Otago Regional Council has launched a campaign to help make buses, hubs and stops in Dunedin and Queenstown feel safer and more welcoming for everyone.

The campaign encourages people to be respectful and considerate of everyone using buses and urges people to report bad behaviour to the Police or ORC.

Otago Regional Council Transport Manager Lorraine Cheyne says ORC is asking bus users to lead by example through their behaviour and to also report any concerns.

“Most public transport customers are very respectful of others. This means most of the 12,000 trips in Dunedin and 5,000 trips in Queenstown taken on the Orbus network each day are without incident,” she says.

“At times though, we do see some problems with some people’s behaviour.”

“This campaign is about encouraging people to be respectful of each other. We want people to let us know if a situation makes them uncomfortable.”

“If any situation is potentially criminal or dangerous, the Police should be contacted in the first instance. We want everyone to have a positive experience when using the bus,” she says.

With the tagline ‘It’s cool to be kind’, the campaign asks people to respect everyone at the bus stop and on the bus, and to respect bus drivers.

ORC is continuing to work closely with Police and community leaders and groups on a range of initiatives through the Central City Advisory Group.

ORC encourages customers to report any problems they observe or experience on buses or at stops.

They can contact the Police by calling 105 (non-emergency) or 111 (emergency), or for non-urgent concerns, call ORC on 0800 672 8736 (Dunedin), 0800 672 8778 (Queenstown) or email transport@orc.govt.nz

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