More people are using Otago's public buses, but increasing the number of passengers will continue to be a struggle, Otago Regional councillor Bryan Scott says.
"Patronage is being held back by other economic options out there," Cr Scott said at a recent committee meeting.
Figures released for the meeting showed the number of trips since services were changed, including rationalising services on the southern route and Saturday services and to the Dunedin system, show for the first six months of this year trips had increased 2.5% on the corresponding period last year.
The improvements to the southern routes for services between Dunedin and Mosgiel and Brighton, Abbotsford and Green Island included new runs and the removal of others.
Those improvements had led to a 6.4% increase in trips taken on those services in the first six months of this year compared with the same period last year.
While the changes to Saturday services to align them with weekday services led to a 11.7% increase in trips over the six-month period.
Cr Scott believed cheap parking and the ease of using cars was affecting bus patronage.
Cr Michael Deaker said 1.126 million trips on Dunedin's bus network in that period was "reassuring".
Cr Sam Neill said while the percentage figures sounded good, it was still relatively low numbers of "bums on seats". The figures did not tell the whole picture, except to say "we're going in the right direction".
Queenstown showed a similar increase in trips, from 517,758 in the year to June 2011 to 619,816 in the year ending June 2012.
The Queenstown services were part of a 32-month trial, which started in July 2010, with the aim of the services becoming commercially viable by its end.
The first service to be operated on a non-subsidised basis would be Arthurs Point.
The operator planned to operate the Arthurs Point run on a reduced subsidy to start with and then without a subsidy from the end of September.
