Media Release – Wednesday June 13 2012


CBD Red Zone commercial bus venture


Earlier this year the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority called for expressions of interest from commercial operators regarding running bus visits through the CBD Red Zone.

Three operators registered an interest, all were of high calibre.

One of those, Red Bus Ltd, has been identified as most able to provide the necessary health and safety logistics to run an operation potentially involving large numbers of people.

It is now up to Red Bus to decide if it wants to proceed with a business plan and develop a commercial fare scheme.
CERA will not be involved in that decision or any subsequent commercial process.

The original CERA bus visits through the Red Zone late last year were extremely popular with more than 28,000 people taking the weekend and evening trips over a six-week period.

That venture was tax-payer funded and passengers were asked for gold-coin contributions to cover the $220,000 operational costs. Those contributions offset $60,000 of the taxpayers input.

Note: Commercial sensitivities means the two other businesses that expressed initial interest cannot be named by CERA. Of course that does not preclude the businesses naming themselves should they choose to.