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Phil Doyle/Stuff
Auckland Transport has rejected a request by Hammer Hardware Wellsford to become a Hop card retailer. (File photo)
Auckland Transport is not looking to “increase” the number of Hop card retailers in Wellsford – where there are none.
Auckland’s northernmost suburb has nowhere to buy or top-up a Hop card, with the nearest retailers about 19 kilometres away in Warkworth.
Hammer Hardware Wellsford, opposite the town’s bus station, recently applied to sell Hop cards.
Store owner Mitch Martin said people would sometimes ask if they sold Hop cards, and believed it made sense for his store to sell them. But Auckland Transport (AT) disagreed.
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“At present we’re not looking to increase the number of AT Hop retailers in your area,” AT said in an email to Martin.
A factor was the “limited number of retail devices”.
Chris McKeen/Stuff
There are no Hop card retailers or top-up stations north of Warkworth. (File photo)
“At [the] moment, Welsford [sic] residents will need to visit Warkworth Service Centre to buy or top-up AT Hop card.”
People could also buy or top-up cards online. The AT website said people should allow 10 days for shipping while it can take 24-72 hours for an online top-up to process.
Martin wanted to be a Hop card retailer to make public transport more accessible for the community and was “really disappointed” AT didn’t share his view.
He believed Hop cards should be sold in every town that has public transport.
Wellsford’s 998 bus service runs to-and-from Warkworth on an hourly basis, seven days a week. The service began in 2019 and is funded by the Rodney Transport Targeted Rate – which residents pay on top of their usual rates to accelerate local transport projects.
“It seems ridiculous that there’s this big push to use public transport and yet they won’t make it easy to ride if you live in Wellsford,” Martin said.
“If you want people to use public transport, make it easy.”
Martin said AT’s decision reflected the Wellsford community’s feeling of being left out of Auckland, since the Auckland councils amalgamation in 2010.
“It just smells of super city. Small towns never win in a super city.”
According to a map of Hop card retailers and top-up machine locations, city fringe areas in the south, such as Pukekohe and Waiuku, are well served.
Auckland Transport has been approached for comment.
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