We were almost promised no significant changes to bus services over this shorter second Lockdown darcy the pandemic. there are some changes announced this weekend though which are partly planned and partly due to an unplanned shortage of drivers.
To be fair, most bus operators have remained true to their word. One bus operator has mentioned that ridership had been back to around half of the pre-pandemic service before reducing this week.
I have not mentioned that some buses might be duplicated or will have unannounced extras. This is because it will affect a very small number of people and you should always check with operators before travelling! I offer this blog for free, with no bias towards any one area and I make no money for the posts…. even on the small Google Ads you see between sections.
Portsmouth and Fareham
Some minor service increases during weekdays will help with your social distancing.
The Eclipse services between fareham and Gosport will have service enhancing between 0700 and 0800. The timetable shows a bus on each of the E1 and E2 to be every 12 minutes which is still less than the daytime service Every 10 Minutes.
Whether this means that first Solent will simply add in unscheduled duplicates across the route where necessary remains to be seen, and to be fair would probably be more adept at guaging the demand this week.
Additional trips are also being added to:
- Southsea to QA Hospital service 2 in the morning,
- Hilsea to City Centre service 3 in the afternoon,
- The Morning trips on the 7c to South Downs Crookhorn campus will not increase in number, but will now all run at 5 Minute intervals.
- The 13/14 to Portsmouth College will now run at a 40 minute frequency each – a combined headway of every 20 minutes.
Details of the revised services from Monday are Now available from the First Solent COVID page.
Southampton
From tomorrow the Sunday Services before 0600 on the CityRed 2 and CityRed 11 will not run. NOTHING else changes.
This is probably a minor change that will affect less than a dozen passagers on the basis that these never ran pre-pandemic anyway.
These changes are detailed on the First Southampton COVID page.
Bluestar are also making a minor change to school bus 306.
Eastleigh
Xelabus announced on Friday that they are making substantial changes to their services from Monday. A shame that they have been the last to announce, but the biggest changes to service; but they have opted to do so.
Services X6 and X7 are running every FOUR hours in each direction on weekdays, with a combined service of every 2 hours to Chandlers Ford and Hiltingbury.
Services X9 and X10 from Bishops Waltham to Eastleigh / Southampton will run to a Saturday timetable on Weekdays.
Service X21 from Southampton to the Science Park will not run the lunchtime shuttles to ASDA and Southampton Airport Parkway station.
All other services, including schools and schools relief extra services, will run.
Basingstoke (from Wednesday)
Stagecoach South have announced a driver shortage in Basingstoke.
Due to the large number of drivers self-isolating, there are changes from Wednesday 11th November. This is a midweek change because the decision was only Confirmed and put into action late on Friday.
Service 6 will be reduced between Popley – Town Centre – Winklebury to run every 15 minutes on weekdays.
Stagecoach is already aware that there is an error in the timetable on that the Late Buses on a Friday and Saturday night are being shown as running. These are still cancelled and will be corrected on Monday.
Service 7 has a minor change that the 19:35 departure from Town will terminate in Chineham and not return to Town.
The Link also has a minor change in that the 15:40 schools duplicate from Basingstoke to Kingsclere will now run 5 minutes later.
Timetables for these changes are not yet found on the COVID page, but on this separate announcement.
I will have missed some!
You are free to let me know in the comments. I know that some comments have taken longer to approve because of an issue with a spam filter, and I have then not been told that they are waiting. Comments will take a few days to approve but I will see them.