Better Transport

A press release by the local group Campaign for Better Transport, Leicestershire and Rutland.

The Leicester City Council Cabinet and in particular the Lead Member for Transport matters, Councillor Patrick Kitterick, have been blamed by the Leicester Campaign for Better Transport for grooming the Inner Circle Link bus service for the axe, by the neglect of the long running and historical route. The Inner Circle Link bus route is proposed to be axed in May this year according to reports in the Leicester Mercury.

At a special Group meeting last week, on Thursday 7th February, members of the Leicester Campaign for Better Transport were furious at the lack of consultation;   furious that there were any budget cuts for public transport at all; and furious that the brunt of the cuts should fall on one very necessary route.

Leicester Campaign for Better Transport said:

"No proper notice, just a trailed announcement in the Leicester Mercury, without proper consultation is outrageous and inexcusable. There has been no debate at the Council or in the community or amongst the users. The officers appear to have just presented it as a decision made. It is a banana skin that politicians will have difficulty side-stepping.

"Funding for bus services should be increased not cut. Buses are essential for Leicester to make progress towards reducing car use and the car mentality and the car dependence that is known to be disastrous to the global environment. It’s no use making cars unwelcome until there are alternatives of excellence in Leicester. Bus cuts will make this harder to achieve and it will be hard enough anyway. The Council’s transport thinking is taking us backwards and that is the direct responsibility of Councillor Kitterick.

"The Inner Circle Link is a socially necessary route that is more effective at delivering place-to-place travel around Leicester, than doing the same trip by going into the city centre and out again.  It must be Leicester’s oldest still-functioning bus route. It was set up in the 1950s, or possibly even before that, and yet those bus people then got it really right and it is still a relevant route today, more than 50 years on. But there is an air of dereliction about it. On-route surveys by members of the Leicester Campaign for Better Transport, done this week, show that only about one in ten of the places where the Inner Circle Link stops have got a timetable and that printed timetables are almost impossible to get hold of according to local shopkeepers and staff in libraries served by the route.

"On-route surveys have been done by members of the Leicester Campaign for Better Transport during the last two weeks. There is a disgraceful neglect of the bus infrastructure around the route. Only one in ten of the places we have seen, where the Inner Circle Link stops, have got a timetable. Whole chunks of the route seem to show labels for the clockwise service on the anti-clockwise side of the street. There are no printed paper timetables to be found. No wonder only a few people are using it, despite it being much quicker to use to get from place to place, than buses via the city centre. Timing surveys show about a 10 minute time saving, on an average 25 minute journey, on the Inner Circle Link, as compared to other bus services between the same places. But I expect that most people can’t find out what times it runs. And as Leicester funds it, that is Leicester City Council's problem: obviously their officers can’t even fix a few timetables and service numbers to a bus stop. Either that, or they have been instructed to neglect it by the politicians."

'Bus operator also contributing to poor image of the Inner Circle Link bus', claims transport group

It is not only the Council that has come under fire from the Leicester Campaign for Better Transport, as the bus operator is also pinpointed for its poor image, its low key dowdy buses that are in use on the route, with their step access rather than level floor; and even for the lack of a complete timetable on the company’s own website.

Leicester Campaign for Better Transport said:
 
"Do they care about the decrepit image that this route has got? People have quite rightly, as a result of the effort of some bus companies, come to expect sleek modern low floor level access buses that can have buggies and wheelchairs put directly on them and quite right too! People now reject having to fold the buggy, carry the child in one arm, the shopping in the other, or look after the other child or children while they all climb up the steps and then struggle to find the fare from their purse. This is no longer a valid bus experience in the 21st century. No wonder most people reject having to do it with this difficulty when there are easier ways. But this is what the Council was paying for. This is presumably what the council required. It’s frankly not good enough. Now level access is the norm.

"There are also some deeper questions to ask. For example, the grant aid three years ago, at the beginning of the 5 year contract, that, according to a Freedom of Information Act response to the Leicester Campaign for Better Transport from the Leicestershire County Council is supposed to go on until 3rd September 2010, was only, it appears, on the basis of what others have told us, at least, to have been £125,000 per annum. But over the last three years this appears to have risen to a massive £450,000 per annum for the same level of service. Why? There are also, it is understood, again based on what others have told us, private indications, but not confirmed, that not all the grant aid cash is actually finding its way to the bus operator, which appears a strange matter to the Leicester Campaign for Better Transport and raises potential questions about what the money might actually be funding, if the rumours are true. These are some of a long list of questions that are being put in writing to the Leicester City Council by the Chair of the Campaign for Better Transport in Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland and the answers are awaited.

"Leicestershire County Council seems to be the only organisation that has impressed us on this issue. Not only do they have a very, very, useful and expandable full Inner Circle Link timetable on their website, when it is certainly not on the City website as far as our web searches have shown, but Leicestershire has delivered a complete set of costing figures for all publicly paid for bus services in the County, when asked for, without complaining about being too much trouble for them and on time."

The Leicester Campaign for Better Transport is now asking that the cut be urgently referred to the Transport Scrutiny Task Group at the Leicester City Council and that proper public consultations be done and results published prior to making any final decision on Inner Circle Link bus cuts.

Notes for editors

The full survey results obtained by the Leicester Campaign for Better Transport are available on request.