Southern Moreton Bay Islands ferry times to change for Russell Island State School students

Students have been missing the last 15 minutes of school daily or having to wait unsupervised at the jetty for more than an hour to catch the Southern Moreton Bay Islands ferry.

Translink agreed to an extra service after meeting with Redlands MP Matt McEachan and Assistant Transport Minister Glenn Butcher.

Mr McEachan said the meeting came after months of pushing Translink to make a change.

“As a direct result of advocating both locally and in Parliament for an additional service, I am pleased to report success,” he said.

“Translink have reconsidered their position and granted a 3.11pm ferry service for the SMBI community.”

Russell Island State School principal Janet Tucker said without the extra service students could be late for the ferry.

“If they miss that ferry, they must wait for over an hour unsupervised at the wharf for the next ferry,” she said. “It is great that the issue of safety has now been taken on board.”

She said it was difficult for students to be missing the last 15 minutes of learning every day and leaving early was disruptive for the class.

“We, as the community, had tried everything we could and were just getting nowhere,” she said.

Mr Butcher said many issues had been worked through during the meeting and he hoped problems had been put to bed.

“I think we’ve come up with a very amicable solution across the board and from what I believe most people are happy so we’ll get that embedded in place hopefully over the next couple of weeks,” he said.

“The quicker we can get that connectivity from the bus onto the ferries, the better for us so it was a no-brainer for me to work with the ferry service and the department to make these changes.”