‘Good ideas’ put forward in talks on bus services

The West of England Mayor held a public meeting in Bath on Tuesday to discuss the future of transport and buses.

The meeting was held at Southdown Methodist Church, and Dan Norris was joined by B&NES councillors Liz Hardman, Dine Romero, Winston Duguid and Dr Yukteshwar Kumar.

“It was a great turnout,” said the Metro Mayor, “with some really good ideas and most importantly people were open to new ideas and different ways of doing things. I often find the very best ideas come from the public so I was grateful for everyone’s input tonight.”

The authority wants to review and rethink the whole local network and how it is integrated.

The idea is to create the best solutions both for vulnerable people who have few alternatives but also for isolated rural residents and commuters.

Mr Norris still wants to get people out of their cars even where the cost of running a bus starts to run into hundreds of pounds per journey or where there are just no drivers available.

“I can’t magic up bus drivers,” he said, “but I can and will have a big conversation with local people about public transport.”

Last year, Mr Norris agreed in principle that the authority would pay to keep all the current ‘supported’ bus services running, but they have introduced a ‘value for money criteria.’

Now the authority says it will continue funding supported services providing they cost less than £40 per passenger per journey where bus companies agree to run them. The routes at risk include buses 82, 11, 12, 20, 22, 42, D2,171, 173, 178 and 379.

Saving any particular service is dependent on finding someone who is willing to run it.

For further information visit: www.westofengland-ca.gov.uk/bigchoices-on-buses.