New morning bus service from Warrington to City

The new service will start on Wednesday 26 April to support the start of the new school term.

The decision follows a consultation with the Waikouaiti Coast Community Board about crowding and capacity on the morning commuter service.

“The additional weekday service will start from Warrington and finish at the bus hub in central Dunedin,” says Lorraine Cheyne, Transport Manager.

"The service provides additional morning capacity on the popular route 1 service, which often runs out of space in Waitati. It will also provide a new public service from Warrington to the city.

“The community has been engaged in developing a solution that works for them and we are pleased we can meet the demand.”

Services are normally co-funded by Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency and ORC, but the new morning service will be entirely funded by ORC.

The current route 1 Palmerston to City weekday service is aimed at morning and afternoon commuters and school students and provides three services to city and back. It starts in Palmerston, and serves Waitati, Karitane and Waikouaiti.

“We have been fielding complaints for some time about overcrowding on Route 1 buses and we are pleased to see that something is being done to rectify the situation,” said Waikouaiti Coast Community Board chair, Alasdair Morrison.

The new service will be labelled the same as the normal bus and will depart Warrington on weekdays. It will leave the bus stop outside Warrington School on Ferguson Street at 7:35am and run via Evansdale and Waitati, arriving at the bus hub at 8:10am.

The new service is available to all passengers and will cost $1 per trip for adults and 60 cents for school students.

The bus will run on weekday mornings during school terms only and will pick up passengers at Evansdale and Waitati after Warrington. The usual service from Palmerston will continue to serve Evansdale and Waitati.

Passenger numbers on the northbound afternoon service will be closely monitored by ORC.