With Venus Bay Community Centre calling on locals to have their say on the use of its recently arrived electric bus this Saturday, January 20, the bus nicknamed ‘Sunny’ is already in action.
It visited Leongatha on Friday, forming a connection with a V/Line service and picking up a group of friends who will spend the weekend in Venus Bay.
Iris Mullan of Brunswick was onboard Sunny with her dad Terence to meet Iris’ friends, with Iris enjoying time at her family’s Venus Bay property.
The teenager said as Venus Bay continues to grow, transport options need to expand, and is delighted at the bus’s arrival.
“It’s cool that it’s electric and the community centre has been great in supporting the locals,” Iris said.
Bill Karambatsos was behind the wheel, with the Venus Bay local the project officer for La Trobe University, one of the partners in the planned two-year electric community bus trial.
While it is intended to recruit several volunteer drivers, Bill is enjoying the responsibility for now with no volunteer policy yet developed.
iMove and the Victorian Department of Transport and Planning are the other partners working with La Trobe and the Venus Bay Community Centre on the electric bus project.
“La Trobe’s role is to get data from the project in order to assist other communities to roll this project out using best practice,” Bill said, explaining how the trial period will be beneficial.
La Trobe will monitor enquiries in relation to ‘Sunny’, and how many bookings that generates.
“We’ll be surveying passengers about the quality of the ride and doing interviews with drivers to collect feedback about their experiences and what passengers are telling them,” Bill said.
Saturday’s session to chat about people’s ideas on how Sunny can best be used to service those in the Venus Bay area takes place at 12pm at Venus Bay Community Centre with anyone interested encouraged to come along.
“It’s the start of the consultation process about what you want to use this bus for and we’re going to work through that with the community,” Bill said.
Venus Bay Community Centre’s extensive work to build energy resilience was decisive in it being chosen to participate in the electric bus trial.
The centre has solar panels, a substantial battery system and three phase power, meaning its electric bus can be quickly charged and will deliver great savings.
“We just plug it into the sun and reload,” Bill said.
Sandy Point’s identical electric bus ‘Sandy’ is also part of the two-year trial.
