MAKE BUSES SEXY: REFRAMING MELBOURNE’S MOST OVERLOOKED TRANSPORT MODE: MPAVILION/NAOMI MILGROM FOUNDATION
SOcial Impact Advisory & Strategy • FACILITATION
The Challenge
Despite being one of Melbourne’s most flexible and equitable transport modes, buses remain underused and culturally overlooked. Conversations about buses often focus on infrastructure and reliability, but Make Buses Sexy explored a broader question: what role do perception, identity and experience play in whether people choose to use them?
The event was held during Victoria’s month of free public transport, creating a timely opportunity to explore whether cost is really the main barrier to bus use.
The Task
Amplifier Collective was invited to host a public conversation and participatory workshop at MPavilion exploring how buses might be better understood, experienced and talked about. The design of the session aimed to move beyond a conventional transport discussion and open up new thinking around behaviour change, customer experience and public perception.
Our Approach
The event combined:
pre-event consultation with panellists
a multidisciplinary public discussion
audience participation and workshop activities
live idea testing and synthesis.
The panel brought together perspectives across transport planning, communications, accessibility, lived experience and user experience design.
The Result
The session generated a wide range of ideas and observations around accessibility, confidence, usability, safety, identity and atmosphere. A recurring theme was that buses are not simply a service challenge, but also a cultural and behavioural one.
The event also surfaced opportunities around stronger branding, customer experience, storytelling and behaviour change approaches — including the idea of prototyping a ‘desirable bus’ to test how experience and perception might influence use.
While intentionally light-touch and exploratory, the project helped frame what could become a much larger conversation about the future of buses in Melbourne — and the role they might play in a more connected, accessible and sustainable city.
The event was delivered with support from MPavilion and the Naomi Milgrom Foundation.
