Waikato Regional Council transport committee minutes indicate that this year’s Raglan bus improvements are proving to be popular. Latest data from the council shows that annual passenger numbers are up by 4.2%.
The double decker commenced service in January and is proving popular. At the moment there are seats available from Raglan, but on the busiest trips the double decker is close to capacity from Whatawhata into Hamilton. The school assist buses are also experiencing heavy loadings.
WRC staff have implemented changes to the Raglan and Whatawhata School assist services to better utilise available capacity across the two buses used to operate these trips. These changes mainly affect people traveling between Whatawhata and Hamilton. Service timings to and from Raglan have also been adjusted to improve service reliability. These changes commenced from the 4th of March.
The minutes says that, “If patronage on the Raglan service continues to grow there will be a need to add more capacity, potentially later this year or early next year. This will be discussed with the three service funding partners being Waikato District Council, the regional council and the NZ Transport Agency.”
The actual numbers in February on the Raglan route were:
| Boarding Type |
Monthly Result | 12 Months to Date | |||
| Boardings | % change compared to same month last year |
Boardings | % change compared to same period one year prior |
||
| Raglan | First boarding | 7,139 | +12.9% | 64,242 | +4.2% |
| Transfer boarding | 338 | +65.0% | 2,009 | -19.2% | |
| Total | 7,477 | +14.6% | 66,251 | +3.3% | |