Buses and 1,000 drivers needed to bypass Olympics traffic blockade

Transport experts say south-east Queensland faces a real challenge to temporarily expand its bus fleet – and find the necessary drivers – for the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Because rail projects take years to complete, the time for new infrastructure for the Olympic Games is almost up.

Public transport advocate Robert Dow of Rail Back on Track said this means the 2032 Games will rely heavily on buses, especially in locations without rail services.

“That’s a problem because in 2032 there won’t be enough bus drivers to drive these damn things,” he said.

Professor Matthew Burke, deputy director of Griffith University’s Cities Research Institute, said it was a “major problem” for organisers – not just finding the drivers and buses, but what would happen to those surplus buses afterwards.

“We’re going to need a lot of bus drivers, maybe 1,000 or more, and that’s a very large number,” he said.

“A few retirees might come back and say, ‘I’ve still got my heavy vehicle licence, I’m here’, but on that scale that’s a lot of volunteers.”

Burke expected that bus drivers from other Australian cities would also holiday in south-east Queensland, something he said happened during the 2000 Sydney Olympics and Paralympics.

But that did bring with it some major problems.