- By Laura Kvigstad, Auckland Council reporter funded by New Zealand on Air
Auckland Transport has reported that July was the first month since 2020 to have no deaths and serious injuries on the region’s roads.
At the Auckland Council’s transport, resilience and infrastructure committee meeting last week, Auckland Transport (AT) presented its first quarterly report for this council financial year.
One of the wins presented to the committee was how there were no deaths or serious injuries on Auckland roads in July 2024, the first month without a death since April 2020.
Councillor Mike Lee challenged the reported win and said there had been instances of injuries from violence on buses.
“Has AT considered putting notices on buses that if you see antisocial behaviour, violence or abuse because not all these cases are reported,” Lee asked.
AT has been installing screen dividers between passengers and drivers on buses.
“At last, the drivers are going to get protection. There’s still the passengers and I think that’s much more difficult.”
AT chief executive officer Dean Kimpton said violence, threats and aggression were separate measures to deaths and serious injuries.
“The first number to call when it is serious is 111 and we don’t want to confuse people with any other message,” Kimpton said.
AT public transport director Stacey van der Putten said they were working with Crime Stoppers to make reporting easier but having more methods added a challenge.
“[Reports] come through so many different sorts of methods whether that be the contact centre, our website, the app, Crime Stoppers, or just reported at a service centre, so we’re trying to get all that into one database,” van der Putten said.
She said it was also now easier for drivers to report incidents so AT would be able to see where incidents were happening most often and increase transport officers where needed.
