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Estimates: discounted AirTrain fares

During Estimates hearings on Tuesday 30 July 2024, I asked the Director General of the Department of Transport and Main Roads about the discounted AirTrain fares. 

You can read my questions and her full responses below, or in the official Parliamentary record of proceedings (Hansard) here

Mr BERKMAN: Thanks, I will move on. I want to spend a moment discussing the Airtrain, particularly in relation to the government’s deal with Airtrain for the six-month trial of half-price fares from August that I know has been discussed already. Director-General, has the department modelled how many additional Airtrain trips this initiative is expected to generate over the six-month trial, and what are the targets or conditions that might need to be met at the end of the trial for another form of fare discounts or for those prices to be extended? 

Ms Stannard: I thank the member for the question. Can I just confirm: you are interested in what are the thresholds for Airtrain as a successful model post the trial. 

Mr BERKMAN: Yes. Sorry, it was a bit of a double-barrelled question. How many additional trips is it expected to generate, and what would be deemed a success to extend those discounted fares on Airtrain? 

Ms Stannard: I thank the member for the question. Airtrain is a private company and obviously a number of the criteria that we have agreed with them are commercial-in-confidence so some things I cannot talk to. I think you are aware that ticket prices will reduce from $21.90 to $10.95 for a customer travelling on go card and $11 for a customer travelling on a paper ticket. That is a 50 per cent reduction. A similar reduction has been applied to the Airtrain worker ticket. 

We do estimates of these kinds of changes, but it is not the kind of thing we can model in detail. What you will find in the patronage on a line like that is a mix of customers, some of whom are very price sensitive. Backpackers coming to Queensland on a working holiday visa or that kind of travel might be more price sensitive than, say, someone travelling for work if their employer is paying for their travel. In that mix of customers there will be a wide variety of responses to a pricing change like that. 

In terms of the success of the trial, we are focused on these initiatives first and foremost as a cost-of-living measure. The first benefit we are really targeting is that customers who are already on board save money, at a time when that is very important to us in terms of the range of customers who are on there, particularly those who might work at the terminals. There is not a lot of parking for workers there. It is a spot that is hard to travel to if you are not on public transport. If you are working there, you may not want to pay that level of parking. First and foremost, those customers will save money, and that is one of our key criteria. 

It is a really a policy decision, then, that I would have to defer to the minister about—what would make a government choose to continue to offer that reduction. We definitely want to see more customers on public transport, but the sustainability of the pricing is really a policy matter for the government. 

Mr BERKMAN: Without meaning to rehash the question, I take from your response that at this stage there is no set policy as to what might happen at the end of the trial in terms of success or otherwise? 

Ms Stannard: We have flagged a number of criteria that we are monitoring: cost of living first and foremost; an increase in public transport usage secondly; and, thirdly, hopefully that will benefit everybody on the transport network, including on the road network, who might perceive some congestion reduction. All three criteria are very important to us and we will be monitoring those so that the government can make a decision about whether such a trial would continue. 

Mr BERKMAN: Does the existing deal with Airtrain include a guaranteed minimum payment to Airtrain from the state government? 

Ms Stannard: I might need to take some advice from my team. I am fairly sure that I cannot disclose the detail of the commercial agreement we have struck with Airtrain, just because it is a commercial agreement with a private sector entity. I do not have notes in front of me that would enable me to answer that at this time. I will take some advice and see if there is anything else we can advise.

[The Director General later returned to the question]

Ms Stannard: In terms of the Airtrain deal, I can confirm that the terms of the Brisbane Airport Rail Link deed are commercial-in-confidence, as are any related documents. I have to fulfil my commitments to maintain that confidentiality under those arrangements.

 

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