Southern Vectis changes in May

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Along with the rest of Go South Coast, Southern Vectis are rolling out the summer carpet across the Ryde Interchange and down to the Shanklin seafront. Now as a double helping of interesting things going on, Southern Vectis also have a few trial electric buses floating about.

Yutong and Volvo

So the first thing to say is that there is already a Yutong U11DD on the Island under trails following a successful ZEBRA application for £12.7m and zero emissions vehicles are planned in 2026 for routes 1, 5 and 9.

“EV1” has been out for a few days at the time I am writing this, with the Southern Vectis press release suggesting that it will be on the Island for a month. With the buses first appearance on service 1 being 10th May I hope to pop over and take a look, particularly as I have not actually managed to grab a ride on the U11DD yet.

As for the Volvo, it is apparently a double decker and it is due at the end of June. At least I suppose it is not a Wright Electroliner.

Service Changes

So with the summer season approaching there is a full swing of things, the advertised changes are now on the Southern Vectis website, but also please remember that The Isle of Wight Festival affects many services for the 20th to 24th June weekend.

So starting at the most minor:

• The last N1 running on Friday and Saturday nights will run 5 minutes later, connecting at Newport with the incoming N9
• Routes 2 and 3 through Brading, Sandown and Shanklin have extra time added to trips to cope with the summer traffic – as per every summer
• Route 7 will have an additional Thursday service at 2205 from the Alum Bay Fireworks
• Route 9 gets a new 0525 Ryde to Newport (via the Staplers route)
• Route 12 minor timings changes

There also also more substantial (and mostly annually regular) ones

• Service 5 gets a new service uplift thanks to the the Bus Service Improvement Plan and Isle of Wight Council. The Monday to Saturday service increases from every 20 minutes to every 15 minutes. There is no indication to how long the additional funding is for, however with the planned investment in electric buses for the 5…..
  • At the time of writing there is no PDF on the IslandBuses website, but the “live times” timetable is up to date
• Service 8 regains it’s additional short trips between Newport and Sandown on Monday to Saturday daytimes. This gives a half-hourly service.
  • Again, still no PDF yet
• The Shanklin Shuttle returns on it’s largely half-hourly frequency
• The Downs Breezer returns on it’s hourly-ish frequency

You can find details and timetables of the summer “Explore Wight” services on the Southern Vectis website.