In 2023, I started a community campaign for new school buses to Indooroopilly State High School (ISHS). At the time there were no direct buses for the hundreds of ISHS students who live in Taringa, Bardon or Toowong. If students wanted to catch the bus, they were forced to catch one of the infrequent buses that travel to Indooroopilly Shopping Centre, a 15-20 minute walk away. This was a hassle for parents and forced many families to drive their kids to school, when they'd prefer to catch public transport.
The community came out in force to support my campaign and hundreds of parents contacted decision makers to ask for a real bus connection to ISHS. In January 2025, we heard the great news that our campaign was successful! We secured a new bus route and two bus route extensions that take students straight to school. These include:
- New route S716 from Toowong to/from ISHS (via St Lucia)
- Route extension S714 from Taringa to ISHS (via Indro Shops)
- Route extension 415 from ISHS to Spring Hill (via Taringa, Toowong, Auchenflower, Milton, and the CBD)
This is a huge community win! Fixing some of these black holes means hundreds of kids who previously couldn’t take public transport to ISHS now can. It also means we can get cars off the road from the chaotic Lambert Rd precinct.
There’s plenty more that the State Government and Brisbane City Council can and should do to improve the public and active transport for students in this precinct, but these new bus services are a huge step in the right direction.
