Western Daily Press (Saturday)
Economy paying the price as our rural bus services start to ‘fade away’
Rural buses have become increasingly expensive to run and less attractive to use, prompting a call for Government action. Alex Ross analyses the decline, assesses the implications and asks ‘where do we go from here?’
“AN advanced city is not one where even the poor use cars, but rather one where even the rich use public transport.”
So said Enrique Penalosa, former mayor of Bogota, the capital of Colombia, during a talk on the city’s beleaguered transport system.
It is a statement that rural parts of the West Country could arguably learn from.
Almost one in five people in the UK live in rural areas.
But unlike their urban-based counterparts, they are the ones who have been facing years of decline in public transport provision.
While cities such as Bristol have seen huge investment in schemes like the Metrobus, in counties across the South West more than 100 routes have been lost in just three years.
A dramatic reduction in council funding is partly to blame, say operators and campaign groups – funding in the region has reduced significantly from eight years ago.
Another reason for the reduction in routes has been the rise in car ownership.
As it stands, 94 per cent of people in villages have a car or van, according to the National Travel Survey, and now only around two per cent of all journeys in rural areas are made on a bus.
As a study recently released by the Campaign for Better Transport says, part of the challenge now is to get people who gave up on public transport to return to buses.
Otherwise, car ownership, it says, will perpetuate the cycle of decline.
The scathing report, called The Future of Rural Bus Services in the UK, described the current provision of rural public transport as “piecemeal and fragmented”.
It is a situation that is hitting the rural economy hard.
This was acknowledged by John Birtwistle, head of policy at First Group’s UK Bus division.
Speaking to the rural economy select committee, he said the “whole rural economy was largely dependent on rural transport”, adding that many people treated it as a lifeline.
He said: “I believe that public transport, particularly bus services, in rural areas are in decline.
“Commercial services are suffering due to the adverse effects, even in rural areas, of congestion and parking problems in market towns.
“It makes the services more expensive to operate and less attractive to passengers and that means that quite often they fade away.
“The safety nets provided by local authorities through tendered services are becoming fewer and fewer as local authorities’ expenditure on discretionary spend reduces.
“Discretionary spend is diverted to mandatory duties.”
He added: “We are in a situation where rural economies are definitely suffering as a result of cuts to bus services.”
This is backed up by a report by the Federation of Small Businesses called Going The Extra Mile, in which it found that half of small firms believed road quality and the public transport system had declined over recent years.
Bus services generate an estimated £45 billion in footfall, the body says.
Mike Cherry, national chairman w of the FSB, said: “Most small businesses rely on roads and public transport for accessing goods, customers and employees. This is par-
As a business, we would definitely benefit from a more frequent service which was easily accessible. The question is, have too many people already turned their back on the buses, however?
TRACY PARKER
ticularly true in rural areas where the reliance on the local road network is huge.
“Small firms in these communities often report little or no access to vital public transport links like rail or buses. Where there are services, they are often infrequent and unreliable, hindering staff trying to get to work, as well as visiting customers.
“Small businesses want to see investment in rural public transport and more resources earmarked for local roads.
“With most road journeys starting or ending on local roads, investment in smaller projects must be prioritised to help alleviate congestion and bottlenecks, and improve productivity and growth.”
Tracy Parker is president of Trowbridge Chamber of Commerce and owner of coffee shop Leykers in the town.
She lives in Chapmanslade, a village 10 miles from Trowbridge. To drive, it takes 20 minutes; on the bus, it takes almost an hour.
She said: “I could not survive without my car. The bus services are too unreliable to go to and from work on them. It is something my elderly cus-
tomers complain about, too. Many depend on it to come into town from villages around.
“As a business, we would definitely benefit from a more frequent service which was easily accessible – I think that could lead to more people coming into town.
“The question is, have too many people already turned their back on the buses, however? It is a trend which needs turning round.”
The Campaign for Better Transport’s The Future of Rural Bus Services agrees.
It said the situation had deteriorated so much that public transport was often seen as a last resort to get around in rural communities.
It said: “Even the least affluent households in the remotest areas ran a car such as to get to and from work.
“More affluent households made more journeys by car and travelled further. The car is seen as crucial to attaining and maintaining employment. Many rural dwellers without access to a car were forced to be dependent on friends and relatives for lifts to work and shopping.”
It added: “Rural dwellers were found to be unwilling or unable to consider public transport as an alternative.”
Also at the select committee, Ben Colson, chairman of Bus Users UK, complained that rural communities were getting “secondhand” buses disposed of from urban routes.
He said: “As we see more sophisticated buses required in urban areas, the old methodology of the trickling down of those vehicles cascading to rural areas means they are increasingly not fit for working in rural areas.
“Such as a low floor, for example. It means that some routes have been withdrawn because the road surface is not adequate. It means that some people have to climb off the bus onto a bank to get off the bus.
“It is just not fit for purpose.” So what is the answer?
Darren Shirley, chief executive from Campaign for Better Transport, told the committee changes needed to take place to improve public transport in rural area. They included:
Greater local knowledge
Better partnerships between councils and bus operators
Flexibility in transport provision (taxis, minibuses, mopeds).
Mr Shirley said: “There is no clear framework from Government, no policy really, for rural transport. What we really need to see is a more coherent policy from Government.
“We need a bus investment strategy from the Government which can pull together all the different Acts, all the guidance, all the policy, to set out a direction, set out the duties and responsibilities required and tie funding to that.
“There is more central Government should be doing immediately to solve the problem we have with buses, particularly for rural transport, which is the most acutely affected by the problems we have now.”
One key aspect is for funding provided to central Government to be ring-fenced to ensure it is spent only public transport, rather than being used for other services.
A Department for Transport spokesman said: “We are determined to do everything possible to improve journeys for passengers.
“That is why we provide around £250 million every year to support local bus services, and give councils extra powers to work with bus companies to shape the services communities want to see in the areas they live.”