£2 to go anywhere in the Liverpool City Region
New single fare agreed as part of huge changes to local transport
HALTON residents will soon be able to travel anywhere across the Liverpool City Region for £2 as part of a radical overhaul of local transport.
The new single fare for all bus services was rubber-stamped by the Liverpool City Region’s (LCR) combined authority on Friday.
Halton is one of six councils in the LCR along with Sefton, Knowsley, Liverpool, Wirral and St Helens with the new fare covering the entire area.
It means some passengers will see a saving of up to 13 per cent in the cost of a single journey regardless of which service they use.
Young people will also continue to have access to all day unlimited travel for £2.20 until 2025 after the MyTicket scheme was capped.
Plans are also in the works to simplify the region’s wider ticketing system under a ‘tap and go system’.
Earlier this year, the LCR took a step towards the major reform of its buses after local leaders voted to confirm franchising as the preferred model for running the network - a landmark move that would reverse the industry’s deregulation in the mid 1980s.
Steve Rotheram, Mayor of the Liverpool City Region, said: “Today marks another massive step on our journey to revolutionise our region’s buses.
“Hundreds of thousands of people rely on buses to get about every day, yet too often they tell me that they are still too expensive, too unreliable and too confusing - I want to put that right.
“We’ve listened to people’s concerns and have responded with direct action that will help ease the financial burden - especially during the cost-of-living crisis - by making it cheaper to travel on our bus network.”
The new fare is subject to agreement with the bus operators and for an initial three-year period.
Subject to confirmation, the £12m Bus Services Improvement Plan (BSIP) allocation will be used to fund the measures which are designed to encourage more people to use the bus by helping them travel further for less as well as helping the environment.
He added: “This is just a down payment on my wider ambitions, though. I’m fighting to win London-style funding that will allow us to build a public transport network that is better connected, faster, and cleaner.
“If it’s good enough for the capital, then it’s the least that we should expect.”