Pāpāmoa school bus chaos: Extra service reinstated after students stuck

Pāpāmoa College students were "stranded" on Monday afternoon after a Bay of Plenty Regional Council bus didn’t pick them up. Photo / Mead Norton

Dozens of Pāpāmoa College students were left stranded for more than an hour on Monday after a school bus failed to show, prompting safety concerns.

An anonymous Facebook post said up to 40 students were left without transport and others were crammed on to an overcrowded bus, leaving families scrambling and raising renewed questions about pressure on the rapidly growing school’s transport network.

It said the one available bus was “crammed beyond capacity ... kids packed in far too tightly”.

“Parents and students were put in a stressful and potentially unsafe situation.”

One student commented, “It’s genuinely not safe for students to board”.

They said buses were “always full” and an extra bus was “extremely important” for student safety.

A parent commented, “Even the first stop in the morning leaves no seats some days.

“My kids had told me since the start of term, there’s been days the bus driver has had to drive past kids waiting because they’re so crammed.”

Another commented, “My son didn’t get home until 4.15 as [there were] no buses.

“And the teachers were not informed either.”

“People are really worried about it – and rightly so,” Bay of Plenty MP and Pāpāmoa resident Tom Rutherford said.

Rutherford stepped in after parents raised concerns in late February about overcrowding, unreliable services and inconsistent morning and afternoon buses.

Pāpāmoa College also contacted him, saying it had repeatedly flagged roll growth and bus capacity issues throughout 2025.

He said the regional council added a dedicated morning and afternoon bus to ease pressure, monitoring capacity daily and prioritising safety.

This had been in place for the past month.

No major timetable changes were planned until “at least Term 3”.

Rutherford reached out to them again after a bus didn’t show on Monday.

Bay of Plenty MP Tom Rutherford. Photo / Alex Cairns

He said it wasn’t communicated to families or the school, leaving students “waiting around for an extended period of time”.

The school supervised students until they got alternative transport.

“A huge credit to Pāpāmoa College for the way they handled it,” Rutherford said.

Bay of Plenty Regional Council acting transport director Jen Proctor said the council had been monitoring bus boarding levels and, based on the information available at the time, “the additional afternoon support was stood down from Monday”.

“However, Monday’s demand was then higher than previous afternoons had been, therefore the new arrangement did not work as intended.”

The additional afternoon support bus has been “temporarily reinstated” as demand is further monitored, Proctor said.

“We will continue working with the school and operator.”

Pāpāmoa College planned to meet with the regional council this week and said it would have more information available after the meeting.

Annabel Reid is a multimedia journalist for the Bay of Plenty Times and Rotorua Daily Post, based in Rotorua. Originally from Hawke’s Bay, she has a Bachelor of Communications from the University of Canterbury.