General News
7 August, 2023
Youth council advocate for improved public transport services for whole community
Young leaders from the shire have boarded the advocacy bus — with improved public transport services in the area their next destination. The Central Goldfields Youth Council is inviting residents to participate in a survey aimed at understanding...
Young leaders from the shire have boarded the advocacy bus — with improved public transport services in the area their next destination.
The Central Goldfields Youth Council is inviting residents to participate in a survey aimed at understanding the community’s experience of using buses and trains as part of their commute within and around the region.
Data collected from the survey will be used to create a public campaign pushing for better and increased transport availability.
Currently, there are limited public transport options that can be accessed by people — including two trains running daily from Maryborough to Melbourne alongside a small number of buses servicing local routes.
For deputy youth mayor and former Newstead resident Silas Knighton-Weire, this short supply of transportation has often resulted in missed chances.
“I’ve actually moved from a more rural area than Maryborough and I’ve seen a lot of opportunities open for me because I’ve no longer needed to rely on public transport,” he said.
“I didn’t run for any executive positions in the youth council last term because I felt that I couldn’t access extra meetings and public appearances because I was 20 kilometres out and could not get into town.
“There’s people I know that have had to cancel events or reschedule things because they can’t access the location as a result of inadequate transport — we do heavily rely on buses and trains.”
Since a lack of transport is prominent in the community, Silas and his fellow council members decided it was necessary to address them through the survey.
“We’ve created this survey to best find and investigate the needs of the community regarding public transport — bits that are good, bits that are bad and parts that are best to improve on,” Silas said.
“The youth council was sort of collating a lot of the problems that we face as youth and just the problems that we see within the community and public transport needs and demands were identified as one of three main areas that we feel that our actions could be best put towards.
“Through the survey we’re trying to collect data so that we can create a proposal to the local government or anyone we can find that has the power to enact those actions. And we feel that this survey is the first step towards really solidifying that and making it the force of change.”
Hoping to get a significant number of responses, Silas said it was crucial for everyone especially young people to take time out to fill the questionnaire.
“We’re trying to make our reach as wide as possible to get as much data as we can,” he said.
“It’s important that everyone advocates for it but particularly the youth because of how transport dependent we are because of a lack of independence.
“I was talking to a civil engineer at one point, and they put it really well into perspective that everyone loses the ability to drive at some point in their lives, even if that's temporary and so if we are in a situation where it’s not possible to get from place to place without using a car, then that is just limiting.”
On the same track of promoting participation from the local youth, council’s L2P and FReeZA coordinator Audrey Bartlett said it was important to know what the cohort’s transport requirements were.
“Young people in the shire need to support this survey and be a part of it,” she said.
“We need to know from a young person’s point of view, what they want and what type of transport is going to work for them — it may be more trains or more buses.
“Is it just our rural and remote young people or is it also our youth in town who are struggling to get around, we need to know.”
Ms Bartlett said the survey was one of its kind and urged the community to get behind it.
“The youth council are doing a fabulous job with this. There’s a good group of young people now supporting the council and they’re making the word go around so it’s a great effort,” she said.
“This survey is a first — it is actually finding out what people would like on a bigger scale and it’s a really good start.
“We need to hear from everyone otherwise if we don’t collect that feedback, we’ve got nothing to go to the local government about.”
To fill the online Public Transport in Central Goldfields Survey visit www.centralgoldfields.vic.gov.au/Community-Services/Youth/Public-Transport-Survey