Minister admits cancellations as buses await repairs

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 28: More than a third of the island’s buses were out of service yesterday.

Transport Minister Terry Lister said 47 of the island’s 121-strong fleet were in the depot undergoing maintenance work or repairs.

He admitted the maximum number of buses Government could afford to have out of action before the schedule was adversely affected was 35.

Manpower

Mr Lister said: “We can operate the system brilliantly when we are 35 buses down.

“But we have struggled over the last two weeks and had days when there have been 50 buses out of action.

“The situation comes about due to funding and staff.

“For two weeks we have not had enough manpower to do all the maintenance on the buses. We have run the buses pretty hard and we are now at the point where we should be doing serious, preventative maintenance.

“We are bringing additional manpower on board.”

Senator Michael Dunkley, deputy leader of the OBA, said: “It is totally unacceptable that such a large percentage of buses are unable to be in service due to maintenance issues and the inability to fund the purchase of parts.

“For too long Bermudians have suffered, whether it be not having buses to pick our children up at school or buses not being able to keep to the schedule.

“The current Government has allowed this to impact our lives in a negative way.

“People are tired of excuses and finger pointing. They want the matter resolved.”

Mr Lister told a press conference that he hoped the bus system would be running with just 35 buses down within the next couple of weeks.

But he conceded there had been cancellations on some of the quieter routes, and the lack of buses had affected some schools.

He added: “We have had an issue in some schools and we are obviously very concerned about this.

“One of the problems we have got is that our buses are manufactured in Germany. The average age of our fleet is 14 years old and there are as many as five different sorts of transmission.

“If we cannot do it ourselves we have to send the transmissions back to Germany and that is part of the slowdown.

“We would like to keep the fleet younger. One of the things we have talked about is bringing German mechanics over here to do the work.

Overdue

“We have sent some mechanics out there in the past but we have not been able to do that for the last four years.”

Mr Lister admitted the bus schedule also needed updating as it had remained unchanged since 2001.

He said: “We are determined that this year we will have a new schedule done. It is terribly overdue.”