Greyhound races for the mines

A CONTRACT between Greyhound Commercial and EDI Mining has resulted in the transport giant operating 40 services per week in the Bowen Basin.

Greyhound Australia CEO Robert Thomas expects the mining industry to start picking up with improvements in both investment and mineral prices.

“It’s definitely a great area for us to get involved in as they need a major player for transport at the mines,” says Thomas.

“Whether it’s in South Australia with BHP’s Olympic Dam mine, in the Bowen Basin with many users, Rio Tinto in Western Australia, this is a key area we want to focus on – we have the luxury of having all the infrastructure already in place, so it’s simply a bolt on.

“For a long time, Greyhound was simply an express service taking people all around the country, but it is more and more required of a leader to find diverse revenue streams.”

He says mining companies had traditionally accepted what was available for transport, with operating cost a key factor.

“We leverage the skill sets learned from our experience of delivering safe, on time, low cost service to consumers and apply them to the mining industry,” says Thomas.

The Brisbane-based company has also brought aircraft monitoring technology to the coach industry in Australia, so Greyhound can keep mines informed of employees’ travel progress.

“We utilise state-of-the-art maintenance systems to manage our modern fleet, which ensures the highest levels of reliability, safety and on-time performance,” says Thomas.