Reasons to retain the No. 154 service journeys

DEAR Leicestershire County Council and Centrebus,

I moved to Loughborough in March 2019 and, as a keen daily walker, immediately started to look for bus routes that I could use to take me a few miles out of town for a nice linear walk back. This method provides a change from a circular walk directly from my house (in central Loughborough) - which naturally involves walking in a built-up area on both the outward and return parts of the walk.

I am looking for a daily walk of between 1 and 2 hours - but often walk for longer than this in good weather.

I find buses in this area ideal for a varied 1.5 - 2+ hour walk and it is obviously a much ‘greener’ option than taking the car somewhere to do a circular walk. In fact, I wonder why more people don’t do this - especially those with a bus pass, which I don’t have!

So far, I have used routes 8 and 127 and - best by far - the 154. The latter gives me many options, including a walk in the lovely Charnwood hills. I have walked home (or elsewhere) from several destinations along the route - Old Woodhouse, Woodhouse Eaves and Swithland and it is the only service that visits these places.

I was, of course, dismayed to find out that Centrebus intends to reduce the 154 service so drastically! But if I’m going to feel the impact of this reduction on my ‘leisure’ activity, how must people in these places who regularly use the 154 bus as their main method of transport be feeling? Extremely upset, I imagine!

I put ‘leisure’ in inverted commas because walking has so many benefits that go way beyond leisure. I hardly need tell you that we are in the middle of both obesity and climate change crises - and walking and public transport have very important parts to play in reducing the impact of both of these things.

Instead of reducing a service such as this, ways must be found to encourage people to use it. Because once it’s been reduced, people will have to go back to using other, less green, forms of transport and it will be much, much harder to get them back into ‘good’ habits again!

Don’t assume everyone has access to a car, either! By reducing a rural bus service you are making it more likely that some people will become more isolated, lonely - and, yes, sedentary and unfit.

Maybe a ‘bus walk’ just isn’t something keen walkers consider round here - though it was where I previously lived in the Pennines: a bus walk from my town could take some of the hard work out of a walk, leaving you with a pleasant, mainly downhill, stroll back. Ideal for the less fit and elderly! Some buses were even laid on mainly for walkers during the summer!

http:// www. hbwalkersaction. org. uk/906/info.html

I realise that lack of customers has been a factor in Centrebus’s decision to massively reduce the 154 service. So perhaps using it for walking could even be something you might encourage through marketing!

But please, please please do something to keep more of the Monday-Friday journeys of the 154 route than is currently being proposed by Centrebus. Janina Holubecki MA MAHI

ECHO editor’s note.

Since sending a copy of her letter to us, Janina has received an email from Leicestershire County Council

Although it looks good news for some at least, regarding the service we decided to publish her letter anyway to reflect the strong feelings felt and arguments for the service to continue.

In the e-mail the council says that following discussions with Centrebus, Leicestershire County Council has reached agreement to allow the service to continue to operate hourly (Monday to Saturday) with a revised timetable in operation from 26 January 2020.

The email did add however that there would be “a minor change, which will see some off-peak journeys not serving Station Road and Reservoir Road in Cropston in order to improve reliability on the service.”