Better Buses Owhiro Bay
The Issue
Ever since the changes to the Wellington public transport network 6 years ago, we have noticed how horrible the bus services are for our suburb. Routes 29 and 39 aren't consistent or frequent enough to provide reliable public transport to a suburb the size of Ōwhiro Bay. The data also supports this, showing that Ōwhiro Bay is the most severely underserviced suburb in the entire city when it comes to bus routes.
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Disproportionate Representation
This map shows Wellington’s bus network services high-frequency core routes to and from major suburbs, as well as less frequent local routes to and from smaller suburbs. Ōwhiro Bay, despite its comparatively larger population than other smaller suburbs, receives less than or about the same amount of bus services as very small suburbs. For example, Maupuia has a population of at least 20% smaller than Ōwhiro Bay, yet they receive on average 15% more buses to and from their suburb.
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School Bus Stops
If you live on Happy Valley Road or Severn Street, you know that all of the bus stops are for school buses only. This means that it can take upwards of 15-20 minutes to travel to a bus stop which will be serviced by a public bus. In total, there are 14 school-only bus stops in Ōwhiro Bay. When compared to the number of school-only bus stops in the entire city of Wellington, it shows that 42% of all the school bus stops in Wellington are in Ōwhiro Bay.
Forgotten Reports
There have been many reports written about the bus network since the 2018 changes. A common theme among all of them, when they discuss Ōwhiro Bay, is the need for more frequent and reliable buses. A report commissioned by the GWRC, conducted by Research First, recommended greater reliability for Route 29 and the extension of hours for the (now defunct) Route 29e that would improve service to Ōwhiro Bay. These recommendations were not acted on by Metlink. Many recommendations in other reports regarding the service to Ōwhiro Bay have also been ignored.
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The Smoking Gun
By categorising Wellington’s suburbs on the basis of their distance from the central city and their importance as a thoroughfare for other suburbs, it can be found that suburbs like Ōwhiro Bay, Seatoun, Houghton Bay, Maupuia, Melrose, Southgate, etc. are really quite similar to one another. When plotted on a graph against each other, comparing average buses per hour against population shows a linear trend. However, there is exactly one outlier who receives far fewer services than they should: Ōwhiro Bay