Areas with no Sunday bus provision

[Martin1988]

Know we've had a similar thread before but given the various enhancements to services that have taken place recently as a result of BSIP funding and other alterations to public transport networks what are some of the largest areas without Sunday bus service provision?

Yeovil, Sandbach, Congleton and Macclesfield now all have Sunday services again but Shrewsbury and Cannock no longer seem to. Are there any other key towns without Sunday services or which have had Sunday services introduced/reinstated?

 

[PaulWC]

Still in Cheshire, Northwich, Winsford and Middlewich still have nothing on a Sunday.

 

[Llandudno]

Still in Cheshire, Northwich, Winsford and Middlewich still have nothing on a Sunday.

Blimey, and rail options are somewhat limited too:
Middlewich, freight line but no passenger services
Northwich, Northern train every 2 hours, if they bother to staff it
Winsford, decent service but rail station over a mile from the town centre

I wonder which is the largest town in the UK without any bus or rail services on a Sunday…?

 

[Flange Squeal]

Fleet is a commuter town around 40 miles south west of London, in Hampshire, with a population of over 45,000 in its built-up area (source: Wikipedia). Monday to Saturday it has two bus routes operated by Stagecoach South - the hourly 10 to Farnborough, and two-hourly 7 to Aldershot and Hartley Wintney. Neither run on Sundays. Until its withdrawal in September 2022, it also had a Reading Buses service to Reading, but this also didn’t serve Fleet on Sundays. To be honest, I can’t remember when it did last have a Sunday service! I can’t think of anything in the last 25 years, so likely the 1990s at the latest.

 

[stevieinselby]

I find it staggering that a town the size of Shrewsbury has no Sunday buses at all – not suburban, not interurban, not P&R, not leisure routes – that's appalling. Around here in Yorkshire, you have to get down to towns that are little more than villages, like Settle or Stokesley, to find somewhere that doesn't have year-round Sunday buses (and those two do both have some provision for summer Sunday leisure buses, although on a very limited scale in Settle's case).

 

[TheSel]

I find it staggering that a town the size of Shrewsbury has no Sunday buses at all – not suburban, not interurban, not P&R, not leisure routes – that's appalling. ...

Pedant alert. Shrewsbury does have a leisure service, the T1 'Shrewsbury and Ironbridge Sightseeing Tour' which runs on the first Sunday of each month, April - September inclusive, operated by Regional Transport.

Link to their website here and a scan of their promotional leaflet (including dates and times of operation) attached.

Oh - and on Sundays, the 0750 Shrewsbury to Hereford (National Rail Timetable 131) is a bus!

 

[thomasheywood]

Know we've had a similar thread before but given the various enhancements to services that have taken place recently as a result of BSIP funding and other alterations to public transport networks what are some of the largest areas without Sunday bus service provision?

Yeovil, Sandbach, Congleton and Macclesfield now all have Sunday services again but Shrewsbury and Cannock no longer seem to. Are there any other key towns without Sunday services or which have had Sunday services introduced/reinstated?

Cannock is served on Sundays by the X51 from Birmingham and Walsall.

 

[ricoblade]

Stagecoach East Midlands has no service from Gainsborough on Sundays (or most Bank Holidays). I'm not sure about local services in Gainsborough but certainly the Doncaster and Retford services don't run.

 

[JKP]

Stamford is I think a no bus area on Sundays.

 

[Omnidekkalover]

I know monyash in the Peak District is the polar opposite with service there only running on sundays

 

[YorkRailFan]

Wooler in Northumberland, despite having a "Bus Station," has no Sunday bus service.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Friday at 16:11 ==

Around here in Yorkshire, you have to get down to towns that are little more than villages, like Settle or Stokesley, to find somewhere that doesn't have year-round Sunday buses (and those two do both have some provision for summer Sunday leisure buses, although on a very limited scale in Settle's case).

Like Settle, Thirsk doesn't have a year-round Sunday bus service, but both Settle and Thirsk have a Sunday rail service.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

A whole raft of places in Somerset and Dorset with Shaftesbury (9k), Gillingham (12k), Sherborne (10k), Crewkerne (7k) and Chard (14k) have no Sunday bus service.

Yeovil has only just got two routes restored courtesy of BSIP funding

 

[alex397]

A large bus desert exists around the Sittingbourne and Isle of Sheppey areas in Kent on evenings and Sundays.

This contrasts to the frequent service on the North Kent railway line. There is also of course the Sheerness branch line to the island too.
So, there is no direct link to Maidstone at all on a Sunday.

Though Sheppey is about to get summer Sunday services from Sheerness to Leysdown, I believe on a trial basis.

 

[43055]

Uttoxeter in Staffordshire. 10 to 15 years ago it did have Sunday buses on the 401 to Burton and 32/32A to Hanley but both has since been withdrawn or cut back. Whilst there is a train service it doesn't start until 1500.

 

[aron2smith]

It's not no buses on Sundays where I live in Cheshunt but for somewhere right next to London, the Sunday service is very very poor, basically unusable. Only one bus an hour on the main route on Sunday, when it's every 15 minutes in the week, and not really anything else so 1/2 the town has no bus service on Sundays, which seems like a huge drop. Many many regional routes in Hertfordshire and Essex run two hourly on a Sunday which is pretty much useless. At least 3/4 of the routes including many key routes don't run on Sundays at all. Neighbouring town, Waltham Abbey has such a weird Frankenstein route (16C) on a Sunday, it gives me a headache to use it! Cuts created these weird routes, that really aught to be 2 or 3 separate routes to run effectively.

So buses run, but compared to London on our doorstep, the service barely exists here! Harlow, given the size of it, buses are very poor there too.

I think Nazeing in Essex nearby has no buses on a Sunday.

 

[Ken H]

Wooler in Northumberland, despite having a "Bus Station," has no Sunday bus service.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Friday at 16:11 ==


Like Settle, Thirsk doesn't have a year-round Sunday bus service, but both Settle and Thirsk have a Sunday rail service.

Why is settle sunday bus free zone (except for 1 return from Hawes) but Grassington, Richmond, Leyburn, Ingleton, Hawes get buses. Cos it has a few trains?

 

[neilmc]

Why is settle sunday bus free zone (except for 1 return from Hawes) but Grassington, Richmond, Leyburn, Ingleton, Hawes get buses. Cos it has a few trains?

Possibly because all the other places mentioned are quite touristy and will get weekend visitors.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Why is settle sunday bus free zone (except for 1 return from Hawes) but Grassington, Richmond, Leyburn, Ingleton, Hawes get buses. Cos it has a few trains?

Richmond’s bus service is commercial mainly because of soldiers returning back to Catterick Garrison.

 

[DannyMich2018]

Blimey, and rail options are somewhat limited too:
Middlewich, freight line but no passenger services
Northwich, Northern train every 2 hours, if they bother to staff it
Winsford, decent service but rail station over a mile from the town centre

I wonder which is the largest town in the UK without any bus or rail services on a Sunday…?

Spalding is one of the largest towns (30500 pop) with no Sunday rail service and looking at Google quite a limited bus service.

 

[Simon75]

Know we've had a similar thread before but given the various enhancements to services that have taken place recently as a result of BSIP funding and other alterations to public transport networks what are some of the largest areas without Sunday bus service provision?

Yeovil, Sandbach, Congleton and Macclesfield now all have Sunday services again but Shrewsbury and Cannock no longer seem to. Are there any other key towns without Sunday services or which have had Sunday services introduced/reinstated?

Macclesfield had the 58 Buxton to Macclesfield, before BSIP funding

 

[Ken H]

Possibly because all the other places mentioned are quite touristy and will get weekend visitors.

Settle is heaving on a weekend. And nearby Horton in Ribblesdale is rammed with walkers cars while they do the 3 peaks.

 

[RDP]

Apart from Sittingbourne and Sheerness already mentioned another town in Kent without Sunday buses is Edenbridge but it does have two railway stations on different lines with hourly services from both.

 

[Jimmi]

Why is settle sunday bus free zone (except for 1 return from Hawes) but Grassington, Richmond, Leyburn, Ingleton, Hawes get buses. Cos it has a few trains?

Likely as most people who would travel to there are most likely to do so by using the train. A few attempts have been made to run the 580/581 on Sundays in the past but seemingly has never taken off, the 881 ran on Sundays between Ingleton & Malham via Settle (extending to/from Lancaster at the start/end of the day) but Dalesbus have not been able to get anybody to run the 830 & 881 for the last few years from the North West, also not helped by Northern changing the day of operation of their 'Yorkshire Dales Explorer' from Sunday to Saturday.

 

[stevieinselby]

Why is settle sunday bus free zone (except for 1 return from Hawes) but Grassington, Richmond, Leyburn, Ingleton, Hawes get buses. Cos it has a few trains?

Basically yes. There have been summer Sunday buses to Settle in some previous years – both on the Skipton to Kirkby Lonsdale axis, and from Malham (some years extending through to Slaidburn and/or Lancaster) – but it hasn't been anywhere near as consistent as many of the other routes, it's like they keep trying something but it doesn't work too well so they give up and move on and try something else. Which when your funding is limited is probably all you can do, hard to have a multi-year strategy to build a viable customer base if it isn't there to start with.

Settle has 6 trains each way on Sundays, from Leeds, Keighley and Skipton in one direction, and from Ribblehead and Carlisle in the other, plus another 5 trains each way at Giggleswick on the line from Leeds to Lancaster and Morecambe. Dalesbus services provide connections at Ribblehead and Garsdale for access to/from the Northern Dales.

Yes, it would look nice to have Settle on the Dalesbus map, and it would be cheaper for people travelling there if they could use Dales Rover, £3 singles and maybe ENCTS depending on where the route would run, but what actual journeys would it facilitate that people can't make by public transport now?

 

[Llandudno]

Uttoxeter in Staffordshire. 10 to 15 years ago it did have Sunday buses on the 401 to Burton and 32/32A to Hanley but both has since been withdrawn or cut back. Whilst there is a train service it doesn't start until 1500.

This is a very good shout!

As EMR/Network Rail are unable/unwilling to run any trains between Derby and Stoke before 1400 on Sundays, howabout EMR funding a rail replacement bus say every 2 hours from 0800-1200 between Derby and Stoke for rail connections to Crewe etc.

It may not carry too many passengers but it may lead to some people buying a long distance ticket because public transport is an option rather than using a car or not travelling at all?

 

[Smethwickian]

Cannock is served on Sundays by the X51 from Birmingham and Walsall.

And from 20 July 2025, according to Staffordshire County Council's website, there will be Sunday journeys on service 60 (Cannock - Lichfield) and 74 (Cannock - Stafford).

 

[geoffk]

A whole raft of places in Somerset and Dorset with Shaftesbury (9k), Gillingham (12k), Sherborne (10k), Crewkerne (7k) and Chard (14k) have no Sunday bus service.

Yeovil has only just got two routes restored courtesy of BSIP funding

Staying in Somerset, Taunton has no town buses on a Sunday. The only services running (all by First) are 21 to Burnham-on-Sea, 22 to Wellington and 28 to Minehead.

 

[Jimini]

Over here in south east Reading we don't have any Sunday services on routes 19a/b/c. Someone (I forget who now) on here kindly explained to me in an earlier thread that it's due to Wokingham Council being skint / not willing to subsidize the routes on Sundays. You have a 12 minute walk to either Cemetery Junction or Christchurch Road though, so it's not too bad.

 

[aron2smith]

Staying in Somerset, Taunton has no town buses on a Sunday. The only services running (all by First) are 21 to Burnham-on-Sea, 22 to Wellington and 28 to Minehead.

That's really surprising for a town of Taunton's size, especially as the town keeps growing. Harlow's town buses are all 2 hourly and often mini-buses on a Sunday. May as well not even bother if that's the best they can do! Doesn't help that one company runs the commercial services and another runs the contracted ones on the same routes, which in the mad world of deregulation means tickets aren't valid on both, even though the route is the same.

 

[joieman]

In Loughborough, Kinchbus's service 2 (Loughborough - Quorn - Barrow-upon-Soar - Sileby) has had a Sunday service reinstated, and Centrebus's service 154 (Loughborough - Quorn - Woodhouse - Woodhouse Eaves - Swithland - Cropston - Thurcaston - Anstey - Beaumont Leys - Leicester) has also had a Sunday service introduced. The 2 is still a far cry from when it ran through to Leicester as it did for decades.