Is Tim Nicholls Out of Touch?

Tim Nicholls MP - Out of Touch?

BrizCommuter was recently delighted to see the LNP Brisbane City Council refining the Brisbane Metro design to something more sensible - Bus Rapid Transit. It was also good news, that Lord Mayor Graham Quirk, and Deputy Mayor Adrian Schrinner have been quoted as finally supporting Cross River Rail, which the Brisbane Metro will connect with and complement. The LNP Federal Government have also recently stated (whilst playing tit-for-tat politics) that Cross River Rail needed to have better integration between Brisbane Metro. Well now it does, both systems are looking a bit more likely. Even car lobby group RACQ is highly supportive of Cross River Rail, stating that it is Queensland's number one infrastructure project. So what are the views of LNP Leader of the Opposition Tim Nicholls MP?

Unfortunately, it seems that Tim hasn't quite got the memo that Brisbane and SE Queensland is well and truly screwed with coping with future population growth, if it doesn't build Cross River Rail. He has recently been quoted as saying:

"the Cross River Rail project had been "hopelessly stalled" under the Palaszczuk government"

Hey Tim, didn't, the LNP Newman Government (for which you were Newman's henchman), delay Cross River Rail by years, by scrapping it for the flawed BaT Tunnel design, for which sources have since been quoted as saying "would never happen"?

"The Metro solves a current infrastructure bottleneck while the cross river rail seeks to address a bottleneck that ‘may’ occur in 2026."  

Hey Tim, maybe patronage would have been better if under the awful LNP Newman Government, the following hadn't occurred:

• Increase in public transport fares by 10%, and failed to review the fare structure?
• Delayed the opening of Moreton Bay Rail Link due to the purchase of incompatible signalling?
• Delayed and screwed up the design of Indian built New Generation Rollingstock trains?
• Stopped QR from hiring new staff, and demoted driver trainers, resulting in Rail Fail?
• Failed to implement bus network reform?
• Put many public transport users out of jobs? 

So Mr Nicholls - what are your policies? 

• How do you expect Brisbane to compete with other Oceana cities (such as Auckland, Perth, Sydney,  Melbourne, and Wellington) which have far better public transport? Build more financially disastrous road tunnels?
• How do you expect train lines to be built to new towns such as Greater Flagstone when there isn't enough core network capacity? Force people onto already congested roads?
• Or are you anti-Cross River Rail, because you can't admit the the BaT Tunnel was severely flawed and half-arsed?
• Are you completely blind to the fact that Brisbane's least frequent train line (Doomben Line) runs through your Clayfield constituency, and that it could have been more usefully extended to Northshore Hamilton?
• Do you want Brisbane to continue to be only developed city in the world that actively promotes car use as if it is still the 1960s?

Please tell us Tim? Anyone there?