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Public Transportation Love-Hate: No Love For Surfers in Perth

Jaunted is in the midst of a public transportation festival. Join us in celebrating the ultimate travel tool: a cheap way to get around. Share your stories in the comments or by emailing us at tips [at] jaunted [dot] com.

Down in Western Australia, the people of Perth love their cars. Added to that, Perth's a coastal city that stretches nearly 80 miles just to house one and a half million people who've all gotta live near the beach--all that makes it hard to make the ultimate public transport system. Transperth gives it a go, but just ask any tourist or foreign student in Perth and they'll tell you about the time they had to wait an extra half hour for their bus, or the bus drivers who wouldn't let them take their surfboard on a bus bound for the beach. (The bus drivers, however, do wear shirts, unlike their brothers in Bratislava.)

Just this year Transperth gave Perthites a big buzz with their new payment system: now you can be a SmartRider by getting a special card to use as a ticket. You can use it over any distance, it can be automatically topped up from your bank account when its balance gets too low, and when you do some complicated multiple bus moves during a day, it'll calculate the lowest possible fare for you. All you have to learn is what "tag on" and "tag off" means: Perth people are beginning to learn it's something to do with waving your SmartRider card over a magic box.

[Photo: Scotticus_]

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