Editorial: Stop dallying and put on more buses

The frustrations of driving in Auckland are well documented. Now it seems a similar fate has befallen the city's peaktime bus commuters. Perhaps, indeed, they have even more cause for grievance. In addition to suffering long periods in gridlock, they commonly spend up to an hour waiting at bus stops, often watching as packed buses pass them by.

It is all a long way from the promised bright new world of public transport; of an efficient and comfortable system that would play a significant role in lessening congestion on the roads and pollution of the air above.

Bus passengers have every reason to ask how it has come to this. The response of the operators is unconvincing. They indicate that 9 per cent passenger growth this year has taken them by surprise. They have been unable to buy new buses, and employ new drivers, quickly enough. But so poor has the service become that the explanation seems inadequate. If this year's increase has exceeded expectations, it is also true there has been sustained average passenger growth of 7 to 8 per cent over the past three years. And the reasons are not hard to discern: a surge in the number of foreign students in Auckland, an increase in university attendance, and ongoing migration to the city.

Increased demand of such magnitude should be manna for any business. But if operators have boosted their fleets, or are in the process of doing so, there does not seem to have been undue urgency. Talk of the problem of buying New Zealand-made buses does not wash. Buses, either new or second-hand, purchased or leased, could surely be sourced quickly from overseas. Commuters must wonder why this has not happened, and ask whether bottom-line imperatives have played a part.

Whether, for example, operators do not want to spend money on buses that would sit idle outside peak hours. Whether they are tempted to sit back and wait to see the impact on passenger numbers of the new Britomart-centred train service. Or whether the monopoly they enjoy on routes removes the incentive to meet passenger needs.

Not only bus operators are to blame, of course. Local authorities make much of the introduction of bus priority lanes, and how these have made this mode of transport a more attractive proposition. They say far less about the bottlenecks that remain, and their tardiness in eradicating them. The chairman of Auckland City's transport committee writes, for example, of how the council has "resolved" to develop an inner-city transport corridor along the Symonds St ridge to give "reasonable priority" to buses. And how bus lanes have been "tacitly" approved for Sandringham Rd. Such phrasing does not smack of urgency. Nor does the failure to deliver what should be simple remedies, such as a bus lane along Tamaki Drive.

Nor has the city council been active in enforcing its "quality partnership" agreement with operators. The pact, which sets out obligations to the council and to passengers, says in part that operators will "increase service frequencies so that passenger capacity ... always exceeds passenger demand at all points along routes".

Commuters are being let down while such agreements go unheeded. A tougher line needs to be taken with operators. If they are not prepared to meet increased demand by acquiring extra buses urgently, badly served routes must be thrown open to other operators at peak times. Competition would work wonders for customers. Additionally, dilatory operators can hardly expect to have contracts renewed.

Quite simply, bus companies must meet increased demand, not provide a standard of service that drives passengers away.