Are countryside buses coming back into business?
BBC
Council-funded rural buses described as a “lifeline” by some are enjoying a resurgence after years of decline and new laws are giving authorities more power. Does this mean buses are back in business?
Government data shows council support for local buses is rising. With the exception of London, 17% of bus miles travelled across England were supported financially by government.
That’s down from almost a quarter in 2010, with bigger drops in rural areas, but it is up from a pre-pandemic low of 13% in 2019-20.
However, fewer of us have been catching the bus.
Journeys per person in England stood at 88 in 2010 and that number was down to 63 by 2024-25.
Numbers dropped sharply during the pandemic and a recent rise has not returned them to pre-Covid levels.
Figures for 2024-25 show the councils providing the most support to their bus networks tended to be in rural areas.
The charity Bus Users UK described supported bus services as “fundamental to social inclusion” and “a lifeline, not a choice” for many.
“Without them, people can become isolated and less able to participate fully in their communities,” a spokesperson said.
Wiltshire is one of those rural areas.
The council is one of those across the country attempting to tackle this using DRT – demand responsive transport.
It is a type of on-demand service that passengers book in advance when it is needed and the bus route changes depending on where people need to go.
In 2021, the Department for Transport provided £20m to 15 local authorities in England to trial DRT
The Wiltshire Connect service has been rolled out in different areas across the county.
It has 13 minibuses operating across three zones and first launched in 2023.
There have been 250,000 journeys since, a spokesperson for Wiltshire Connect said.
Councillor Martin Smith, the cabinet member for transport in Wiltshire, explained it has been more “affordable” for the council.
“If we weren’t doing this we’d be trying to subsidise a lot of rural bus routes taking very, very few people from place to place and here we have a solution where it’s a couple of buses which move around the area all the time,” he said.
Passengers have the option to be picked up from various spots close to them and travel to areas within a certain zone.
The council still subsidises other services, which are contributing to their supported mileage rather than the DRT.
It was expected at first that older people would mostly use DRT but the council said it had found younger people “piling in there”.
Smith said: “If we can get the younger generation used to using public transport then they will continue to do that potentially through their adult lives.”
One passenger, Cat Jones, and her family started using the service when they moved from London to Wiltshire.
They had not needed a car at their previous home and they said the buses were a “lifesaver”.
She said: “In Wiltshire, you sometimes need more flexible transport than the scheduled buses allow and that’s what Wiltshire Connect is.
“Everybody is smiling. You feel plugged into the community.”
James, who is a Wiltshire Connect driver, said: “They [the passengers] love it.
“It’s a service that has helped so many people be able to get out.
“I think some of them feel quite trapped, especially in the smaller villages.”
Bus Users UK has described the overall mileage increase as “encouraging”.
A spokesperson said: “It shows targeted investment can work but mileage alone does not tell the full story.
“A bus service is only useful if it enables people to make the journeys that matter – whether that is getting to work, attending a hospital appointment, accessing education or staying connected with friends and family.”
It emphasised that the decline before the pandemic was down to local council budget cuts forcing them to “abandon” routes.
It said that to get people confident in using the bus again, long-term funding for networks “that people could rely” on was needed.
The Campaign for Better Transport said that the publication of a national bus strategy in 2021 had made “the value of buses more explicitly understood and authorities have had the option to step in and plug gaps in provision thanks to dedicated government funding”.
Silviya Barrett, of Campaign for Better Transport, said: “It is great news that these services are now increasing but overall bus provision is still at a lower level than in 2010 and our mapping shows that many areas still do not have the bus service they need.”
The Local Government Association has a similar view.
It described the recent investment in services as “good” but said it also wanted to see “sustained levels of funding” to encourage people to use buses.
The government announced more funding last year as well as the Bus Services Act which gives local authorities more power over the buses in their area.
It is not just rural council-backed services that have shrunk.
The miles on the buses – for commercial routes too – have been slowly dropping since 2010. There has been a drop of about 22% since 2010.
It is back on the rise but has yet to reach the same levels as pre-Covid.
Commercial bus miles decreased by a quarter between 2010 and 2025.
The government’s own analysis shows that some change in mileage between commercial and supported might be down to post-pandemic changes.
Companies, for example, may have stopped non- instead
The Confederation of Passenger Transport (CPT) said one of the reasons is bad traffic.
Worsening congestion on the roads has made buses slower and therefore less attractive to passengers. It can also make them pricier to run.
The organisation said buses outside London currently travelled on average at 11.7mph.
It said council support was needed most in rural areas, with lower populations making it harder to cover cost through bus fares and the countryside meaning “longer distances, more fuel”.
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