A Wakefield parent is dumbfounded that the new electric bus timetable will be of little use to those school students heading to Nelson schools each morning and paying up to $50 per week to get there on another bus.
Kim Salmon says she was looking forward to eBus arriving in Wakefield as they have one child at Nelson College for Girls and another two children who will head to schools in Nelson in coming years.
Students heading to Nelson from Wakefield cannot use the Ministry of Education-funded school buses to their nearest school and now pay Nelson Coachlines $7 for a one-way trip or $10 for a return trip.
The new eBus fares from Wakefield to Nelson is $2 one way from August 1, but the new timetable has buses leaving Wakefield just after 7am and then almost 9am.
A Tasman District Council spokesperson says the bus service was designed initially to assist with commuting traffic for people who do not have alternative transport options, whereas the Ministry of Education runs services for school children.
But Kim says students heading to Nelson schools pay their own way and would have helped fill seats on the bus.
“I had assumed, given it’s a new bus system, that they would be thinking about getting bums on seats which would mean people starting school or working (9am start) or tertiary education.”
She says the morning buses are either too early or too late for school students going to Nelson schools and they will have to keep paying higher fares on the Nelson Coachlines bus.
“I can only think of good reasons why creating a service to cater for those in that particular group would be of benefit for the entire initiative because you’re guaranteed to have those people on the bus every morning.”
Kim says the afternoon timetable is not an issue as many students have after-school activities, sports, or can fill in time for half an hour or so.
For her family, it costs between $35 and $40 for bus fares each week, depending on activities after school.
That amount will triple by the time they have three kids at high school.
Students taking a return trip on the bus five days a week are paying $50 a week each.
“It’s a huge, huge amount of money for parents to pay, just to get their kids to school.”
She says parents choose out-of-zone schools for a variety of reasons and they decided a girls-only school with smaller classes was the best fit.
The Tasman District Council spokesperson says peak times for commuters tend to be closer to 8am than 9am, so the first bus is scheduled to cater for those heading to the city for an 8am start.
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Due to the number of buses available to service the Wakefield route, the bus needs to get to Nelson and then make the return journey back to Wakefield, before leaving again at 8.57am.
The spokesperson says the bus service is being upgraded in stages according to the council’s transport budge.
Future transport plans will look at whether resources can be increased to make the services into both Wakefield and Motueka more frequent.
