KEY POINTS:
Auckland passenger trains will not run tomorrow but free trips will be offered along many bus routes.
Northern Express buses between Albany and Auckland will join the traditional practice of those run by NZ Bus (formerly Stagecoach) and offer free travel on Christmas Day, although on a reduced
Sunday timetable.
Up to 20,000 passengers have taken advantage of the Yuletide gesture in past years, especially on routes to the region's beaches after Christmas lunch.
Unlike last Christmas there will be no fear of having to pay the piper through New Year fare rises.
The Auckland Regional Transport Authority, which irked passengers by allowing train and bus fare rises just two weeks into 2007, says it has completed an annual review of operating costs and decided there would be no justification for increases next year.
That follows concern in the Auckland Regional Council about slow patronage growth on the buses which it and the Government subsidise through the authority.
Authority communications manager Sharon Hunter said that although bus operators had endured average cost rises of 3.4 per cent this year, these were offset by three rounds of fare hikes from 2004.
But she said the authority was moving towards a simpler "integrated" fares policy which it expected to introduce in 2009 for subsidised services under its auspices, as part of a move towards a single region-wide public transport ticket the year after that.
Although the authority has no control over non-subsidised services, NZ Bus chief executive Bruce Emson said his company had no intention of raising its fares on these.
Tertiary students have added cause for celebration, being promised a doubling of their public transport discounts in February, to 40 per cent off bus, rail and ferry fares.
Although no trains will run tomorrow, and services in parts of the rail network will be disrupted until early January while track construction work forges ahead in several areas, passengers are promised improvements next year.
Buses will replace trains along the entire western line and between Britomart and Newmarket on the southern line from Boxing Day to New Year's Eve.
They will also be used to replace trains along the southern line between Britomart and Otahuhu between January 2 and January 6.
That is to allow preparations for remodelling Newmarket's rail junction and station for $70 million by mid-2009 and for preliminary earthworks on a 1km railway trench to be dug through New Lynn for more than $100 million.
Buses will operate between Henderson and Waitakere from January 1 to January 5 to allow work on a railway bridge on a section of track duplication work that Government agency Ontrack says will be completed to Swanson in June.
A new platform will also be available from January 7 at the Sturges Rd station just west of Henderson, the latest to be redeveloped in Ontrack's $600 million upgrade of Auckland's basic rail network.
Ontrack is pulling in about 200 rail workers from around the country for the Christmas construction push, which will include track lowering work beneath Broadway in Newmarket, and between Remuera Rd and St Marks Rd.
That is to allow enough clearance under road bridges for electric trains and to build two new temporary stations while the permanent station is redeveloped on its existing site.
* For special holiday-period timetables and details of bus replacement services along the rail network go to www.maxx.co.nz
