Park and Ride? Not a chance

Green Heart City Smart.
The new Brisbane City Council program to make Australia’s most sustainable city.
The deal is we’re supposed to be carbon neutral. All that jazz. Catch the bus to work, plant a tree. Easy enough right?
Sure! Unless, that is, that you live anywhere near Westfield Garden City and have to park and ride from there.
The first morning I decided to skip the hour-long bumper to bumper crawl along the freeway by car, I arrived at Garden City just before 7:30am. Just in time, I thought, to secure the first parking space of the day. Surely it’s far too early for the rest of the world to want a car park.
Much to my dismay, the entire measly Park and Ride car park was full to bursting!
Right, okay, well its one of the biggest shopping centres in Brisbane, plenty more to choose from, right?
Wrong.
Much to my confusion and anger, countless chains, invisible to the driving eye, blocked every single other car park in the centre. What is this? All those spaces gone to waste?
But wait, that’s it, Woolworthes opens at 8am! Aha! Surely that car park will be open!
Wrong again.
Upon driving up the Woolies ramp I am greeted by what is possibly the world’s largest security guard who is kind enough to inform me that unless I’m a customer (and not a commuter or staff) this area is off limits.
Right.
So let me get this straight.
Campbell Newman and his can-do team want us to catch the bus.
But how am I supposed to do that without parking my car?
The next day I return to slogging it out on the freeway. At least this way I know my car park is waiting for me.

Shannon Gimpel