Cambridgeshire: Rural Bus Summit helps protect services

Beleaguered bus services

Over 9,000 local bus services (42% of all) had been lost in little over a decade across Great Britain, with many of the cuts – particularly to commercial services – happening during and since the pandemic. However, the East of England, where Cambridgeshire is located, was particularly hard hit – it suffered the highest loss of bus mileage in the first year of the pandemic.

Campaign for Better Transport has a good history of campaign success in Cambridgeshire, successfully stalling planned cuts in 2011 by supporting local campaigners in the county. This is why we were well-placed to support the county in their work to improve bus service provision.

Timeline

September 2022: Service cuts loom

Local bus operator Stagecoach East announced it would need to cancel 18 bus services across the county. This was due to reduced passenger numbers since the pandemic, which meant that on some of these routes passenger numbers had dropped to around 50 per week, so they were not covering their operational costs.

The Government’s bus recovery funding arrangements included conditions that operators need to ensure services reflect changed travel patterns. Yet these routes were not sustainable or financially viable for the longer term. By cancelling them, Stagecoach said they were able to utilise the resource from the cancelled routes and reinvest in 12 other routes in the network which saw stronger passenger demand.

In response to the cancellation announcement, the Mayor of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Dr Nik Johnson said he had begun an “urgent process” to try to save these rural bus services, but said there would be a “short wait” while they look for new operators. This process was expected to take three weeks and then plans would be put before the Combined Authority for approval. However, it was not clear whether any new services would be in place in time to replace the cancelled routes.

September 2022: Stagecoach calls for summit after bus routes axed

Meanwhile, Stagecoach East’s Managing Director Darren Roe proposed a rural connectivity summit to identify new transport solutions across Cambridgeshire. The majority of cancelled routes had served rural areas with low population densities, and low demand meant that covering operational costs was difficult. The operator felt it needed to be more creative with vehicle and driver resource so that it could continue to provide vital links for rural communities without being reliant on taxpayer funding. So, Stagecoach wanted to bring together councillors, transport officials, local bus operators, transport users, business groups and other representatives to help find ways to achieve efficiencies and to protect services for the local community.

November 2022: Most routes saved, but public unhappy

Following a tender process, the council managed to find a new operator to run 17 out of the 18 bus routes removed by Stagecoach East until the end of March 2024. However, many residents were unhappy with the frequency and current level of service that they were receiving, with several revealing that some scheduled buses never turn up.

December 2022: Campaign for Better Transport visits Cambridge

Norman Baker and Michael Solomon Williams from Campaign for Better Transport visited Cambridgeshire. The busy schedule took in meetings with the Greater Cambridgeshire Partnership team, local politicians, and Cambridgeshire Chambers of Commerce. They met with Stagecoach East’s Managing Director, Darren Roe, and Business Development Director, David Boden.

Stagecoach East, being the biggest operator in the region, stated that they were now facing a multi-million-pound loss compared to pre-pandemic, so had to do something. They had talked to the Combined Authority in May to discuss the ending of the Covid Bus Recovery Grant at the end of September, which would have a huge impact locally. By June, however, no progress had been made. They stated that they wanted to ‘take their Stagecoach hats off’ and help to find a solution for all, therefore offered to host a rural connectivity summit. As a transport charity and experienced campaigners, they asked Campaign for Better Transport to chair the Rural Bus Summit and facilitate different stakeholders putting their heads together.

February 2023: Rural Bus Summit

The aim of the Rural Bus Summit for Cambridgeshire was to determine the key transport needs for the region, as well as priorities for bus improvements in local metropolitan, urban and rural areas.

The summit was hosted and facilitated by Norman Baker, former transport minister and Director of External Affairs at Campaign for Better Transport. It brought together organisations including:

• The Department for Transport
• Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority, Greater Cambridge Partnership, councillors and other local authority representatives
• Stagecoach East and other local bus and community transport operators
• The NHS and the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Integrated Care System
• Community and interest groups.

The event, focused on the ‘One Transport Need, One Transport Solution’ initiative, aimed to map out current transport needs and work together on tangible solutions. It enabled operators and authorities to examine how best to coordinate funding, timescales and resources to avoid duplications of plans and budget across organisations. The goal of this approach is to create more sustainable bus services and ensure maximum results with available resources. Workshops were held at the summit for the attending organisations to collectively identify the ‘One Transport’ approach for Cambridgeshire residents, understand the different transport modes currently operating to identify any duplicated routes or underutilised vehicles and devise an action plan to implement the model in Cambridgeshire.

The event included presentations from the Cambridge and Peterborough Combined Authority, Kidney Care UK, Passenger Focus, Confederation of Passenger Transport and the Department for Education’s Home-to-school transport initiative to offer attendees a perspective of various community groups. Their insight identified needs from a variety of local groups using public transport, including passengers using bus services to commute to work, people on dialysis needing non-emergency transport to and from their appointments and rural based school children travelling to school.

A second summit was planned for later in the year to follow up on this initial event and track progress made.

April 2023: Summit outcome revealed

Following the summit, Campaign for Better Transport convened a meeting between the Cambridge and Peterborough Combined Authority’s Transport and Infrastructure team and the Adults and Health Committee with the Cambridgeshire County Council Education Committee and the Greater Cambridgeshire Partnership, to discuss the ‘One Transport Need, One Transport Solution’ model and how it could be implemented in the region.

The charity also organised follow-up discussions with the Local Government Association, the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Integrated Care System and Department for Transport Officials, to share the findings of the summit and urge them to work together on key transport improvements for the region.

Tim Bellamy, Interim Head of Transport at the Combined Authority said:

“The Cambridgeshire Rural Bus Summit was an important event, allowing those involved in bus operations within our rural and peri-urban areas to come together to think about short-, medium- and longer-term solutions for the people of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough.

“The ‘One Transport Need, One Transport Solution’ model will allow us to maximise the efficient use of our collective resources to help us to meet the accessibility and connectivity needs of our residents. The Combined Authority will play an integral part in the development of this model alongside our other workstreams to create a better, improved and more integrated transport network for the people of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough.”

Darren Roe, Managing Director of Stagecoach East, said:

“The Cambridgeshire Rural Bus Summit offered a valuable opportunity for us to come together with key local authorities, other bus operators and transport groups to further understand the needs of bus users in the region and ensure our plans are aligned…

“We look forward to seeing the progress made following the summit and are dedicated to doing what we can to ensure positive change is made.”

June 2023: Route 904 saved

Following the Cambridgeshire Rural Bus Summit, the 904 service between Huntingdon and Peterborough was saved from being cut through a new partnership between a Stagecoach East and Dews Coaches. Stagecoach buses are still being used on the route, with drivers from Dews Coaches which run the services on the bus company’s behalf.

Other partnerships and service efficiencies are expected in the near future.

July 2023: Awards recognition

The Rural Bus Summit was shortlisted in the Best Alliance / Collaboration of the Year category of the Transport Times’ UK National Transport Awards.

Photo above: Stagecoach