National bus card delayed for third time

Tuesday, 10 June 2025

Only route 29 - between Christchurch city and the airport - has had a contactless payment upgrade in Canterbury.

The New Zealand Transport Agency has commissioned an independent review of its $1.3 billion national ticketing solution - Motu Move - in the wake of ongoing delays.

The new system - meant to unify the multiple different bus cards across Aotearoa and enable contactless card payments - was meant to have launched in Canterbury by now, but no longer has a release date.

Transport Minister Chris Bishop has asked the agency to please explain, while the Taxpayers Union is calling for the whole programme to be scrapped.

Motu Move was meant to roll out in Canterbury by mid 2025, but it has been delayed for a third time.

It follows a May 30 update from NZTA that Motu Move - first due to roll-out in Timaru in early 2025, followed by Greater Christchurch in mid-2025, then the rest of Aotearoa - has been delayed for a third time.

Transport agency staff were now regrouping to revise the regional roll-out plan and create a new timeline, which a spokesperson said would be released in August - about a month after an NZTA-commissioned independent review of the programme was due.

The agency has previously described the Motu Move trial on route 29 - Christchurch city to the airport - as a “great success”. However, that trial did not involve Motu Move cards, rather allowed people to tap on with their personal debit or credit cards.

Transport Minister Chris Bishop said he was concerned about the project and delays, and had recently met with the team behind it.

An NZTA spokesperson told The Press on May 23 the delays were because of challenges with the “more complex components” of the technology behind the new system. System tests were ongoing, the spokesperson said.

The Press understands those components included the regional nuances of how much it cost to ride a bus and who could get concessions.

On Monday, the NZTA spokesperson said staff had been exploring “alternative delivery approaches” for Canterbury, saying Motu Move features might be implemented in phases - appearing to suggest a contactless payment system could be rolled out before the cards were ready.

Transport Minister Chris Bishop said he was concerned about the project and delays, having recently met with the team behind it - the NTS Governance Board - “to stress the significant investment … and to encourage them to exercise leadership to get the project back on track”.

Taxpayer Union’s Alex Emes believed Motu Move should be scrapped, saying it was an expensive “vanity project”.

He said he expected a copy of the independent review findings in July, along with a delivery plan.

According to NZTA, the programme was expected to cost $1.3b over 14 years.

That included 10 years of operating the system, plus four years worth of design, procurement and implementation work. According to information released by NZTA under official information laws, some $528 million was earmarked for designing and building the system.

As of December, $146m had been spent and a further $800m was allocated to operational costs, which NZTA began incurring through the route 29 trial.

At the time, Greater Christchurch was scheduled to get the new system in mid-2025, with other regions - including Auckland and Wellington - getting it later, in 2025 and 2026.

Taxpayer Union’s Alex Emes believed the whole programme should be scrapped, saying it was an expensive “vanity project” and it would be better to just focus on enabling contactless payments with debit and credit cards.

An NZTA spokesperson said to maintain existing regional systems over the same period of time - without any upgrades or providing contactless payment options - would still cost $785m.

The spokesperson said Motu Move could be rolled out in phases, as did Giles Southwell, Environment Canterbury’s head of corporate and public transport services.

“We know our customers are looking forward to being able to use their contactless payment cards to pay for transport on our network, and we look forward to providing this for them,” Southwell said.

Regional councillor Deon Swiggs said NZTA’s lack of communication and clear timelines was frustrating, saying elected members were often the ones who residents blamed for delays.

He said if the contactless payment system was ready for launch without the cards then NZTA should do that in the meantime, however overall Motu Move was a worthy programme.

“No point in throwing the baby out with the bath water,” he said.