KEY POINTS:
Mother Theresa was not alone, it seems, in having the odd crisis of faith. Earlier this week, public transport crusader Mike Lee had his own little meltdown. The Auckland Regional Council chairman despaired that pouring ever-growing public subsidies into the pockets of private bus operators was "like pumping
blood into the patient and getting the odd twitch".
He was bemoaning the fact that despite an 89 per cent increase in subsidies since 2004, from $45 million to $85.1 million, Auckland bus patronage had increased only 1.2 per cent - or within the statistical margin of error.
For Mr Lee, the crisis of faith was more about the ability of private bus operators to deliver the dream, than in the dream itself. He says he feels like the man who puts his money into a vending machine and ends up frantically banging the sides trying to make something come out.
He plans, if re-elected, "to study the feasibility of a small publicly-owned bus company along the lines of the very successful Christchurch Red Bus Company. It would at least provide some competition for the private operators. What else can you do, keep pouring money in? How much will people tolerate?"
He says that in Christchurch, patronage has increased quite successfully with a ratepayer subsidy of 68 cents a passenger trip, compared to $1.51 in Auckland.
Of course, reversing the trends of half a century was never going to be easy. As the Auckland Regional Transport Authority statement of intent points out, "since the 1950s, most funding has been applied to expanding Auckland's motorway system to the detriment of passenger transport with patronage plummeting to one of the lowest levels of any major city in the world - 7 per cent of total trips."
While the overall increase in bus patronage figures in ARTA's 2006/07 annual report is not encouraging, the message is not all doom and gloom. What stands out is that when a service actually meets the customer's needs, they will use it.
The Northern Express Bus is the outstanding example of that, with patronage nearly doubling since start-up in November 2005, as reputation of reliability and convenience spread. Last month, marking the one millionth passenger, North Shore Mayor George Wood said "the service has managed to do what many people thought was impossible, get North Shore-ites out of their cars and on to public transport, and they are doing it in their droves." A survey revealed that 39 per cent were first-time public transport users who intended to keep using the bus.
No doubt that had something to do with punctuality of the service scoring 99 per cent - a fantasy which those of us stuck on normal bus routes can only dream of.
The other glimmer of hope is the increases of patronage on the two main rail lines, up 15.6 per cent on the southern/eastern service, and 11.6 per cent on the western line.
The western line figures are distorted by the fall that occurred during the double-tracking saga. In July last year, patronage on the western line was up 32.9 per cent on the previous year - in August, up 46.9 per cent. But once summer came and the service calamities that resulted from the double tracking began in earnest, patronage plummeted. In February this year, it was slightly down on the previous year, by April down 12.8 per cent.
Now passenger figures are picking up but with more work to be done, recovering lost customers will take time.
Both the Northern express bus success story and our flirtation with rail travel show Aucklanders are not averse to public transport, as long as it offers an attractive alternative to car travel.
A big attraction of both the northern bus and the rail services is they have the potential to get people to work faster than by car. As congestion on the roads increases - there's said to be an extra 40 cars entering Auckland's car pool every day - the advantage of speedier journeys is only going to increase. Particularly as more dedicated busways come into being.
