NWQ Councils welcome new transport service contracts

The Mayors of North West Queensland have welcomed the Queensland Government’s confirmation of its new five-year regional transport service contracts for four of North West Queensland’s essential air and coach services.

The Palaszczuk Government announced earlier this week the successful tenders for regulated coach and air routes with its new five-year contracts aimed at providing regional communities with long-term certainty around local travel options.

The North West will see Regional Express (Rex) Airlines continue to service the Cairns-Normanton-Mornington Island (Gununa)-Burketown-Doomadgee-Mount Isa, and the Townsville-Hughenden-Richmond- Julia Creek-Mount Isa air routes, with the Cairns to Karumba coach services being retained by Trans North, and Greyhound taking over the Brisbane to Mount Isa coach service. 

NWQROC Chair, Cr Jack Bawden said: “The new five-year tenure will add certainty for our communities on these essential travel services. 

“Rex continues as the service provider on the important Gulf and Northern two routes, and we congratulate them on being awarded the contract for another five years,” Cr Bawden said.  

“We have built a good relationship with the airline and look forward to working with them as they continue to deliver services and support for the region and securing the best possible pricing arrangements under the community fare scheme.

“While we welcome the continuation of these services, there are still some big issues on air services that we need to tackle if we’re truly going to unlock the region and support our communities to grow.

“This includes the high cost of airfares particularly on unregulated routes which limits our remote and vulnerable communities from accessing essential health and community services. It also gets in the way of essential family travel, and business and tourism potential.

“These issues are still on NWQROC’s agenda, and we will continue to push for the North West to have affordable, as well as fair and equitable services.”  

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