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Two bus routes serving Banbury saved with extra funding
06/07/2021
The evening S4 bus and the Sunday 488 service will continue running until at least April 2022
The evening bus service between Banbury and Oxford will continue to run until at least April 2022. Funding has been provided to ensure the S4 route continues to be served later in the day.
Without the short-term interim support the service would have faced withdrawal in August.
The route is one of twelve in Oxfordshire which have been given funding to keep them operating.
The Sunday 488 two-hourly service between Banbury and Chipping Norton has also been saved.
Oxfordshire County Council will use £275,000 of its existing Local Authority Bus Subsidy Grant (LABSG) from the government to provide funding to keep the services running.
Of the twelve affected routes three are being saved in full with the other nine having specific routes, journeys or days of operation being supported.
Councillor Tim Bearder, Oxfordshire County Council’s Cabinet Member for Highways Management, said: “Helping to improve the county’s bus services is one of the key aims of this administration when it comes to transport. These are challenging but exciting times for the industry and we will be working in partnership with the county’s bus operators in the future to make bus travel more attractive. In the meantime, we are happy to be able to keep these 12 enhanced services in operation for the people who rely on them.”
The longer-term future of the 12 bus services will be decided as part of work to develop the bus service improvement plan which will come back to the council for approval in October. This follows a decision by the council’s cabinet on 22 June to set up an ‘enhanced partnership’ and it will invite all of Oxfordshire’s local bus operators to participate in it. The aim is to encourage more passengers back on to the buses as part of the government’s national bus strategy.
Published: by Banbury FM Newsteam