Does the ORC care about public transport?

IT is apparent from the attitude of spokespeople for the Otago Regional Council that the said body does not understand that the purpose of a public transport service is to transport commuters from point A to point B.

It is not to send nearempty buses along specific unhelpful routes picking up the odd passenger as a secondary consideration.

In the case of the peninsula secondary and intermediate pupils, there are up to 124 potential commuters wishing to travel to four destinations each morning of the school year and return to their home stops in the afternoon.

I believe this would be dream loading for any capable bus operator, quite apart from the safety aspect of large numbers of pupils negotiating, on foot, busy streets and intersections at peak traffic times.

Perhaps it is a case of there are none so blind as they who will not see? Ron G. Paterson

Dunedin

AS a former Dunedin resident with strong connections to this city, I was troubled to learn that school children from Otago Peninsula were now being forced to walk 2km to their schools in South Dunedin.

I was also dismayed to learn that the Otago Regional Council had voted down a request from the affected schools to make minor adjustments to the bus route.

While it is healthy to encourage children to walk to school, dropping them at a considerable distance from their schools goes against the Government’s efforts to promote public transportation.

The ORC are abandoning their duties as elected officials. They should remember that they can be voted out in the next local election.

Perhaps it is time for local bodies and communities to invest in dedicated school bus services instead of relying on the tender mercies of corporations.

Andrew Lim Parnell, Auckland

Hospice funds raised

I WOULD be very interested to know from Claire Grenfell, the Craic Irish Tavern owner, how many tens of thousands of dollars was given to the Otago Community Hospice from the $5 cover charge imposed for bar entry in the Octagon on the two nights over the weekend, i.e. after midnight Thursday into Good Friday and after midnight Saturday into Easter Sunday.

From the crowds witnessed on these two nights, my low estimate would be $50,000 at least, being only 5000 patrons across the Octagon each night. Stephen John Morris

Caversham [The Craic Irish Tavern owner Claire Grenfell replies:

‘‘The Craic Irish Tavern raised $1380 for the Otago Community Hospice. The $5 cover charge was a condition of the special licences issued over the Easter period allowing people to enter between midnight and 2am. We decided that we would like to donate this to a charity close to our heart. The capacity of the Octagon’s licensed premises is about 1700 people.’’]

We must do more

BRIAN Turner raises the very important question (ODT, 31.3.18) of why society is not doing more to promote sustainable living.

One of the reasons for the failure to do more is because, in the choice between sustainability and consumerism, the immediate benefits of the latter tend to prevail. It is a truism that immediate reward is the best way to promote behaviour, which could mean we may be living under the curse of conditioned consumption.

This could be a trap, because overindulgence may be undermining the moral strength required to face the daunting challenges of the future.

The more we consume, the more we need to. The bigger the challenge, the poorer the response. Does mankind need to be put on red alert?

K. Bragan

Wanaka