Covid or cars? Bus use in steady decline across North-East

There were 162.2 million bus passenger journeys in the North-East from April 2019 to March 2020, 10.5 million less than the year prior.

The figure dropped from 207.1 million ten years ago (2009/10).

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A bus passenger journey is each time a person gets on a bus. If they have to change busses to get to their destination, this is counted as two journeys.

In England, passenger journeys fell by 238 million to 4.07 billion year on year.

A Darlington Green Party councillor says the cost of driving is falling due to fuel duty freezes and subsidised parking.

The College ward councillor Matthew Snedker said: “The cost of driving a car has gone down while the cost of busses have gone up.

“A journey on Transport for London services could cost £1.50 but it would cost £2.50 here. There is virtually no investment in our travel while TfL gets big subsidies. This is another case of the North-South divide.”

Government data also revealed car traffic has increased by 2.2 per cent from 2018 levels. The figure of 278.2 billion vehicle miles (bvm) is the highest annual estimate ever of car traffic.

Source: UK Government

Mr Snedker, who chairs Darlington's cycling campaign, applauds Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen for his Tees Flex initiative but says it does not go far enough. Tees Flex is a ride-sharing app where people in rural parts of the Tees Valley can hail a bus from their phone and are directed to nearby pick-up points with other passengers.

Mr Snedker added: “We need to nationalise bus services so they are publicly run for the public good. The busses themselves don’t have to be publicly owned but the service needs to be run by us.

“We also need to rebalance the way we subsidise travel and level out the funding formula because for-profit companies cannot compete.”

Mayor Houchen in front of a Tees Flex bus

The bus and coach industry trade association the Confederation of Passenger Transport however says the drop in usage is down to Covid.

Chief executive Graham Vidler said: “The numbers reflect that in the weeks before lockdown we had already begun to see people deciding to travel less as a result of Covid-19. Following the stay at home message we also saw bus passenger numbers drop to 10 per cent of normal in a matter of days.

“To ensure we don’t lock in the increase in car use we have seen during the pandemic we need both the Spending Review and National Bus Strategy to prioritise measures that focus on getting people back onto the bus.

"This must include speeding up journey times and giving local authorities and operators the tools to deliver the services passengers need as we exit the pandemic.”

A Go North East spokesperson said: “As the Department for Transport has said itself about the statistics it has issued, Covid is ‘largely’ to blame for the slump. Lockdown began on 23 March, but bus companies saw declines in earlier weeks.

“Here in the North East the ongoing efforts of bus operators to invest in cleaner, greener buses with the latest onboard features as well as evolving services had actually delivered growth, or at least halted historic year-on-year decline in bus use across the North East.

“We felt that we were almost at a turning point but Covid has since had a disastrous effect on the use of all public transport, not just buses."

Go North East says bus operators are working closely with local authorities and are ready to welcome people back on board as and when restrictions are lifted.