Goodbye to our e-Bus

Judging by the wonderful comments and feedback we have received from passengers and drivers alike, Dunedin has enjoyed having its first electric bus.

The e-Bus joined the Orbus Dunedin fleet for October on select routes to see how it performed on the hills and highway and to give drivers and passengers a chance to check it out. It travelled 3,348.4kms in just over 4 weeks, taking thousands of passengers quietly across the city. We’ll be reporting on more stats as we analyse the data.

Thanks to everyone who tried the bus, who entered the competition and who filled in the survey. Thank you also to Go Bus Transport and Global Bus Ventures, the Kiwi manufacturers of the bus, for making the trial possible.

Scan in

Recent news about COVID cases in the South Island is a timely reminder that we should all be tracking our travel.

• Please scan the COVID QR codes provided on each bus. If you don’t have the official COVID tracker app, keep a manual diary of your travel.
• If you have the app, but forget, add your trip as a manual entry. QR codes on buses are registered to the particular bus rather than the route, but if you enter the bus route number manually alongside the time of your departure, this will provide enough information to track the bus you were on.
• Please wear your mask. Remember, some drivers are exempt from wearing a mask if it affects their ability to drive.

New Depot Manager at Go Bus

Go Bus, one of the two operators that owns and operates our buses and employs the bus drivers, has welcomed Narindervir Singh as their new depot manager in Dunedin. 

Narindervir, or NV to his friends and colleagues, will manage the urban, school and charter services for the company.

He started in early October just as the e-bus trial started, driving himself down the length of the country to relocate 1,425km from Auckland to Dunedin.

NV says he’s already awed by the beauty of the south and is excited to experience all that the city and surrounding area has to offer.

“I’m honoured to be here in Dunedin to help increase my knowledge and work closely with the local team here to continue delivering great service for our customers.

“I also am extremely proud to be the first Indian depot manager for Go Bus in the South Island.”

NV has worked with Go Bus since joining the team in August 2018 as an operator at the North Auckland Silverdale depot. He was promoted to duty person for East Auckland depot in East Tamaki in 2019 and then a year later was promoted to the real time monitoring team based in South Auckland to supervise wider operations across Auckland, Hamilton and Hawke’s Bay.

Getting to your stop on time

Are you getting to your bus on time? Remember to be there well before a bus is due to arrive and to signal so drivers know you are waiting for their bus, rather than another bus. You can wave or hold up your Bee Card.

Buses will not always be at your stop at the exact time indicated on the timetable, because drivers are not in control of the traffic around them. While there are timing points where drivers may stop if they are a bit early in the schedule, it’s still important that passengers do their bit, and get to their stop 5 minutes beforehand.

That same rule applies for passenger using Transit, the live bus tracking app, because Transit cannot predict exactly when your bus will arrive. It’s more precise and can usually time up to the minute, so we recommend being at your stop 2 minutes before the bus is tracking to arrive.

If you see your tracking information pause on Transit as it gets nearer, that might mean it’s less than a minute away. Transit doesn’t track down to the second! If you see your bus is tracking a minute or less away from your stop, make sure you are ready to signal the driver.