PoweredByCNG wrote:I should add that Perth has several factors that negatively influence public transport use.
1. The cost of registering a vehicle is lower in Western Australia when compared to other states.
2. The lower density outside of the Perth CBD means that parking is generally not considered to be a problem.
3. The lower traffic density, particularly further away from the Perth CBD, combined with limited bus priority measures means that public transport transit times are often not competitive with private car transit times, unless a significant portion of the trip is on a train service.
4. The lack of toll roads means that long-distance travel by public transport is not seen as price-competitive, especially if the travel is required during peak periods.
5. The set zone boundaries means that in some cases, the price of short distance travel is not competitive.
I would add:
6. The nation's highest car ownership rates (and incomes). There aren't huge low income non-car owning populations like you have in Sydney or Melbourne. Even 1 car households are rarer.
7. A predominantly post-1960s urban form (based on drive-in shopping centres, limited access roads and curved local streets that make pedestrian permeability poor and direct bus routes difficult). Reurbanisation of old inner suburbs has been less than eastern states cities and autopia starts only a few kilometres from the CBD.
8. A mismatch between transport hubs and activity hubs (the railway stations with the best transport access rarely have activity at them, particularly on the newer lines. While there are attempts at development around stations the outcome isn't as good as in older centres in Sydney or Melbourne. If you want to choose a car-free lifestyle, there are many suburbs in Melbourne or Sydney that would be adequate (due to historic development around transport). Whereas in Perth you need to choose between being able to walk to the train, beach or shops and can rarely get all three. Perth doesn't have much of Sydney, Melbourne or even Adelaide's low-car inner city living culture. But it has improved service to the traces that exist (Beaufort St, Vic Park etc) with the roll out of 900-series bus routes in the inner 10km ring (although night services aren't yet quite as good as trams in Melbourne or buses in Sydney or Brisbane).
9. Jobs that apart from the CBD are located in 'transport deserts' with free parking (eg Balcatta, Osborne Park, Malaga, etc). Ditto for shopping where stand-alone shopping centres surrounded by parking are dominant and have largely replaced strip centres which outside a few inner suburbs are closed, struggling or non-existent. Except for CBD commutes, the typical work trip by public transport is likely to be bus + train + bus which is uncompetitive with free parking. Transperth has countered by improving services to those suburban job concentrations that public transport may have a hope - eg the bigger suburban universities and hospitals like Curtin, Murdoch, QEII, UWA.
Generally speaking the factors that increase public transport usage in Perth are due to internal factors (eg good infrastructure and service planning and operation) whereas those that depress it are external factors to do with the city's development patterns.
In a nutshell, Perth has a good public transport system in a bad city for it. Whereas some other places have a city better than the public transport in it.