News Snippets
After the Stone consultation a little while back, Staffordshire County Council is running another one now for bus passengers in its Lichfield, Rugely and Tamworth areas. The supported services on which it needs feedback are listed on the consultation page and the associated form is very open ended. Like the Stone consultation, it is difficult to see what exactly is behind this but I hope it is nothing as what lay behind a similar exercise in Cheshire East in 2012. The deadline for the new consultation is just over three weeks away at February 28th.
Worcestershire County Council have been sent messages as to the unacceptability of bus service cuts and it got featured in a local newspaper article too. Apparently, comments have been collated although the Campaign for Better Transport is contesting the expectation that all comments have been included. Thursday will see a decision from the council’s cabinet and they have pledged not to break the law. In reality, that probably means that they want to avoid going where North Yorkshire Council now finds itself. Perhaps, greater legal protection for essential bus services is needed than is the case at present. The current government’s treatment of bus services shows that it will not do much for that cause though.
Cumbria County Council is talking about phasing in savings by looking at nudging bus operators to operate services without subsidies along with other options. £1m is set aside for that purpose though it would be better not to do anything too drastic. The overwhelming message to the council appears to be the unpopularity of what is proposed and it’s not just about bus services either. Interestingly, a majority appear to be willing to accept council tax rises in place of service cuts. It’s something that possibly should be considered more widely. The corollary to losing services to spending cuts is paying for them through tax, never a popular suggestion but that reality is facing us all now.
After looking as if they were going to have more savings than expected, the decision to reduce funding for buses in North Yorkshire is being reviewed at a meeting this coming Friday. There apparently was the sort of silo thinking that results in the passing of costs from one department to another that negates any savings in the first place. Hopefully, enough concerned members of the public can attend to make their feelings known. One service did survive on consultation but there have been saving reductions elsewhere and there now are concerns about a reduction in the independence of the elderly that forces them into care homes. That, of course, could increase council costs too so any saving on bus funding would be a false economy.
At the end of March, Monmouthshire County Council is taking over bus service between Chepstow and Monmouth via Trellech from Chepstow Classic at the end of March. Thankfully, the timetable is not changing but they are mounting a consultation regarding where to take things from here. Hopefully, we are talking about innovations and not cuts like other places.
Even if they could have been worse, the cuts agreed by North Yorkshire County Council still don’t look pretty. They got £2m of cuts when they were trying for £1.1m. Were we too weak in opposing them or how else did this happen? Are bus users seen as a soft touch for cuts like this too? Maybe we are seen just as a special interest group in comparison to others.
Lancashire has been having a consultation on cutting some of the £8m per annum that they spend on funding bus services. It ends this Friday (2014-01-17) after being open for more than a month. The survey is online so now’s anyone’s chance to ensure that nothing really important is lost. At least, they are planning on keeping most of the funding in place unlike other places but that leaves no room for complacency.
Staffordshire County Council is conducting a review of subsidised bus services in the Stone area of the county. On their website, there is a fairly open-ended form to complete that lists the affected services and you have until tomorrow to complete it. Only by doing so, you can prevent something very drastic from happening.
The two lines that are affected are the Cambrian Coast one, between Machynlleth and Pwllheli, and problems between Llanelli and Carmarthen are disrupting services between Swansea and Pembrokeshire. The first of these is set to be shut for a few weeks because of the damage and Arriva Trains Wales have issued timetables for rail replacement bus services: Machynlleth to Pwllheli and Pwllheli to Ysgol Dyffryn Ardudwy. The West Wales should open earlier (16:00 on next Wednesday, 2014-01-15). In the meantime, they have shared a timetable for the replacement bus service operating in both directions between Llanelli and Carmarthen.
It has come to my attention that we have had Arriva Trains Wales around for 10 years and I didn’t think it was that long ago when they took over from both National Express’ Wales and Borders and First North Western. Clearly, it was so they are offering season ticket holders the chance of a £10 return ticket to anywhere in Wales on any day and at any time between 2014-01-05 and 2014-03-29, apart from when Six Nations rugby matches are taking place in Cardiff. With all the recent talk about increases in the price of season tickets, this is an eye-catching offer that only can be taken up at a train station over the next few months.