Our joint Bus Service Improvement Plan builds on and follows our West of England Bus Strategy, which we enthusiastically adopted last year.
By making it easier to access and use public transport, we can get people out of cars and tackle congestion. This will improve local air quality, support transport decarbonisation, and improve the health and wellbeing of people in our communities.
Delivering high quality bus services is a crucial part of achieving that vision. This Bus Service Improvement Plan (BSIP) sets out our ambitious targets to: reduce bus journey times, ensure services run on time, return to pre-pandemic patronage by 2025, increase passenger satisfaction and aim for all buses to be zero emission by 2030.
Our delivery plans aim to:
Make the bus convenient - taking residents where they want to go at the times they need to travel by extending the current network and improving frequencies.
Make our public transport network co-ordinated – by providing a recognisable brand, easy access to information, integrated ticketing across operators and enabling simple connections.
Deliver a positive customer experience – by bringing our bus stops up to a high quality standard, delivering new accessible and environmentally friendly buses and offering a value for money and affordable service.
Our delivery plans for ten areas where we are looking to make significant improvements to our bus services. These are based on addressing current and future challenges and opportunities, meeting our targets, and prioritising investments where we can have the most significant impacts.
Intensive services and investment on key corridors, and with routes that are easier to understand.
There must be significant increases in bus priority.
Fares must be lower and simpler.
There must be seamless, integrated local ticketing between operators and this should be across all types of transport.
Service patterns must be integrated with other modes.
The local bus network is presented as a single system that works together, with clear passenger information.
Modern buses and decarbonisation.
Give bus passengers more of a voice and a say.
More demand-responsive services and ‘socially necessary’ transport.
Longer term transformation of networks through Bus Rapid Transit and other measures.
Progress against the Bus Service Improvement Plan will be published every six months.
Download West of England Bus Service Improvement Plan - Progress Report - July 2023
Download West of England Bus Service Improvement Plan - Progress Report - December 2023
As committed to in the Bus Service Improvement Plan (BSIP), the Combined Authority and North Somerset Council have developed an Enhanced Partnership (EP) with local Bus Operators and Local Highways Authorities (Councils) to deliver the objectives laid out in the BSIP.
On 9 February 2023, the EP Plan and EP Scheme were officially made. This unlocks £105m of Government funding to deliver against the objectives laid out in the EP Plan using the measures committed to in the EP Scheme.
The partnership is designed to be the long-term mechanism to deliver bus improvement objectives across the EP Area, beyond existing funding streams such as BSIP (which runs until March 2025) and City Regional Sustainable Transport Settlement (CRSTS – until March 2027). The commitments made by all will evolve over time to respond to changing realities on the ground and available funding.
Download West of England Enhanced Partnership Plan - February 2023*
Download West of England Enhanced Partnership Scheme - February 2024*
* Please note, the documents above may be difficult to read for users of assisted technologies, such as screen readers. The signed versions of these documents must be published to meet legal obligations. We are working to improve the design of these documents ahead of next publication. If you'd like to request access to this information in an accessible format, please contact enhancedpartnership@westofengland-ca.gov.uk.
August 2023 - EP Advisory Panel
10 March 2023 - EP Advisory Panel
29 March 2023 - EP Board
25 May 2023 – EP Advisory Panel
27 June 2023 – EP Board
1 August 2023 – EP Advisory
7 September 2023 – EP Board
30 January 2024– EP Advisory Panel (postponed from 5 December 2023)
21 February 2024 – EP Board (postponed from 23 January 2024)
For more information on the role of the EP Advisory Panel and EP Board, please refer to the Governance section of the West of England Enhanced Partnership Scheme. Should you have questions, please get in touch with your stakeholder group representative on the EP Advisory Panel or the LTAs at: transport.operations@westofengland-ca.gov.uk citing “Enhanced Partnership” in the subject line.