Use it, or lose it warning over buses
A BUS service for Spencers Wood and Swallowfield is to be resinstated – with a warning to use it or lose it – after Wokingham Borough Council agreed a funding deal with Reading Buses.
The Tiger 7 route was put on hold from Monday, January 17, due to a lack of customers. Reading Buses said at the time, it was partly due to long-term roadworks between Hartely Wintney and Fleet, and partly due to the pandemic.
As well as low passenger numbers, the company was also facing a shortage of bus drivers.
The decision left the two villages without any public transport.
Since the earlier cancellation of the Tiger 7 service, the chairman of Swallowfield Parish Council, Cllr John Anderson, wrote to Reading Buses and engaged with Wokingham Borough Council, including its CEO, its assistant director highways and transport and his transport team to ascertain the situation, explore the options and convey the strong need for a bus service serving the parish.
Cllr Anderson said: “In fact WBC’s Climate Emergency Action Plan states that: ‘Residents will be encouraged to use public transport more frequently. The Council is reviewing its tendered bus network and aims to expand and improve the use of public transport’.
“Nearly 200 local residents responded to a transport survey conducted by the Parish Council and this information, along with residents’ understandable concerns, have been shared publicly and with WBC.”
At a meeting of the Executive last month, it was agreed to use funds from house builders, known as Section 106 money, to provide the cash so the service could be reinstated.
Although the meeting discussed six months’ worth of funding, it has since been decided to run it for three months.
Reading Buses said in a statement on its website that the service would resume on Monday, March 14, and would maintain key journeys between Reading and Riseley, but with some adjustments to reflect that the tiger 7 will no longer run to Hartley Wintney or Fleet.
The service falls in the company’s Wokingham and Reading zone, with a daysaver 5 ticket costing £19.50. These cover five non-consecutive days’ worth of travel across the company’s network.
Wokingham Borough Council leader John Halsall welcomed the move, but warned it was a use it or lose it situation.
“Traffic hasn’t come back to buses, and the government has indicated it will continue with some grant funding for buses, but they haven’t told bus companies what they will get,” he said.
“What we’re trying to do is maintain the services we’ve got while these conversations are finalised. We can’t subsidise buses forever to the extent we have been doing, but hopefully the traffic will come back and the government grant funding will continue for a little longer.”
The three-month reprieve would, he said, give everyone time to “review the whole scenario in the interest of our residents”.