Placards are to be seen again on the Guildhall steps at 1:30pm today as bus campaigners protest the news that their service may be cut.
With a plan to deliver a statement to the council committee with oversight of Transport, it’s two years after the start of the Save Our 6-7 Buses campaign in the North East of Bath with their hard-won 30 minute frequency once again under threat.
In 2010 the grass-roots effort scored a victory restoring the bus link between two halves of the hilly community, but was left with half the former frequency. The resulting 40 minute gap between buses caused overcrowding and left people behind at bus stops in freezing weather. With the advent of the new council in May 2011, a subsidy was granted for one additional bus to replace the two which First Bus had withdrawn, bringing in a compromise frequency of 30 minutes.
Now campaigners say they have been told that the council are planning to discontinue subsidising the increased frequency. Lin Patterson, a campaigner from Larkhall, said, “We have it on good authority that in the budget now being planned for after March 2013, this hilly area with the highest proportion of elderly people in Bath is in danger of losing the funding which makes the route tolerable. This has always been a health and social need issue. There are many frail and disabled people in our community. Medical experts say that standing long periods at windy bus stops contributes to excess winter deaths just as surely as poor insulation of houses. Councillors should be alert to the particular hardship a cut would cause in our area.”
Pamela Galloway, of Fairfield Park, said, “As our first action in re-igniting the campaign, we sought to alert the public and gauge their level of commitment to this issue. We’ve had over 150 feedback forms returned in the last 2 weeks from people in all walks of life who depend on the 30 minute service—voters who are looking closely at how they are being represented. The subsidy was the right decision in May 2011 and continues to be right today.”
