Integrated ticket deal expected to boost popularity of airport bus

Long-distance coach passengers are being hooked into a single ticket with an Auckland Airport bus service to boost its popularity after a sluggish takeoff.

Although patronage on the Manukau Airporter 380 service almost doubled in the first five months of this financial year, compared with the equivalent part of 2008, that was off a low initial average base of just 2.5 passengers on each of 78 daily bus trips.

The Auckland Regional Transport Authority, which subsidises the service to connect with trains at the Papatoetoe railway station, says patronage rose from 28,845 in 2008 to 51,331 passengers for the five months to November 30.

Although that still meant an average of just 4.5 passengers on each trip, both the authority and the airport company hope an "integrated" ticket deal reached before Christmas with InterCity Coachlines, the Naked Bus and the Magic Travellers Network will lift interest in the airport service.

Airport sustainability adviser Martin Fryer said travellers who previously jumped into taxis to catch flights after getting off long-distance coaches in central Manukau were now able to use their coach tickets to travel on the 380 bus service, which runs half-hourly between 4.15am and midnight.

An award-winning travel plan involving employees of more than 20 companies based at the airport is also being used to publicise the service, which began in June, 2008.

A Herald reporter who caught a train from Britomart and then a bus from Papatoetoe station on the service's first morning saw only one other fellow passenger on it, a Manukau City transport official, even though the $8 cost of the combined trip was just over half of the $15 fare on the more direct Airbus service from Auckland to the airport.

Despite the official patronage figures, a Herald reader emailed the newspaper at the end of November saying he saw buses at least five times a day on their airport runs and they were "always empty".

"It breaks my heart," wrote Krish Naidu.

"The maximum number of people I have ever seen on that is three people - it is appalling taxpayers' money goes into something which nobody uses because most people who work either take private transport or get dropped off."

But the regional transport authority sees patronage growth on the airport service as "a good result for such a short period".

"Further initiatives in partnership with the operator are planned to expand on this growth," said communications manager Sharon Hunter.

Those would include greater marketing efforts and onboard research into how passengers were using the service and what initiatives they would like to see.

The more direct Airbus service, which runs 149 airport trips a day, has also increased its patronage since introducing a round-the-clock schedule in November.

It is believed to have carried about 47,000 passengers in December, a 23 per cent increase on the same month of 2008, or an average of just over 10 on each bus trip.

The transport authority says a connection between Northern Express buses from Albany and the Airbus service on a single passenger ticket has also helped to boost its growth and increase accessibility to the airport by public transport.

Mr Fryer said the bus services were an important part of the airport's staff travel plan, which includes 750 registered car-poolers.

His organisation is also lobbying the Auckland Regional Transport Committee and the Transport Agency to provide rail links or busway rapid transit to the airport well before the final decade of a 30-year draft transport strategy.

It has said in a submission to the committee on the strategy that a proposal to leave the airport without dedicated rapid transit links until at least 2031 is "simply unacceptable".