We have Voles - Brisbane's tunnels

Ok, I've accepted that we're getting a tunnel under the river - I'm never going through it, but it'll be there. But some of the other parts of the TransApex plan are a little odd, at least as I understand it.

TransApex is a proposed network of five tolled road tunnels, including three river crossings, linking inner-suburbs of Brisbane. If you check out this pdf and scroll through to the appendix's there is a map of the proposed works. Basically there is more stuff to get people to the airport, a tunnel under the Storey Bridge, a tunnel from Dutton park to St Lucia and a bridge from West End/South Brisbane to Hale Street/Milton Road across Corro Drive.

The argument for the project is that by 2016, Brisbane will 450,000 more people leading to 40% increase in vehicle travel and a 400% increase in congestion delay. The current statistic is that 43% of traffic in the CBD is through traffic and most jobs are located in the CBD & Urban Fringe. The plan is that the council will pay 4bn, the state and feds will contribute 1bn and we'll pay 3bn through user pays. In the Courier Mail, 18/3/5, an article ran (with a great map) stating that the project faces a 1.2 bn blowout and that the bridge between West End and Hale St will probably be dropped, and this is before any work is even done.

The bit that is going to go through first is the North South Bypass Tunnel and it does make some sense. It's just that I have some issues with the base assumptions at the heart of all this - there is no questioning in the first place of the necessity of growth in Queensland, either at Federal or local level. It's like we have no choice and yet it's the current gov'ts that are approving the developments of more and more town houses in the inner city and development projects in the burbs. And that basic assumption has impacts on everything from water consumption and electricity (which affects our climate) through to public transport and schooling. I get that. I also see that these decisions seem to not even be on the agenda for discussion in the first place.

It also seems to be focussed on getting people into the city - now most of these people only work there. It's rush in and then rush out. This is fine and good - we're supposed to have lives outside of our worklife. But it also means that we could find public transport solutions that would bring the people to where they need to be. Now I want a free service between the valley and southbank via the city. And we could have better park and ride services with reinstatement of the buslanes but the assumption, again is that growth is good and that we must each and everyone of us have a car, or two.

I had a scout around for links to people who are discussing this, but as with most of the government proposals there is little actual community involvement in the discussion - yes business, no community. If anyone can point me towards any groups working on these issues, I'd love to link them here.

For more information on the Council's plans go here.

St Patrick's Day

Just a quick note on St Patrick's Day. It's my SO's b-day and so we usually spend it running around town shopping as he refuses to work, a very sensible and Australian attitude.

We ended up meeting up with some friends and family for dinner but before we went to the Pancake Manor. And during this time we got to watch the crowds of people doing the irish pub circuit in the inner city. I can think of three, but i'm showing my age when I refer to them as the Treasury(which it's definitely not called), O'Malleys and Gilhooleys and I think there's another.

One of the things that's interesting to watch is the way that everyone bonds over their mutual pissup and celebration of Irish-ness. People who would never talk to each other at any other time of the year are friendly and helpful and joyous. One lass was trying to find a pub and asked a crowd of fellow green and orange wearers which way and ended up joining their crew at least past where we were.

Australia does have a lot of Irish immigrants and ex-convict families - it's part of our heritage makeup and in Brisbane an area of the Valley is sign posted in Gaelic. But most of us have never been there, have only distant roots and are only Irish on St Patrick's day, a pissup.

My favourite thing was the Guiness hats this year because in practicality one of the things about St Paddy's is it's a great marketting opportunity. Guiness produced these fantastic akubra styled hats with little corks made out of plastic Guinness pots. I really wanted to get a picture (or one, without having to do all the drinking and probable buying of multiple pots of guinness) because i think it's a great meld of commercialism and nationalism that only works in a post modern way. (See I'm a cynic with a sense of humour)

Btw all at dinner had a good time, and it seemed to be a pretty low key night out from what we could see of the pubcrawls.

Schools back...

It's cooled down a little bit and I'm settling into Uni life a bit more. I've been puzzling over something to write about for the last week or so because there aren't any major events happening except, well, St Patrick's Day and Easter coming up.

I guess the main thing that happens in early March is the change from summer holidays with students running around town to the school/uni year.

School starts back at the end of January although depending on which grade your in you'll get between 6-8 weeks holidays starting in Nov-Dec. Year 12 finishes in November and is followed, usually, by Schoolies down at the Gold Coast. Uni starts back at the last week of February with O-week and classes in the first week of March (of course all of this is approx and changes year to year).

The patterns in the city change, though, with public transport and the amount of people running around the city changing. Once school starts back the public transport gets a bit more populated between 7:30-8 although it's a bit spread out. In the afternoons, however, there are spots where you can't even get to the bus or train - Mater Hill bus stop is just filled with private school students (I never did know the name of the school just up on the hill - but boys private) and State High. The platform at Coorparoo Station (where I went to school many years ago) was always filled with the amalgam of Coorparoo, Cav Rd, Churchie and Villanova and there were fights all the time. Coorparoo has gotten more classy since then so I'm not sure it still happens. So there's a lot of energy and movement around 3-4 and then it's all quite again waiting for the coming home crowd.

Interestingly I've noticed that bus drivers seem to hate high school students, particularly boys. They get harrassed about their tickets being exactly right, to give seats up for adults and all the other social codes and it's usually the drivers that seem to have something to say. Even though I'm paying a half fare, with a ticket that I just flash at the driver (and sometimes I have used the wrong one from my purse), I'm never harrassed about my fare or about getting out of my seat... socialisation and dominant power plays at work.

During the summer there are young people wandering around the inner city all over the place. The energy at Christmas is kinda odd with lots of shoppers and the like. When people return to school/uni it's mostly just the workers and the odd students so the whole purpose of the city seems to shift. It was all fun and pleasure and shopping but during the day, during the academic year, most of the purpose is work or passing through. Mind you the weekend is a different playground all together with people out drinking and socialising till all hours all year round.

I'm kinda interested to know if anyone else notices these kinds of shifts - are there any other times of the year? or changes in the use/population patterns because of different purposes?
I think that the way that people use a space actually contributes to the energy of the place and that these are as cyclic as the seasons. When I've got some time I'm going to try and do some research on space and place and link to some of the ideas and articles about the way people live in a city.