Talk:Suburban bus routes in Sydney

Roll out of Suburban routes

The whole concept of suburban routes is based on a four year old 2013 plan which describes this concept. Since then there is no evidence that any routes have been rolled out. Until a reference can be produced that any routes have been rolled out it must be pointed out that at this point in time there is no known rollout and not give the idea that this whole concept is in place which it is not. Without such a not the article indicates that the whole concept is in place. There may even have been rollout without the name Suburban routes being used. This name may only have been used for planning purposes and may never be used at an operational level ie the name may have died before it even started. Fleet Lists (talk) 21:22, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

The SBF plan, which is government policy, describes then-existing routes as "suburban" and the tiered structure in the present tense. The terms rapid and suburban are not used for marketing purposes, if that's what you mean. If you have proof to the contrary, please share it. Mqst north (talk) 22:04, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

The plan was policy in 2013 but 4 years later there have been a lot of policy changes. The very fact that the route 530 was introduced at a 20 minute frequency instead of the Suburban define 15 minute frequency shows serious doubt on the fact that it is a Suburban route. I can ask you for proof that any routes are now Suburban routes I am sure that you can not provide such evidence. In fact I have checked all the routes and only route M90 meets the 15 minute weekday frequency requirement. Others are 970 -30, 450, 30, 270 - 30, 400 20 minutes between Burwood and Pagewood, 136 - 30, 525 - 30 and 418 -30. So there is now way that the Suburban route concept has been implemented on all these routes ( and I doubt that they ever will).Fleet Lists (talk) 01:31, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

You're getting into the realm of OR if you're poring over timetables to 'prove' that the policy has been abandoned. Perhaps the Government is walking back from SBF – but you need references before you can put it in an encyclopaedia. Mqst north (talk) 02:38, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

I am not trying to prove that the policy has been abandoned but that very little of it has been implemented. You mentioned that references are needed to prove that but similarly you need references to prove that it has been or is being implemented - what is good for the goose is good for the gander.Fleet Lists (talk) 02:57, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

Articles should reflect what actually has happened or based on firm commitments given, is reasonably likely to happen. With these discussion papers, governments usually cherry pick a few ideas and ignore the rest, rarely are they adopted in full. Much like with railway lines, there have been dozens of proposals in the last 100 years, yet very few ever proceed past this stage and even fewer come to fruition. So building articles based on these becomes WP:CRYSTAL.

Problem with this and other similar articles on Sydney bus routes is that they are built on loosely defined terms, we have Local bus routes in Sydney, Rapid bus routes in Sydney and Suburban bus routes in Sydney, and now its becoming further confused by being broken out into regions, Local bus routes in northern Sydney, Local bus routes in south-eastern Sydney etc. It would be better off in one Bus routes in Sydney article which appears was the case until 21 months ago. That article seems to have always been a bit of a mess, but splitting it out into multiple articles with a fair bit of duplication, is just spreading the problems. Turingway (talk) 07:49, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

In fact with the Transport 2056 proposal it has already been suggested to me that even if the Suburban routes concept is maintained, the routes to be included will be different and even the criteria may change hence the 530 route being at 20 minutes and not 15 minutes - I have this on good authority but can not use the discussion as an official Wiki reference. I also agree that the splitting into various sections of Sydney for local routes is not very satisfactory which will become even more complicated when Region 6 which currently links direct to the STA with other STA regions, is privatised in the middle of 2018 but again this should not be documented as such until it actually happens as it is another thing that can change until the last minute.Fleet Lists (talk) 08:04, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

The other problem with those four pages is that they are supposed to provide "Local Route" information but they supply no such information - they are basically histories of the operators within the regions which can already be found in the pages for the operators concerned - unnecessary duplication.And in some cases they list Metrobus routes which are supposed to be non local routes. Fleet Lists (talk) 22:08, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

The former Metrobus routes don’t all fit into a single tier. And whatever your inside information and personal observations, all we have to go on here is published sources. If you want to weigh in on which promises and plans you think the government will stick to, this is not the forum.

As to your complaint about splitting out the local route articles, I did this to address your earlier (and very reasonable) feedback on the length and structure.

Ultimately, the purpose of these pages is not to provide endless lists of numbers, suburbs and stops as though to an intending passenger, but to explain the how and the why of the network’s design to a lay audience. Leave the trip planning to transportnsw.info. Mqst north (talk) 04:42, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

I totally agree with the removal of the long list of routes but the titles of the pages still say that they are "Lists of Local Routes" which they are not - they are descriptions of the regions with a lot of just duplicate information from the operator websites. And I never complained about the size - if anything that it was too small - certainly not too big. One page to cover all regions with a suitable title to that effect would be much better.Fleet Lists (talk) 05:58, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

The whole thing does seem confusing, and failing its intended purpose based on comments expressed by lay (I presume) editors here. Aside from the problems of large sections being uncited or relying on WP:OR cites (which seemingly has been a long standing problem), the restructure of article appears to be based on a planning model and an arbitrary grouping into regions. Really the 6 articles (local x 4, rapid, suburban) should be wrapped back into one Bus routes in Sydney article rather than the fragmented form it has been turned into. The histories of the operators should be covered on the operator pages (as it already is) and the bus routes article focus primarily on the routes rather than be fleshed out with duplicated text and crystal balling on what may happen in the future. Turingway (talk) 05:21, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Unfortunately or fortunately the editor who caused these problems has not posted in this area for some months now. I envy someone trying to sort all this out. I would love to but do not have the time at the moment.Fleet Lists (talk) 11:00, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

I have had a bit of spare time this weekend and at least I have combined the three pages which regionalised the Sydney local bus routes, back into one page. I am not sure what to with the Suburban and Rapid pages as I very much doubt that the concept will ever see the light of day as far as the public is concerned, after 5 years of no more information about these concepts. I am adding notes about this to the two pages concerned. Perhaps we should review the situation in about six months time to see if there are any further developments.Fleet Lists (talk) 00:18, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Over the past few weeks I have changed the emphasis of both the rapid and suburban routes articles to the fact that basically, except for the B1 implementation, all this is just unimplemented planning. Tonight I came across a reference which confirms all this - it has been added to both articles Fleet Lists (talk) 10:01, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Turingway Gareth PhilipTerryGraham Marcnut1996 Ponyo98

Also see discussion in Talk:Rapid_bus_routes_in_Sydney some time ago. Since returning to Wiki some months ago I have been concentrating on two other projects one if which is complete and the other is nearing completion which hopefully will give me time to clean up this what I call a mess. I am proposing to bypass this article with a redirect to Bus routes in Sydney as after five years there is not a single route which can be identified as having been implemented as a Suburban Route, and the plans as documented are totally out of date. Rapid_bus_routes_in_Sydney is in much the same situation with only two routes now identified as Rapid Transit - both of which have their own article which can be referenced direct from Bus routes in Sydney and planning documented is totally out of date. Local_bus_routes_in_Sydney contains information which belongs in the the relevant operator page or again mentions which routes will be Suburban which is totally put of date. I can not see any need for this page as Transport for NSW no longer makes any mention of Local routes. Hence I propose that all three articles be redirected and could be resurrected at some future date if more information comes to hand. Any comments in the next week would be wecome so that I can proceed with this after 8th July.Fleet Lists (talk) 07:00, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Agree, the restucturing last December was flawed from the beginning, articles shouldn't be built around loosely defined definitions in an outdated government proposal Turingway (talk) 02:50, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

Turingway Gareth PhilipTerryGraham Marcnut1996 Ponyo98

Buses in Sydney was changed a couple of days ago to no longer link to the three pages recommended for redirect and link direct to such pages as Metrobus (Sydney) etc. Today the three pages have been redirected and removed from the Sydney Public Transport template. Over the next few days I will continue to go through other articles to see what other links need to be changed to bring the whole thing totally into line. Any changes by other editors to further improve the situation are welcome.Fleet Lists (talk) 00:14, 11 July 2018 (UTC)