Bristol bus routes restored after campaign to hire drivers

All of the 1,500 bus services cut in Bristol in November have been reinstated following a huge driver recruitment campaign.

First West of England said it now has around 1,000 drivers and 45 more in its training school.

It has also invested in software to improve punctuality.

But the operator said it still has plenty of vacancies and wants to start adding services to its pre-November timetable.

Doug Claringbold, the company's managing director, said he understood passengers may have lost faith in public transport.

Speaking to BBC West, he said: "We are incredibly keen to grow the service we operate and actually put those buses back so people can rely on it.

"Now we are operating just 99% of buses to that timetable that we published in November.

"What we are seeing is passenger growth, we are carrying 10% more passengers than this time last year."

Mr Claringbold said he hoped the service could start a "positive feedback loop" where buses are so frequent, passengers do not even need to check a timetable.

"We know that actually delivering reliable passenger bus service will actually grow passenger numbers," he said.

"We've got routes now where buses are running every five or six minutes and actually that will make a huge difference."

The company is hoping to planning to boost the number of buses on many more of its services.

Mr Claringbold said the service was still heavily reliant on agency drivers and was intending to keep up its recruitment drive for permanent staff.

"We have got some fantastic people joining us and there is room for lots more," he said.

But the company warned that although passenger numbers were rising, numbers are still down 20% on pre-pandemic levels.

It said some services are not attracting enough users to cover their costs, and as a results routes 23, 47 and 91 will be discontinued from Sunday.

Elsewhere, First West of England said it had made a "significant investment" to improve services across the region.

It means additional buses between Bristol City Centre and Kingswood, Staple Hill, Downend and Thorbury in south Gloucestershire.

There will also be extra services between Bristol City Centre and Whitchurch and Keynsham in north Somerset, and between Twerton and Midsomer Norton and Bath City Centre.

Additional funding was provided by the West of England Combined Authority and North Somerset Council.

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