Hawke's Bay Regional Council decides not to raise bus fares

Hawke's Bay bus fares are staying put, after discussion over whether or not to raise them.

Commuters can rest easy after Hawke's Bay Regional Council decided not to raise bus fares.

A meeting of its corporate and strategic committee today decided raising fares would discourage people from using the bus.

It was also thought keeping fares as they are would limit the amount of change to commuters, given a new ticketing system is being introduced in April.

An adult fare on the bus is $3.60 for one zone and $4.20 for two zones. Various groups, including children, students, SuperGold car holders and community services cardholders get free or reduced fares.

At the meeting the committee discussed other ways of improving the bus service in Hawke's Bay - for example, enabling commuters to track buses through GPS, so they could check in real time where the buses were.

Councillor Tom Belford said this would remove anxiety around delayed services.

GPS tracking will be introduced after the new ticketing system has been established. Another idea was to have a calculator on the goBay website which could compare the cost of taking the bus with the cost of driving.

This had not been previously considered, but transport manager Anne Redgrave said it was something to look into.

Bus fares will be reviewed again in November 2019.