Home

In another policy statement on buses, Andy Burnham’s government has announced that the restrictions on the use of concessionary bus passes issued to disabled people are being lifted.

A government spokesman said:

“Eligible disabled people across England will get free bus travel all day, every day, after the Prime Minister announced today (Tuesday 18 August) that the government will lift time restrictions on concessionary passes.  

From 1 April 2027, people who hold a disabled bus pass can travel on buses for free, no matter the time of day. This extra support will help to open up access to workplaces, education, training, and other opportunities as well as giving people breathing space on the cost of living and putting money back in people’s pockets.

Currently, disabled bus passes are only valid for travel between 9.30am and 11pm during weekdays, unless local authorities choose to fund an extension. For example, Greater Manchester Combined Authority permanently lifted the time restrictions from March this year.

Backed by £60 million of funding, the Government is now stepping in to remove these time restrictions across the whole of England, so that from next year, disabled bus pass holders can always travel for free on the most popular form of public transport, regardless of their postcode.”

The change is the latest development to affect disabled pass holders in Lancashire. Prior to December 2018, pass holders could travel before 0930 on payment of a flat fae of 50p. In December 2018, citing budget pressures, this was raised to £1, which applied until April 2025 when the facility was abolished altogether and pass holders couldn’t use their pass until 0930hrs.

Anomalies?

Although the headlines surrounding the announcement stress the ability to travel free in the morning peak, the small print makes it clear that the evening travel restriction is alo being lifted. This leads to the seemingly annomalous position that holders of Disabled passes can travel after 23.00hrs but holders of Senior Citizens’ cards have to pay full fare.

Time for a review?

Whilst there are good grounds for allowing disabled passholders to travel free in the morning peak and whilst there is a need to prevent overloading of busy buses taking people to work and school by passengers riding for nothing, the Bus Users’ Group feels that it is time the 0930 start time was at least reviewed. Outside London and a few larger cities, the peak demand for bus travel is by schoolchildren rather than workers and most children are in school well before 0900. Bringing the start time forward by half-an-hour would give greater flexibility to pass holders and, by spreading journey start times over a longer period, reduce the pressure from passholders on the first bus that comes along after half-past-nine.

Evenings

At present, bus passes cannot be used after 2300 hrs on Monday to Friday nights. The Bus Users’ Group has never seen a credible justification for this other than that it is “national policy”. Lancaster has a better late evening bus service than many places its size with buses running after 2300 to Morecambe, Bare, Heysham, Galgate, Garstang, Bowerham and the University. Despite being well used, they are rarely full and certainly have room for a few passholding pensioners who, contrary to belief, do enjoy an occasional night out! That the restriction was never thought through is clear in that it doesn’t apply on Saturday nights, or after midnight on Fridays, the two busiest nights of the week!

From 1st April 2027 these late night buses will be free for holders of disabled passes, and whilst senior citizens will not begrudge them this “perk” they will be wondering just why it doesn’t apply to them too.

Lancaster & Morecambe Bus Times has been around for about 8 years, having been set up initially for students and staff at Lancaster University, who still comprise the majority of its users.

However, the site has recently been expanded and developed to cover the whole of the Lancaster & Morecambe area as well as parts of Westmorland, Furness and areas of Wyre and Ribble Valley Districts.

Drawing on data from the national Bus Open Data Service, the site is primarily a map-based overview of the area on which are shown buses (both Stagecoach and Lonsdale Buses as well as other operators) in real time locations. Clicking on the bus icon brings up betails of the route it is operating on and its expected arrival at stops along the way. Clicking on one of the blue bus stop icons brings up a list of the next few expected departures, again in real time.

Whilst the overall approach is similar to other sites, such as Bus Times, Lancaster & Morecambe Bus Times also includes options to show the location of road works and traffic levels as shown on Google Maps. Both these features are likely to have an impact on bus service reliability, so to have them together with bus locations in real time is potentially useful.

Unlike Bus Times.org, the site is mercifully ad-free (increasingly rare on the internet these days) although it does include a link for voluntary contributions (on either a one-off or regular basis). There are also links to Trans Pennine Express where you can buy train tickets (for all operators) and this, presumably, in some way helps to fund the site.

The Bus Users’ Group understands that further development of the site to include actual timetables is planned.

The site can be viewed via this link: Lancaster & Morecambe Bus Times (lancasterbus.co.uk)

Lancashire’s Evening and Sunday bus fare offer, which sees fares reduced to just £1 for travel after 7pm in the evenings and all day on Sunday and bank holidays, is being amended.

The Lancashire Combined County Authority (LCCA), which is now the body responsible for local transport in Lancashire, will increase the fare to £2 with effect from 13th September, as the scheme, which currently costs the authority £5m per annum, has been deemed “unaffordable”.

A Report to a meeting of the Combined Authority taking place on 23rd June, states that it expects to receive £18.6m Local Bus Grant funding in the current financial year. The Grant is divided into “Capital Funding” (for building things) and “Revenue Funding” (for running them) and the revenue side of the Grant, which pays for the fares offer, is set to fall by £560,000. The Authority also has to make allowance for expected increases in the costs of contracted bus services as these are retendered and the cost of running the mandatory annual Transport Focus survey of user satisfaction.

Options

After consideration of a number of options, the LCCA will increase the evening and Sunday fare to £2 from 13th September until 31st March 2027, to save almost £1.2m in the current financial year. This will bring the end date of the offer into line with the ending of the Government’s £3 fare cap scheme. Any future local fares offers could then be reviewed in the light of what happens to the national fares cap.

Until then, the offer will continue to be available on all journeys within Lancashire, expect for those operated by Blackpool Transport and most Preston Bus services.

According to the report 3.5m journeys were made using the scheme in 2025/26 or 68,000 per week.

Passengers at Hest Bank wishing to travel to Lancaster or Carnforth on service 55 will have a long walk to a bus stop from next week when Stagecoach introduces a further diversion on the service.

Problems began earlier in the month when overhanging trees on Peacock Lane caused difficulties for the double-deckers resulting in at least one broken window. The recent heavy rain has exacerbated the problem. Buses were initially diverted via Shady Lane, meaning that stops at the Memorial Hall, Peacock Lane and Sunningdale Avenue could not be served. Whilst recognising the inconvenience to passengers, Stagecoach say that they felt that safety was paramount.

Unfortunately, further problems were encountered and so from Saturday, 13th June a further diversion will see buses using Throstle Grove instead. This means that unless some temporary stops are provided at Hasty Brow, the only stop on the Hest Bank loop off the A6 still being served will be Beech Grove, which is only just off the main road anyway.

Tree Lopping

The diversion is said to be “until further notice”, but the Bus Users’ Group understands that Stagecoach is holding urgent discussions with Lancashire County Council, with a site meeting being held to identify the problem trees being held next week. The situation is potentially complicated by it being the bird nesting season. Tree work is only possible between April and August providing that it can be shown that nesting birds are unaffected. Our Group will be supporting Stagecoach by stressing to Lancashire County Council the serious affect that the diversion is having on passengers.

Single deckers?

Only double-deck buses are affected, but these are standard for the 55, at least during the daytime. Stagecoach tell us that they have only a limited number of single-deckers and these are needed for routes such as the 4 and 49 that have to negotiate low bridges. Some of the smaller single deckers might not have the capacity for the 55. The company also feels that having the diversion operating only at certain times of the day would prove confusing for passengers.

Alternatives

Everyone concerned hopes that the situation can be resolved quickly, but if it drags on we would hope that Stagecoach will reconsider the use of Shady Lane and/or single deckers. We also suggest that a temporary stop could be erected at the Hasty Brow junction, which is at least a bit nearer to the village.

Passengers from Peacock Lane do have the alternative of walking to the Coastal Road to pick up service 5 if going to Carnforth and should the problem persist beyond the 6th July they may find that Lonsdale Buses’ revised 85 service a means of getting to Lancaster as well.

Lonsdale Buses is to extend its 85 service, which currently runs between Carnforth and Morecambe, through to Lancaster. The revised route and timetable will be introduced on 6th July, following requests from passengers according to the company’s website.

The revised service will provide through buses to Lancaster from stops along the Coastal Road and Marine Drive between Bare and Hest Bank. It is not clear from the website what route buses will take between Morecambe and Lancaster, nor has the actual timetable been announced, although the website promises a “regular service” six days a week.

Better spacing of buses?

At present, the 85 is timed to run just a few minutes ahead of Stagecoach’s long-established service 5 between Morecambe and Carnforth. The service revision is an obvious opportunity to correct this anomaly and give passengers a better choice of buses between these points, as well as the advantage of a through service to Lancaster from those sections of the route that do not currently enjoy this facility and we hope this will be the outcome.

The new route and timetable will be posted on this website as soon as they are available.

Bus passengers travelling north and west from Lancaster bus station are finding their journeys getting off to an easier start with a change in priority at the Damside Street exit.

Every one of the County Council’s Bus Service Improvement Plans of the last few years has promised various bus priority measures on the city’s streets, although all of them seem to have been delayed or quietly abandoned following objections or lack of capacity to implement them. But suddenly, a scheme that hasn’t featured in any of them has appeared at the heart of the city’s bus network.

Buses leaving the bus station via Damside Street have previously had to give way to traffic coming from their right. Damside Street isn’t the busiest of the city’s roads but buses have always had to approach the exit with the expectation that they would have to give way, which frequently they would be required to do.

Now, however, “Give Way” markings have appeared on Damside Street and buses leaving the bus station now have the priority.

The actual time savings may be small (and buses using Damside Street to enter the bus station from Cable Street actually lose the priority they previously enjoyed) but as the saying goes: “Every little helps” and hopefully this is just the first of many measures to make life easier for the city’s bus drivers and passengers alike.