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Two evening bus routes in and out of Preston are set to see later and more frequent evening journeys.
Lancashire County Council is pumping additional funding into the 152 service between Preston and Burnley as well as the 113 service from Preston to Leyland.
The county council says it is using its ‘Bus Service Improvement Plan’ with £41.9m of funding to help run more evening services – which they say helps more people use the current £1 evening single fare after 7pm offer which is running on all bus services.
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Here’s what’s happening on the 152 – operated by The Blackburn Bus Company (Transdev) – and the 113 – operated by Vision Bus. The timetable changes start from Sunday 21 July.
The 152 from Preston to Blackburn will run a 10pm and 11pm service on Mondays to Thursdays, it already runs on Fridays and Saturdays.
The 8.28pm and 9.28pm services from Burnley to Blackburn via Preston will also run on Monday to Thursdays.
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On the 113 a new hourly evening bus service will run covering Preston, Gregson Lane, Bamber Bridge, Lostock Hall and Leyland running Monday to Saturday at 6.35pm, 7.40pm, 8.40pm, 9.40pm and 10.40pm. A last bus at 11.20pm will run a shorter route and finish at Lostock Hall.
A return service from Leyland to Preston will run 8.24pm, 9.24pm and 10.24pm Monday to Saturday.
Vision Bus is making some ‘minor tweaks’ to its morning weekday journey times to ‘improve reliability’ at peak times.
Cabinet member for highways and transport, county councillor Rupert Swarbrick, said: “Thanks to the funding we have secured from the Department for Transport for our Bus Service Improvement Plan, we’re making some big improvements to services in Lancashire.
“One of our main aims is to encourage more people to use the bus by providing extra journeys at times that people find convenient.
“Later services are often helpful to people who use the bus to get to and from work, as well as being convenient for anyone going out for the evening or visiting friends and family.
“I’m also really pleased that we are providing better links right across Lancashire so that more people have easy access to bus services, with more to come in September.
“We’ve been working closely with operators Transdev Rosso, Transdev’s The Blackburn Bus Company and Vision Bus to build passenger numbers with the aim of making these services sustainable over the long term.
“Our aim is to get more people using buses by making them a more attractive and convenient option, and the funding we’ve secured for our Bus Service Improvement Plan gives us the chance to make some really significant improvements.
“For the people of Lancashire, this is a huge benefit as they can now travel on any bus in Lancashire for £1 for each journey, after 7pm, 7 days a week and all day Sunday. I’d encourage as many residents as possible to try them out.”
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The move comes as Preston Bus brought in a raft of cutbacks to evening services in the city during late June, and have been consulting on further major shake-ups to bus routes in and around the city.
Lancashire County Council stepped in to keep evening services on the number six route which serves the Red Scar Industrial Estate.
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