A report to the council’s public and active transport committee said, further, cruise ship visitors spent more than $45,000 on bus fares during this cruise ship season, helping to cover the cost of the service.
The Port Chalmers community had experienced "significant disruption" to bus services in past years because of large numbers of cruise ship passengers using city buses, the report said.
The issues reached a peak in 2022-23, when capacity issues were compounded by driver shortages, it said.
Council staff worked with the Dunedin City Council, Port Otago and others to develop a "cruise ship action plan" that included "proactively scheduling additional services" and providing ways for passengers to buy tickets before boarding the bus to reduce delays to loading buses.
"The result of this has been positive with significant positive community feedback, and with minimal complaints received relating to the route 14 services in the past six months."
On the busiest days of the six-month cruise ship season more than 5000 cruise ship visitors arrived at Port Chalmers, and primarily used either commercial shuttles or public transport to get into the city.
The cheaper public transport fares created an "exceptional demand" for the No 14 Port Chalmers bus.
Of the cruise ships arriving in Port Chalmers in the 2023-24 season 41 were boats that carried more than 2000 passengers — and to meet the demand an additional 275 bus trips on route 14 were provided, the report said.
Buses were added to peak morning and afternoon periods, based on the cruise ship arrival times.
A cruise ship fare of $3 for a one-way trip and $6 for a return trip, was created.
Working with the regional infrastructure technical specifications team, an electronic portable ticket machine was created to issue paper tickets to cruise ship passengers.
The cost to provide the service was $95,698.
However, this was offset by $45,808 in fares paid by cruise ship passengers.
Further, NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi agreed to co-fund the service (51%) and Port Otago covered the rest, the report said.
