Brakes Put On Plan To Integrate School And Public Buses

Friday, 26 September 2025, 9:07 pm
Article: Max Frethey - Local Democracy Reporter

The brakes have been pumped on work to explore integrating school bus services into local public transport in Nelson and Tasman. Nelson Mayor Nick Smith had been championing the idea, saying that efficiencies could be found if school and public buses were combined into a single service run by regional councils. 

His city council took the proposal to the Local Government Conference in July, where it received support from 85% of councils in the organisation. However, at Wednesday’s meeting of the region’s joint transport committee, Smith suggested that the “big complicated” reform lie on the table, for now. Nelson City Council’s group manager infrastructure, Alec Louverdis, had told elected members from the Nelson and Tasman councils that neither council was able to advance the project and work towards a trial. “We’re not anti this, we just don’t have the bandwidth and/or the resources to move this forward.” 

July 2026 had been earlier suggested as a date for a trial of an integrated service, but he advised that date was premature. Louverdis originally proposed that the councils ask Minister of Education Erica Stanford for $250,000 so consultants to conduct due diligence work that council staff did not have the capacity nor funding to undertake themselves. But Smith said it was unlikely that the Government would fund the work, and that asking for the funding could “hamper” the opportunity to integrate the two separate bus services. 

However, he was still supportive of the overall concept. “We’ve got a number of areas where we’ve got eBuses operating half full, school buses operating half full,” he said. “The public, either as taxpayers or ratepayers, are paying for both, and that the opportunity is to be able to more efficiently integrate those services together.” The education minister had previously directed the Ministry to work with the two councils to explore the possibility, and local parents who have protested the overly “rigid” school bus rules in the past were also onboard with the idea. In the meantime, Smith suggested that council staff simply continue to engage with those at the Ministry to get a better understanding of the risks involved with the reform. 

He was backed by the committee’s chair, Tasman’s deputy mayor Stuart Bryant, who said that there were “a whole lot of challenges” in integrating the services. “Rural buses may well be challenged by some of the system, and that’s something that needs to be addressed.” Council staff will investigate further and report back in the next triennium on the possible next steps for the reform. 

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