Bus changes hard to navigate: College
Teachers of English as a second language in Palmerston North are predicting chaos when the city’s new electric bus fleet starts running on new routes on Monday.
But the Horizons Regional Council will have people and vehicles stationed along the new and discontinued routes to help anyone caught out by the changes.
The city-based English Language College has a roll of 110, and more than 75 of those students of all ages depend on public transport to get to and from classes.
They include recent migrants, former refugees and international students, and many of them would find the changes quite traumatising, senior manager Fiona Bennett said.
Student support administrator Julie Phillips said she was working with students to help them prepare for what would be, for most, an earlier start in the mornings, a longer walk to a bus stop, and an unfamiliar route into the city. She said one student would be able to use a closer bus stop, and some others would benefit from services running later into the evenings.
But for most of the students, it would be harder.
“It’s going to be a monumental change in routine. That can be quite trauma inducing, having to reorder their lives,” Bennett said.
She said some students were elderly or had health problems, and having to walk up to 800 metres to a bus stop in all weather conditions would be difficult.
Horizons transport services manager Mark Read said it was acknowledged that change could be difficult, especially for people who had recently learnt how to use the current network.
Horizons had invited the English Language College students to a hui with UCOL on Friday to talk people through the new network.
Council staff had attended markets and other events to help people plan their new journeys.
Next week, staff would be at the Main St bus hub and other locations to provide advice.
“We are also planning to have vehicles which will travel along old routes throughout the day ... to get people from closed stops onto the new network,” Read said.
The buses would be free to use until March 31.
Phillips said she had found out about proposed changes back in 2021 and made a submission opposing the removal of bus stops and services on Vogel St.
“But it did not change anything.”
She said many of the college’s students were only just gaining confidence about finding their way around the city, and their limited language skills made reading maps and timetables challenging.
She was worried people would be late or not turn up because it was too hard. The college would lose funding if it lost students, and people on benefits would face sanctions if they dropped out of courses that proved they were working towards being ready for employment.
Read said the new bus network was a response to 10 years of feedback that the current services looping through neighbourhoods were difficult to understand, did not run often enough, and took too long to get people where they wanted to go.
The council had aimed to “to address those issues by providing fast, direct and easy-to-understand services”, he said.
Bus services started earlier, ran later, and gave “everyone more and better options for travelling across the city for work, education, shopping, recreation or otherwise”.
“We believe the benefits of the new network will make it easier to use the bus network in the long term.”
Read said Horizons would be listening to feedback on the new routes once they went live.
People who need help planning their bus trips could call 0508 800 800, visit the Horizons office or email transport@horizons.govt.nz.
Timetables were available online at horizons.govt.nz.
Printed timetables could be picked up at the Horizons office and would also be available at the iSite in Te Marae o Hine/ The Square, Palmerston North City Council’s customer services centre, on board Palmerston North and Ashhurst bus services, at public events, and at other locations as more were printed.
People could also use either Google Maps or the free Transit app by inputting where they were travelling from, where they were travelling to, and then changing the “leave at” or “arrive by” date to March 4 or later.