Lonely Planet gives Auckland’s PT the thumbs down
The Herald today reports that the new edition of the Lonely Planet tourist guide for New Zealand doesn’t have particularly kind things to say about Auckland’s public transport system.
Auckland is a more vibrant city after the Rugby World Cup but public transport is a “mess”, says the latest Lonely Planet guide book of New Zealand.…
36 Comments Bus strike cancelled
Great news:Â
Strike averted as NZ Bus and Unions reach agreement
NZ Bus, the Tramways Union and First Union are very pleased to announce that following a last ditch meeting this morning they have reached a proposed settlement for the Collective Employment Agreement covering bus drivers and service staff in Auckland.…
Monday’s bus strike – PT alternatives
So unless there’s a miraculous fix to the ongoing labour dispute between NZ Bus and its drivers, it seems as though all NZ Bus services will not run this coming Monday and every subsequent Monday for the next eight weeks. That means no buses at all – including school buses – if your service is operated by any of the following: Metrolink
GoWest
Waka Pacific
North Star
Link (City, Inner or Outer) All up NZ Bus services account for just over half of all public transport journeys in Auckland, which I guess gives us the opportunity to look at things from a “glass half full” approach and note that half of Auckland’s public transport will still be running.…
The New Bus Network: a step change for Auckland
Auckland Transport’s board papers highlight that the high level principles of the new bus network will be consulted upon in the Regional Public Transpor Plan: which will be open for public submission in the next month or two. The huge number of comments on Matt’s previous post about the network highlights that this will be a very interesting process.…
Bus Strikes back on
Now this is just getting silly. Last week the bus drivers unions agreed to a deal with NZ Bus which saw their planned strikes called off but interestingly the bus drivers who met today decided to reject that offer. I don’t know what they are now demanding but it is very odd for the union leaders themselves to agree to a deal and recommend it but then have the members turn it down.…
Public transport is cool
Call me a snob if you will, but there’s something cool about how those Scandinavians do public transport.
As an example, on a recent journey to a beautiful fjord in Norway, I snapped this photo of a mossy log cabin being used for a bus stop, complete with scooter park and ride.…
More “tin pot dictator” bus punctuality stats
Back in June I blogged about the running joke that is the bus reliability and punctuality statistics, as reported in each month’s PT statistics report. Brian Rudman has also commented on these number previously, noting that even a tin pot dictator rigging an election would be embarrassed by how high they are.…
August Patronage Stats
The PT stats for August are out ahead of next weeks board meeting (thanks AT, please keep this up). The numbers over the coming months in particular are going to very interesting to see just what impact was made by the RWC last year but more on that shortly.…
No Bus Strikes
Some great news has just come out that NZ Bus and the Tramways Union have come to an agreement over their industrial dispute which means that there won’t be any strikes, something that would have severely dented the reputation of public transport right at a time when we are about to start talking the most positive change in for buses in decades.…
Noisy bus advertisements – like torture!
I’ve been catching Inner Link buses this week – rather unusually for me but that’s how things are at the moment. Generally I have found them to be pretty fantastic: incredibly frequent, pretty fast (especially now that there’s no longer the enormous detour down into the city between K Road and Grafton Bridge) and quite consistent with their timing.…
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