Commercial bus tours of Christchurch's earthquake-damaged central city could be operating from the middle of the year.
The Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority, or CERA, is seeking expressions of interests from bus companies to operate tours through the cordoned-off area.
The authority's operations manager, Warwick Issacs, says the bus and walking tours into the cordoned-off zones earlier this year and last year proved extremely popular.
Mr Issacs says the area is still hazardous, so to win the tender a company would have to have a thorough health and safety plan to unsure that no-one is harmed.
He says a contract could be in place by the end of April.
