The bus stops - but not here

Late last year a young Maori woman with two young children in tow was seen walking along SH12 on the rural outskirts of Kaikohe. She turned into Ohaeawai Road which runs off the highway and began the walk to Ngawha Prison, more correctly known as the Northland Region Corrections Facility. She was there to visit her husband - one of the medium to highrisk inmates locked up inside.

There are no bus stops along the highway or the lateral road to the prison which isn't surprising. There aren't any buses to stop at them. This woman and her children had bussed from somewhere near Auckland, hitchhiked from somewhere else (we don't know where) and then walked the 1.7 kilometres from the highway to the prison gates on a road that doesn't have a footpath and with a barrier arm at its start. It isn't designed for pedestrians and she was apprehended by prison staff for a 'please explain'

Think about her journey. It's 1.7k from the prison, down Ohaeawai Road to the highway and another 6.6 kilometres to Kaikohe after that. There's one Intercity bus from Kaikohe to Kawakawa which departs at 1.25pm. Buses to elsewhere have to be worked around this time, often with a considerable wait. At the time of writing the cheaper seats on this 'service' were sold out over a week in advance, as were seats on the bus from Kaitaia through Kaeo to Kerikeri.

Let's say she got to Kerikeri. There's a three-hour gap between the arrival of this bus and the return departure time so even if a prison visitor was to arrive in Kerikeri, some how cover the 35 kilometers to Kaikohe, hitch to Ngawha for a visit that needs to be prescheduled and then hitch back, more than three hours would be needed.
Many more.

Clark's provide a Kawakawa-Kerikeri (via Opua and Paihia) service daily departing at 7.30am and arriving back at 4.15pm. It's mainly used by school kids but anyone can catch it. It doesn't go to Kaikohe and certainly not to Ngawha.

It isn't only prison visitors who are affected. What happens with newly released prisoners who can't call on someone to come and collect them? Alan Robinson from Kaeo is a lay minister with NZ Prison Fellowship, Northland branch. He's given rides to people from time to time and voices his concern about those released prisoners.

"If their whanau don't want to have anything to do with them, they are out the door and are more likely to go back to their mates because of the lack of support."

David Pattison, Prison Manager for Ngawha, says the Corrections Department does not have vehicles for the 'express purposes of transporting released prisoners from prison to their places of residence in the community' which is a long-winded way of saying prisoners on release are expected to arrange their own transport. Given the lack of a bus service at Ngawha there's no alternative anyway.

What the prison does have are case managers and probation staff working with prisoners to prepare for their release in conjunction with services like Salvation Army or Out-of-Gate or organisations such as PARS (formerly the Prisoners Aid and Rehabilitation
Society) which is a charitable organization based in Auckland aiding prisoners at their domiciled prisons. According to Mr Pattison the help from PARS 'may' include 'transport' from prison on release.

There are 'virtual' visits available. In Northland, families unable to travel to prison can contact friends or family in prison via audio-visual technology - like Skype or teleconferencing - which David Pattison says is available at 'some' Community Corrections' sites.

Where does that leave our pedestrian - the woman with her two children? When she explained why she was on foot she was allowed to visit her husband. He asked for what little money she had in her purse, money she was intending to use for the bus trip home, and she handed it over. That left nothing for her return journey so she started walking back down Ohaeawai Road to get to the highway to start hitching again, for a journey
that would take hours and hours. Noone at the prison thought to give her and her two children a lift, not even to the highway in a prison van, as her husband was tucking into a meal and watching television.

To use an obvious metaphor; on this occasion quite a few people missed the bus.