‘London-style frequency’ buses pledged for five major Bristol routes under £7m plan

Bristol could be set for ‘London-style frequency’ with its buses after Mayor, Dan Norris announced a £7million package to improve the city’s rush hour service.

Five services across Bristol will be improved by the ‘turn up and go frequency’ at peak times which will see eight buses run each hour along Gloucester Road and Filton Avenue, nine buses an hour through Church Road, ten an hour to Fishponds and 13 from the University of the West of England (UWE) to Bristol city centre.

These services will be; Gloucester Road (75/76), Filton Avenue (70/73/74), Fishponds Road (48/48a/49), Church Road (42/43/44/45) and UWE-Bristol (m1,m3,m4). This announcement comes shortly before 42 subsidised services are axed by the West of England Combined Authority (WECA).

Metro Mayor Dan Norris said: “Turn up and go means passengers will no longer need to worry about checking a timetable as they will know a bus will normally arrive quickly. I’ll be monitoring this closely to see if London-style frequency is something that really encourages people to get out of their cars and onto buses as it does in the capital. If so, then this is just the kind of top-class bus service I would like to roll out right across our West of England region”.

The plan is a partnership of investment by the Metro Mayor and commercial operator First Bus thanks to funding secured via the WECA’s Bus Service Improvement Plan. More buses will also be added to routes that travel through the heart of areas where WESTlink minibuses are set to arrive this Spring and Summer. This could allow passengers travelling from the outskirts of Bristol to link with central routes more efficiently.

Dan Norris added: “Many more people will now have the chance to catch more frequent buses thanks to this significant investment from my West of England Mayoral Combined Authority. I want to go even further, as we train even more drivers. Right now, I would encourage people to use the bus. More passengers means more fare income which I’ll reinvest in even better buses so we can build a virtuous circle”.