The outback bus trip giving remote residents access to food and healthcare

Andrew Shandley is in good spirits as he tears through muddy floodwater in a ten-tonne bus.

“I couldn’t be happier,” he shouts over the rumbling engine.  

“There’s no job I’d rather do, no place I’d rather be!”

Each week the Gooniyandi man drives around 2,000 kilometres to deliver one of the roughest and most remote public transport routes in Australia.

The service connects 20 remote Aboriginal communities scattered around the central Kimberley, in northern Western Australia, offering residents a once-a-week day trip to the regional hub of Fitzroy Crossing. 

Most live without a local store, and have to try to stockpile food when there’s no working car or licensed driver to take them on the long trip into town.

“It can be tough being so isolated, so we’re all real glad to have the bus now,” says remote resident Kingston Rangai.

“My little family and me, we wait every Tuesday for Andrew to arrive — we’re always glad to see his face.”

Rough and ready road trip

It’s a hot, humid morning in February when the ABC hops aboard for a day-trip to the edge of the of Great Sandy Desert.

We’re headed to the tiny community of Ngalingkadji, where about 100 residents live with no local store or school. 

“Normally, we’d pick them up and then go further south to Djugerari, but the road’s too bad right now,” Andrew explains.

It’s one of many hazards Andrew faces as he completes the gruelling daily schedule of pick-ups and drop-offs.

Sometimes, rogue cattle roam the road. Backtracks are littered with jagged shards of rock that can shred a tyre in seconds.

Today, there are deep stretches of floodwater to navigate, and Andrew’s eyes narrow with concentration as mud sprays and splatters across the vehicle.

“I’ve been driving buses around for almost 30 years,” he confides.

“I know this country north, south, east and west.

Boarding the bus

As we press south into the escalating heat, the landscape becomes sparse and dry. 

We’re in Walmajarri country. Raised, flat-topped rock formations called mesa shimmer on the horizon, ominous outlines looming over the spinifex plains.

Just a few hundred people live in this part of Australia, clustered in three communities and accessible by a single rattly road that’s cut off each wet season.

As we swing into Ngalingkadji a handful of people is ready and waiting, including Kingston Rangie, his partner Kimaya Yamalulu and young daughter Sisealiah.

“We’re going into town for some grocery shopping, and pick up the mail, and for an appointment about housing,” Kimaya explains.

“The bus makes everyone happy.

“There is a shop at one of the other communities, but it’s more expensive, so we’d rather go to town.”

Extreme cost of living

It’s a cruel irony that remote community families have among the lowest incomes and highest daily living costs in Australia.

There are hardly any jobs and barely a functioning economy this far south of the Great Northern Highway, because unlike some other remote areas there’s little tourism, mining or pastoralism.

Most residents live off Centrelink payments not designed for the inflated costs of isolation.

Local stores, if they exist, can be eye-wateringly expensive due to freight and limited storage facilities, and fuel sells for double the average national price in some locations.

But locals say life is more peaceful and healthy than in town.

“It’s good here, we all know each other,” explains Kingston.

The politics of isolation

Over the years there have been the occasional flare-ups of political debate over whether it’s worth the extra cost and inconvenience to maintain the hundreds of small remote communities scattered across the northern half of the continent.

But the reality is they receive relatively little government funding — most is funnelled into regional towns — and defunding them would exacerbate the overcrowding and tensions in towns like Alice Springs and Broome.

Bus driver Andrew Shandley says people are keen to stay where they are, despite the daily challenges of isolation.

“They love their community, that’s why they’re out here, and they’re better off here than in town.

“It’s just good they’ve got the bus now.

Local solution to a local problem

Soon there are a dozen people loaded into the air-conditioned bus as it leaves Ngalingkadji and trundles back up the battered road to town.

The bus service started just a few months ago, in late 2024, and demand has been high.

Locals reckon a lot of people don’t have driving licenses, so the bus service has an added bonus of minimising illegal driving on the vast outback roads.

The bus is organised by the Fitzroy Crossing-based organisation Marra Worra Worra.

The Aboriginal corporation is one of the largest in northern Western Australia, delivering government housing and employment contracts, but also generating income from commercial enterprises.

Media manager Obby Bedford says they’ve been tweaking the schedule to service as many locations as possible.

“The bus service isn’t just convenient, it’s really necessary,” she says.

“It’s not just about shopping, people can visit the hospital if they need, and it could be their only ride into town for the week.

“Obviously cars are expensive so a lot of people don’t have them, and fuel keeps getting more expensive too.”

She says it’s a good example of a locally-devised solution to a local problem.

“I think with Closing the Gap, governments across the continents have refused to listen to Indigenous voices, but as an ACCO (Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisation), we don’t need to check with government in order to do this, we’ve just done it.

“I think if governments did listen more to Indigenous voices we’d have a chance at Closing the Gap, but that needs to happen first.”

The Bunuba woman remembers being driven around by bus driver Andrew Shandley as a child.

“He used to drive the school bus, so I think he just likes driving people around,” she laughs.

“He’s the perfect person for the job.”

Homeward journey

Andrew Shandley waits patiently in the shade outside the shopping centre as the Ngalingkadji families spill out across the town centre.

It’s 42 degrees, and he wipes his brow beneath his trademark battered bush hat.

Soon, he’ll be back on the road, humming country songs and nodding to the occasional caravanner or cattle truck that flashes past along the highway.

There’s something old-fashioned about the tightness of the Fitzroy Valley communities he visits.

There’s minimal phone reception and news is largely passed on via the chatty bus driver and his mud-splattered bus.

“It’s nice to see people and see how they’re doing,” he muses.