The bus now leaving stand nine...

[JoM]

Around here the Staffordshire Card, for under 20 year olds, is being scrapped from this Summer. They've saved us a small fortune with our lads over the years. As long as a journey began or ended in the county they'd pay just £1.30 (it was £1 when they were first introduced) so for Joe going to college three days per week in Stafford by bus (before he passed his test) it'd cost a total of £2.60 a day compared to £6.20 which is what the discounted day ticket cost at that time.

We only have Arriva around here and they've closed all of the local depots on Sundays so we have no Sunday service at all. It's caused problems for non drivers, particularly teenagers, who work in the larger towns ie Stafford and Wolverhampton or who need to visit people in the hospitals there. A taxi to each town would cost around £20 each way

[Workingman]

Jo, you and Ossie have hit on the real problem. Those of us who live in the larger towns and cities have ways and means of getting about - buses, taxi/private hire, Uber, even a bike. However, get out of town and you are stuck, really stuck.

Rural services are the ones that urgently need saving. In parts of the Dales charities have been set up to take over some of the old inter-village and then village to town services. They are not as regular as the services they replaced and everyone chips in with a fare they can afford, but at least they are there. For me these are the routes that need funding by government.

[Suff]

The other forms of vehicles and practices you mention will one day come in and prove very worthwhile. I absolutely agree on that, but they are for the future when the problem is now. There is one thing that I do know and is that bus companies cannot 'force' people out of their cars to use their services - no matter how comfortable and efficient they are. That is going to need a mighty shift in the way society operates.

The thing is WM, lives have already changed and going back to busses is seen to be a retrograde step. It was like my FIL who didn't want a gas cooker of gas CH (on which he capitulated in the end), because gas was the past and Electricity was the future. Interesting thought there.

For society, personal freedom and choice is now baked in, going back to busses, for younger people, is not seen as advancement.

When cars were rare busses thrived. Now busses are struggling to survive and it is no surprise. The problem is that services are less than they used to be in the off times as Ossie says. Who is going to go to work in the morning on the bus when getting home, if you have to work late, can be a real pain?