Limited Stops

A good friend lives in a village and has just had to stop driving. There is a regular bus service to the nearest town,following a circular route, all services going the same direction. It takes her 20 minutes to get into the local big town but an hour and a half to return.

We have five buses a day from the estate on which I live. It is not a long walk,about 20 minutes,to the main road but that it beyond some especially in bad weather. The last one is 1:30 PM out wards and just 15 minutes later to return from the shops. H has an appt this afternoon at the INR clinic and we will have to use taxis both ways.

At my previous address, the local bus had stops in the town and then became a Hail and Ride for the side roads, which worked really well.

Where I am now, the service has been cut so much that it finishes at 3.20pm. Ridiculous! It means using cabs if you need to go into town for GP appointments etc. - £14 round trip! We have a high proportion of elderly people in our area, so they are being hit hard

This is a clever plan to remove the service by stealth. They will argue that people are not using the bus so it is not viable to run the service

Could you get onto them to see whether they would change that to having request stops in between the limited stops? They are not helping the local economy if they are running empty, let alone their own takings.

I think you will find most of the County Councils with some bus routes are being forced to make reductions thanks to the present government.
I am a member of Bus Users UK , who's website www.bususers.org/complaints/ can help you.
I think announcement's will be made in the March Budget by the government which will effect all ages with cuts to save money by them and the County Council Councillors for example in Oxfordshire are trying to take it further by asking those with bus passes to pay a fare if they can afford to , despite the bus pass being something you apply for its been treated like a state benefit.
Mick

I suppose the only consolation is that the bus still runs at all. It must be so difficult with rural transport and all the cut backs they are making have you tried informing the bus company how difficult they are making things for the villagers?