“A lot of areas already suffer from social isolation and without decent public transport, we’re exacerbating that,” Ms Wenham said. “What does it mean next year when we’re paying $3 a litre for fuel?”

In the State Budget, Kevin Foley announced a bumper transport spend of nearly $650 million, which included extending the tramline to AAMI Stadium, electrifying part of the rail system and adding to the tram fleet. It did not include any new train routes or even any new track aside from the 10km to West Lakes, a route which runs between the Outer Harbour and Grange train lines.

University of South Australia professor Michael Taylor has been studying sustainable transport for many years. Most of Adelaide’s 250-odd public transport routes lead to the city, even though town is the final destination for just 10 per cent of travellers. “Convenience is the major issue,” Professor Taylor said. “Rail is a radial system, but most of the travel in Adelaide is cross-town. If you want to go to from one suburb to another, you have to go around two sides of the triangle.”

Looking into the future 40 years, if nothing is done, he sees a city divided by transport. In a worst case scenario we could end up like Manila, a city notorious for its traffic snarls and poor public transport, which conspire together to trap people close to home.

“That would be the future for Adelaide,” Professor Taylor said. “It will be hard to move about. You will just stay in your own area. It will make for a lot of inequity, few employment opportunities and social isolation. We have a lot of that already, but the motor car takes a lot of it away. But you take the car away…”

And cars as we have become used to them will be taken away. With the combined spectres of climate change and peak oil, Professor Taylor fears a litre of petrol could cost $8-10 a litre within 10 to 15 years, ruling out the car as the primary mode of transport. Light rail is the shining hope, but he warns it will not be cheap: we have 120km of rail track now and need to at least double that to make a workable network.

“We have to wake up to the enormity of the investment,” he said. “If we drag our feet a bit, it will be hard to catch up.”

Transport Minister Patrick Conlon said the State Government had “delivered the biggest program of public transport spending ever seen in this state” in June’s Budget. “The 10-year program will revitalise the way South Australians use public transport,” he said. “If future governments maintain the focus that we have put on public transport, I think Professor Taylor will be a very happy man in 40 years’ time.

“Just last week, the Federal Government announced an urban congestion study looking at extending beyond Tonsley and also Noarlunga. With a funding partner as big as the Commonwealth, I’m very optimistic that we will add even more projects.”

Democrats MLC Sandra Kanck has been calling for an overarching transport plan for some time.

“The state infrastructure plan [which takes in some aspects of transport] hasn’t yet come up to speed with the fact that we have problems with climate change, peak oil and housing. It’s out of date and they need to start again,” Ms Kanck said.

“The Rann Government promised a state transport plan at the 2002 election and began the public consultation process, but by 2005 it had been abandoned. All that’s happening at the moment is we are upgrading existing lines. The western suburbs are getting a tripling – they’ve got bus, they’ve got train and now they’re getting tram. What’s all that about when all the growth is occurring in the east of the city, in the Barossa and down south?”

“The transport planning that we’ve been doing, building expressways and freeways, has just encouraged people to rely on their cars,” she said.

Greens MLC Mark Parnell agrees with the need for a plan and wants to see transport corridors set out for new areas as soon as possible. “You’ve got to get your transport planning in place before you do your housing subdivisions and releasing more land for housing,” he said.

“The urban growth boundary keeps getting pushed out and yet we don’t have a clear vision of where the transport corridors are going to be. They’ve put the cart before the horse.

“In the short term, we need a comprehensive transport plan that looks at least 50 years ahead. We need that plan to base the rest of our decisions around. Otherwise what you have is urban sprawl continuing unabated and transport trying to catch up.

“We must start making choices now before things are forced on us by climate change and by the price of oil.” People for Public Transport secretary Margaret Dingle said her group had been looking at transport oriented development (TOD), a concept that creates housing, shopping, community and business hubs around rail lines.

“We need to use land near railway stations to build TODs,” she said. “That’s where urban consolidation is best done because you do have areas of former industrial land and land that is not of any high conservation value.

“We’ve had a look at a couple of TODs at Ethelton and Glanville and we found dense housing, but no evidence of shops and the other facilities that people need – just a couple of pubs.”

People for Public Transport is pushing for more public transport routes and more frequent services, which is one of the main factors that makes buses and trains an unattractive option. “The government has made a start, but there is more to be done. We need to ease off on these huge road works,” Ms Dingle said.

With soaring petrol prices, transport may become one of the deciding issues in the 2010 state election. If that’s the case, both major political parties may see people voting with their feet.