Entertainment

Adele concerts at Gabba create bus headache for Brisbane council

Next month's Adele concerts at the Gabba are shaping up as logistical nightmares for the Brisbane City Council, which is scrambling to source enough drivers to get two capacity crowds to and from the stadium in about 400 buses.

It has also prompted warnings from the city's deputy mayor that people should allow up to three hours to get to the Gabba.

The two shows, on the weekend of March 4 and 5, were expected to attract crowds of 60,000 to the cricket stadium at Woolloongabba.

Deputy mayor Adrian Schrinner said the back-to-back Adele concerts would be "the biggest events we've ever had to deal with" in terms of bus transport and patrons should allow for two or three hours to get to the shows.

He said the council had put the word out for drivers to volunteer to take on additional paid shifts on the Saturday and Sunday nights.

But that could cause significant problems for mornings services, Cr Schrinner said, due to the workplace health and safety requirement that drivers have at least 10 hours down-time between shifts.

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"The drivers that are working late into the evening to ferry people back to our major centres and the CBD," he said.

"If they, for example, finish at 1 o'clock in the morning, they won't be able to come to work to do the morning shift the following day.

"So this is obviously a big organisational exercise that we're running here.

"We're working together with TransLink and the Gabba, but at this stage I'm yet to see any form of communication plan provided by the Gabba."

Cr Schrinner said the Monday morning peak was one of the major things the council was working hard to manage.

"Any driver that worked on the Sunday evening, if they were doing that going-home shift after the concert, 10 hours from that point is 11 or 11.30 in the morning, so they'd miss out on the morning peak," he said.

"So we'll be working very hard to make sure we'll have enough scheduled drivers, and we believe we can manage that risk, but it's a consideration."

Cr Schrinner said he was concerned concert-goers would be caught out by the traffic chaos the shows will cause.

He said many people may not be aware "just how big this is going to be" and could find themselves missing some of the British star's show.

"We're talking about a capacity crowd at the Gabba; a crowd that, as far as I'm aware, has never been seen before," Cr Schrinner said.

"A full-capacity crowd at the Gabba is normally 40,000 people, but we're seeing an extra 20,000 people in addition to that coming to this event.

"So we'll see every seat potentially filled, plus 20,000 people on the grass itself. This is a big event by any standard."

The deputy mayor, who also served as the council's public transport chairman, said Adele ticket-holders would have to aim to leave home by about 5pm to ensure they got to the Gabba on time.

Cr Schrinner said shuttle buses would run every two minutes from Roma Street Station to the shows, and every 30 seconds back to the inner-city station at the conclusion of the concerts.

They would run every three minutes from Westfield Chermside, and every minute for the return legs.

They will run every 2½ minutes from Eight Mile Plains and every 1.2 minutes back, while Carindale services will run every four minutes to the Gabba and every 1½ minutes back.

Private operators would also be contracted to share some of the load.

"It will require a significant number of our drivers to be on the job," he said.

A Stadiums Queensland spokeswoman said they were working with the Gabba, Translink and the council to ensure a "world class event for attendees".

"All parties have been heavily involved in the planning of this event, are well aware of the transport requirements for these events and have planned accordingly," she said.

"As with every event held in Brisbane, all the Gabba's communications and messaging regarding event transport directs patrons to Translink. This has been communicated with all parties.

"And as with all major events, Translink will provide public transport options for this event on their website in coming days."

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