Outrage at school bus axing

Many Dunedin school communities are "outraged" they have not been consulted about changes to school bus routes, which some say will leave families facing severe hardship.

The new Otago Regional Council bus services took effect yesterday, but because many of those routes duplicated existing school bus routes, contractor Go Bus announced last Friday it would be discontinuing some of them.

Otago Peninsula Community Board chairman Paul Pope said he had received two school notices regarding the discontinuation of school bus services to and from the Otago Peninsula.

"To say that families in my community are outraged is an understatement and the fact that they have not been consulted over the loss of this school service until very recently is abominable.

"To suggest that the ORC services in some way duplicate the school bus service is ludicrous because they are entirely separate.

"The Otago Peninsula community and its families are going to face severe hardship because of this misguided and unilateral decision."

Mr Pope said children from the furthest areas of the peninsula would face a "punishing" 7.10am start and 5pm finish, to get to and from school.

"Worse is that the years 6-8 children at Tahuna Intermediate face a 3km walk from Andersons Bay Rd to school and back, crossing Andersons Bay Rd and Queens Dr every day, and this will include a wait for a second bus to get them to their destination.

"Some may end up walking and crossing Portsmouth Dr to catch the bus from the stop near Vauxhall.

"This is a 2.25km walk across an incredibly dangerous area that has no pedestrian crossing points."

"This decision also does not take into account children with disabilities or injuries who may find the distance simply too much for them to cope."

Mr Pope said the ORC had consulted on the bus changes and the community accepted that, but Go Bus, as the ORC’s contractor, had not given appropriate consultation on changes to the school bus routes.

"The so-called improvements to the public bus service actually make the loss of the school bus service worse for our peninsula children and families in terms of safety, convenience, costs and lifestyle."

Mr Pope urged the ORC and Go Bus to reconsider the removal of the school bus services from the Otago Peninsula.

Logan Park High School, Bayfield High School and Dunedin North Intermediate had similar issues.

Dunedin North Intermediate principal Heidi Hayward said she was "stunned" schools were only officially told about changes to their bus routes last Friday.

She said some pupils told her last Tuesday there was a notice up in the bus shelter, saying there would be changes to their bus route.

After calling Go Bus, she was told it was a commercial route and it would not affect school pupils.

"Then on Friday, I got another email from somebody else at Go Bus to say the service would be ceasing at the end of term 3 — two weeks’ notice.

"I said hang on. Three days ago we were told this wasn’t the case, and he [Go Bus spokesman] said things had changed and it was no longer commercially viable to duplicate those routes.

"He then fobbed me off to the ORC, but the ORC have said no, it’s a Go Bus issue."

Bayfield High School principal Judith Forbes said she had a similar experience.

She and Ms Hayward said their schools had had no warning that their pupils’ travel routes would be altered by the changes in the commercial routes, so they did not participate in consultation over the routes with the ORC.

They called on Go Bus and the ORC to conduct proper consultation over  school bus routes.

ORC support services manager Gerard Collings said like the affected schools, the ORC was  made aware of the Go Bus school service changes only on Friday.

He said the school bus services were not contracted by the council, and  were out of the council’s control.

"The discontinuation of the services is unfortunate, but totally out of our control."

Go Bus Transport regional manager Ben Barlow would only say, when contacted, that the company planned to "engage in some dialogue" with Dunedin North Intermediate staff initially.

It  may continue the process with  other affected schools after that, to see what options could be available for them.

john.lewis@odt.co.nz