NZ Bus today unveiled the first bus off the production line in a $50 million investment of state-of-the-art UK designed, New Zealand assembled buses. Launched in Tauranga by the Minister of Transport, Steven Joyce, these new buses represent an important milestone in the delivery of a step change in public transport provision to New Zealanders.

“After an intensive search, we chose Alexander Dennis as our partner” says Zane Fulljames, CEO of NZ Bus. Alexander Dennis buses carry over 25,000 passengers every minute of every day in cities around the world including London, New York, Las Vegas, Vancouver, Hong Kong and shortly Auckland. The new Enviro200 buses will be of the highest quality, reliable, safe and with a Euro 5+ emissions standard, are environmentally friendly. “It was very important to us, as a proudly New Zealand owned company, to pursue the best solution for our customers and stakeholders’ needs and a solution that would also enable broader economic benefits to flow through to the New Zealand economy through assembly, maintenance and servicing” continues Mr Fulljames.

Kiwi Bus Builders were awarded the contract to assemble the Alexander Dennis buses at their new high tech facility in Tauranga. The flow on effect is not only in the plant, premises and jobs required for the assembly, but also in the fact that 25-30% of all the bus components will be locally sourced with a projected four year revenue opportunity for New Zealand suppliers of $38 million. One hundred and two direct new jobs have also been created at Kiwi Bus Builders to fulfil the NZ Bus order, this is in excess of a $4m new injection of wages into the Tauranga economy. One hundred and eighteen new buses will be delivered by March 2012 with over 30 in service in Auckland prior to the start of the Rugby World Cup.

“Our new fleet programme is the single largest investment in the five year history of NZ Bus and represents a positive outlook in support of the government’s stated intentions to deliver public transport solutions built on strong long term partnerships between the public and private sectors” says Mr Fulljames.

“This is an incredibly exciting step for our business, for our customers, staff, and ultimately the quality and reliability of bus public transport in New Zealand.” Mr Fulljames concludes.

ENDS

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