside to Eight Mile Plains (Brisbane Transport)
555 Eight Mile Plains to Logan Hyperdome (Logan City Bus Service)
553 Logan Hyperdome to Beenleigh (Logan City Bus Service)
567 Beenleigh to Ormeau (Surfside Buslines)
727 Ormeau to Helensvale (Surfside Buslines)
715 Helensvale to Southport (Surfside Buslines)
700 Southport to Tweed Heads (Surfside Buslines)
605 Tweed Heads to Murwillumbah (Surfside Buslines)
630 Murwillumbah to Lismore (Gosel's Bus Service)
690/695 Lismore to Grafton (Northern Rivers Buslines)
1 Grafton to Coffs Harbour (Ryan's Bus Service)
360M Coffs Harbour to Macksville (Busways)

The driving distance by the most direct route is 588km. Of course, the bus journey would be somewhat longer. I've calculated that it would take at least three days, assuming you get all your connections right!

Unfortunately you can't make it all the way to Sydney; there appear to be gaps between Macksville and Kempsey; Smiths Lake and Raymond Terrace; and Kariong to Mooney Mooney.

Any other contenders?
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Mitch »

Geelong (VIC) to Adelaide (SA) via Ballarat and Horsham is (driving distance) 708km. All routes are V/line coaches operated by various companies.

Route is as follows:
1. Geelong to Bendigo via Ballarat (1h35m journey)
2. Ballarat to Horsham (2h35m journey)
3. Horsham to Adelaide. (5h55m journey)

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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by triplethree »

Thanks Mitch, but I did specify "route buses". You're talking about coaches (e.g. you must reserve your ticket in advance; luggage space is available; on-board facilities such as toilets and movies; seat belts are provided; etc.)

If we're going to talk about the longest possible coach journey, you're looking at something like:

Cooktown - Cairns (Country Road Coaches)
Cairns - Townsville (Greyhound)
Townsville - Three Ways (Greyhound)
Three Ways - Katherine (Greyhound)
Katherine - Broome (Greyhound)
Broome - Perth (Greyhound)
Perth - Augusta (Transwa)

The direct driving distance between Cooktown and Augusta is 5,790km. Now THAT would be an adventure! :)
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by boronia »

If you use the original criteria of multiple services and operators, you can go right around the continent on coaches.
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by 08 XDi »

I looked at this same arrangement myself some time back. You can actually go further by starting at Cooran on the 632 and changing somewhere in Noosa.

The Rainbow Beach service Polleys run would be a nice starting point but there is no connection between Gympie and Cooran except by rail.

If you include ferries you can get around the Mooney Mooney issue by going from Ettalong to Palm Beach.
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by PaxInfo »

boronia wrote:If you use the original criteria of multiple services and operators, you can go right around the continent on coaches.
Though since the Greyhound service between Adelaide and Perth ceased a few years back, I don't think there's now any scheduled bus public transport across the Nullarbor (except for tours).
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by howlerbus »

You could also do a journey Cairns-Townsville-Three Ways-Alice Springs-Adelaide-Melbourne-Sydney-Brisbane-Cairns with Greyhound...
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Newcastle Flyer »

PaxInfo wrote:Though since the Greyhound service between Adelaide and Perth ceased a few years back, I don't think there's now any scheduled bus public transport across the Nullarbor (except for tours).
You can still use the Indian Pacific as a train, even though it's really now marketed as a tourist type train.

Longest route buses: Not sure, but I think their is a long route run somewhere east of Kempsey or Pt. Macquarie.

And also would you count bus routes that are through routes, but change route numbers, and operate as a separate route?
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Free Lance »

East of Port Macquarie, would that be some kind of FLOATING bus??
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Newcastle Flyer »

Oops, I mean west of said cities/towns :oops:
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Albatross »

triplethree wrote:Not sure if this has ever been asked before, I searched it but couldn't find it ... but I'm curious as to, what is the longest journey one can take in Australia solely by public route bus services?

My guess is Noosa QLD to Macksville NSW, using the following services:

630 Noosa to Nambour (Sunbus)
649 Nambour to Caboolture (Kangaroo Bus Lines)
660 Nambour to Rothwell (Kangaroo Bus Lines)
680 Rothwell to Chermside (Hornibrook Bus Lines)
77 Chermside to Eight Mile Plains (Brisbane Transport)
555 Eight Mile Plains to Logan Hyperdome (Logan City Bus Service)
553 Logan Hyperdome to Beenleigh (Logan City Bus Service)
567 Beenleigh to Ormeau (Surfside Buslines)
727 Ormeau to Helensvale (Surfside Buslines)
715 Helensvale to Southport (Surfside Buslines)
700 Southport to Tweed Heads (Surfside Buslines)
605 Tweed Heads to Murwillumbah (Surfside Buslines)
630 Murwillumbah to Lismore (Gosel's Bus Service)
690/695 Lismore to Grafton (Northern Rivers Buslines)
1 Grafton to Coffs Harbour (Ryan's Bus Service)
360M Coffs Harbour to Macksville (Busways)

The driving distance by the most direct route is 588km. Of course, the bus journey would be somewhat longer. I've calculated that it would take at least three days, assuming you get all your connections right!

Unfortunately you can't make it all the way to Sydney; there appear to be gaps between Macksville and Kempsey; Smiths Lake and Raymond Terrace; and Kariong to Mooney Mooney.

Any other contenders?
I believe it's also possible to travel from Murwillumbah to Lismore via Byron Bay and Ballina, this would probably add another day to the journey though.

There possibly could be a school bus that travels from Macksville to Kempsey, even if there is no scheduled route service. I would be suprised if there was nothing at all in the area. It might involve changing buses at a bus shelter midway between the two towns-possibly after an overnight wait at said shelter.

Smiths Lake to Raymond Terrace is sort of serviced, Busways operate a coach service between the two locations. Although it does have booked seats I do believe you can just rock up and get on, paying your fare to the driver. I would cheat and count it as a "bus service" for the purpose of this exercise given it also does have a route number etc.

As noted, the ferry to Palm Beach-again, it's scheduled non rail surface public transport and the L90 bus would get you to Sydney itself, from there if you wanted to keep going I would catch a M52 bus to Parramatta, T80 to Liverpool, I forget the number of the bus from Liverpool to Campbelltown, and from Campbelltown there is a bus onto Wollongong.

From Wollongong I believe it's possible to get a bus to Dapto. Not sure about how much further beyond this you can go.

In doing this journey I believe you'd use 4 separate ticketing systems. Go Card, the old ticketing system in regional areas of NSW and MyZone from Newcastle onwards, not counting the ferry which I beleive is a separate ticket
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Geoff »

I have done more research on this and found, by looking at company websites, the following:

School Bus - Macksville to Stuarts Point (Cavanagh's BS)
School Bus - Stuarts Point to Kempsey (Cavanagh's BS)
340 Kempsey to Port Macquarie (Busways)
334 Port Macquarie to Kendall (Busways)
317 Kendall to Taree (Eggins BS)
310 Taree to Forster (Eggins BS)
150/151 Forster to Broadmeadow (Busways)
226/349 Broadmeadow to Charlstown (STA)
99 Charlestown to Lake Haven (Busways)
81 Lake Haven to Tuggerah (Busways)
36/37 Lake Haven to Gosford (Busways)
55 Gosford to Woy Woy (Busways)
54 Woy Woy to Patonga (Busways)

Then you catch the ferry. I cannot find any bus service south from the Gosford area till you get to Berowra.

Please note the above may not be totally accurate - all information was taken from the companies web sites without local knowledge.

Geoff.
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Tonymercury »

Actually Brooklyn rather than Berowra
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by captainch »

there is a bus from hawkesbury river station goes to hornsby limited servive,,,,,,,,,,,,,theres no bus from patonga to hawksbury river thats the missing link! then metro bus to parra then m52 parra to sydney
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Albatross »

So you can travel from Brisbane to Sydney, entirely on scheduled surface non rail public transport...

Can we keep this going... see if it's possible to get to Melbourne? Adelaide? Does the Spirit of Tasmania count as a ferry?
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by snoopy77 »

do suburban type buses count.I am from Adelaide and I could say 721 if combined with a 224 or 228 from Noarlunga to Elizabeth or Smithfield via the City.
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Fleet Lists »

That would be negligible in length compared with some of the country trips mentioned above.
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Fleet Lists »

Albatross wrote:So you can travel from Brisbane to Sydney, entirely on scheduled surface non rail public transport...

?
Yes you can by coach but not by bus - as there is a gap between Brooklyn and somewhere south of Woy Woy,
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by hornetfig »

Geoff wrote:I have done more research on this and found, by looking at company websites, the following:
but how many days would it take you? (plus the whole "it needs to be a school day" thing)
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Albatross »

Fleet Lists wrote:
Albatross wrote:So you can travel from Brisbane to Sydney, entirely on scheduled surface non rail public transport...

?
Yes you can by coach but not by bus - as there is a gap between Brooklyn and somewhere south of Woy Woy,
If you count the ferry to Palm Beach though, you can-I worded it as "scheduled surface non rail public transport" to cover that.

As for the distances involved, at least 1 leg that I can think of-Lismore to Grafton is about 140 km and over 2 hours. I can't think of any metro area route that even comes close in distance, let alone time.
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by howlerbus »

Can you count rail replacement buses? Then you can go further and fill in the missing links.
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by BestFriendHasLeprosy »

I've always wanted to do a trip from Brisbane to Sydney via just public transport buses. I tried working it out before, but you guys have gotten further than me.

Btw, get a 565 from the Hyperdome to Beenleigh - not a 553.
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Off The Rails »

Route 909 in Perth is around 90kms long and takes 2 hours.

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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Mr OC Benz »

I think you've got your figures wrong, it's 72km and an all stops will take longer than that during the day. Hence why a full line replacement is rare.

But the thread is aimed at longest journey by route bus, not longest route in one bus/journey.
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Re: Longest journey in Australia by route bus?

Post by Doc68 »

PaxInfo wrote:Though since the Greyhound service between Adelaide and Perth ceased a few years back, I don't think there's now any scheduled bus public transport across the Nullarbor (except for tours).
Heres a business opportunity Anyone know (roughly) how many ex Sydney Leopards I would need to operate this service on an hourly frequency ??? Sorry bit off topic
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