Chew Valley Area Forum Climate & Nature Emergency Sustainable Transport Working Group are working closely with B&NES & WECA to ensure that accurate information is communicated about changes to bus services in the Chew Valley that will be happening from April.
Things are still evolving so information will need to be updated as things evolve.
The newly created Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/858992922045608
is a space to gather a community of people wanting to use public transport in the Chew Valley, where we can disseminate information ‘from the horses mouth’ of our regular contacts with B&NES & WECA.
If you, or someone you know relies on 640, 672, 752, or 754, please email Jackie jch.221@gmail.com or phone 07900 641 839 so that we can collate information about the impact of imminent bus changes and link you to support for your travel needs.
DRT is funded by Bus Service Improvement Plan funding and this is for 2 years from 3rd April. The service needs to become commercially viable within this time in order to be considered for future funding beyond this. We MUST use it in every community to make it commercially viable within 2 years, or there will be NO public transport in the Chew Valley.
The virtual platform also gathers information cumulatively across time, that will be used to consider what services will be needed in 2 years time when the funding for this trial ends. If your community doesn’t use it the system will assume there is no public transport need in your Parish.
Appeals are presently being made to WECA about the 2 shuttle buses that were progressed to tender and bid by WECA but then withdrawn, so we will update you if these get a reprieve.
B&NES/WECA are keen that no person, or community, is left behind.
Warm wishes
Jackie
Please find attached Q&A Guides to changes:
I am a Professor at the University of Bristol and I use the 672 as my main means of transport to work in Bristol. I can see no logic to remove the service. I work in the environmental sciences area at the University where sustainable living and climate change are at the very heart of what I do. Such bus services speak to this agenda.
The idea that village communities will have no connecting bus service to Bristol and Bath is simply not acceptable on any level, social and climate change. The assertion that such services have to be profit making misses the whole point for their very existence. The clue is in the name “service” – yes we should pay to use them but they are fundamentally a “service”, a lifeline to many, not a luxury to be run at a profit. Such services are subsidised all over the world.
I returned to using the service just recently following the pandemic and was very surprised to find the fares had gone down. What was the logic of that? Reduce the fares to show the services are making even greater losses than under the previous fare scheme to make even stronger economic arguments for removing the the service? This smacks of politic maneuvering.
The loss of these services is all the more illogical when one considers the improvements that have been made in Bristol which allow more efficient traffic flows. Add to that the Clean Air Zone in Bristol and journey times are likely to improve still further.
The primary aim should be for commuters to use their cars less otherwise improvements in air quality and net zero targets will never be met. Removing bus services achieves the complete opposite – it justifies car use for commuters – complete madness.
I appeal to our councils to reconsider this decision and adopt further policies to encourage commuters to use the bus services rather than turning their back on them.