Hampshire County Council pledges to look at lack of buses in Calshot after campaign group Better Buses for the Waterside delivers 1,250-name petition

Responding to a 1,250-signature petition calling for action over limited bus services in the Waterside, Hampshire County Council has pledged to see what it can do.

Members of the Better Buses for the Waterside campaign group hand delivered the document to the council’s offices in Winchester to highlight the struggles residents face due to the irregular service, run by Bluestar.

This included resident Maria Cooper, who left her home in Calshot at 6.50am, changing buses in Southampton and arriving in Winchester at 9.34am. Other members joined the number 9 bus as it travelled through the Waterside.

As reported in the A&T, Waterside Changemakers, which was set up to make life easier for people in the area during the cost of living crisis, launched the bus campaign after research showed residents were missing out on job opportunities and hospital appointments due to a lack of bus services.

It previously said it was “gravely concerned” that changes to timetables meant Calshot lost half its buses in September, leaving gaps of up to five hours.

Campaigner Serena Merritt addressed members at a meeting of the county council and described the hardship and isolation caused by the lack of buses in the area.

She said: “There are no shops in Calshot, no amenities, and there is a real need for social connectivity. But with the new bus timetable, Calshot now has periods of five hours on weekdays when there are no buses at all.

“Some residents are trapped there, not able to get out to even attend their GP appointments."

Jackie Clark, who lives in the village, told the meeting that the bus had become a lifeline for her in May when she was unable to drive after a knee replacement operation. But in September, the bus cuts meant she was unable to use the bus to visit the doctor.

“If you can't get in a car, now, you can't go anywhere,” she said.

Jackie also read out comments from her neighbour Josie Taylor, who wrote: “My husband is terminally ill, and I can't be away from home for hours. Recently, my husband had a medical emergency and was prescribed medication, which I could pick up from a pharmacy.

“But how could I get there when the next bus left the village at 2.30pm, and there's no bus back till after 5pm?”

The meeting heard that instead, Josie was forced to spend £30 a on a taxi to collect the prescription.

The group is calling for Bluestar’s Southampton Plus Zone, within which fares are capped at £7.10 a day regardless of how many journeys a passenger makes, to be extended to the Waterside.

This will help passengers who currently have to change buses in Southampton to get to the city’s general hospital, they say, as from 1st January 2025 – when single bus fares will increase by 50% to £3 – it will cost £12 for a person from the Waterside to make a return trip by bus to the hospital.

It is also calling for the number 8 bus that serves Challenger Way in Hythe, and Marchwood to double in frequency, as it runs just once an hour at and stops early in the evening.

Bluestar has been urged by the group to publish weekly or monthly statistics on punctuality and reliability, as it says it has received many reports of “ghost buses” that fail to turn up despite being listed on the Bluestar app and electronic signs at bus stops.

HCC’s executive member for highways, Cllr Lulu Bowerman, thanked Serena and Jackie for their speeches. Addressing fellow councillors, Cllr Bowerman said: “We were quite moved by the deputation [from Better Buses for the Waterside]. It was difficult to listen to, and it really came from the heart.

“We will look at this. It is part of the bigger picture for the bus transport service, and I appreciate, having spoken to them this morning, that Calshot does have issues, particularly with social connectivity, so it is a piece of work which will be contained within a larger piece of work around transport.”

Hampshire County Council was recently awarded around £14m from the Department of Transport to support bus services until 2026, prompting it to set an ambitious plan to double bus usage in Hampshire to 42-million journeys by 2038.

A spokesperson for Better Buses for the Waterside said: “We are very grateful to Cllr Bowerman for agreeing to meet us and hear our concerns about the Waterside’s bus services.

“We were also encouraged to hear that the council will, as a first step, consider whether at least some of Calshot’s buses could be restored, so residents no longer face five-hour gaps in the service.

“We want Bluestar and Hampshire County Council to agree to consult residents about future changes to the bus services. They were planning the cuts to Calshot’s services from January this year but the plans were not made public until August, just two weeks before the new drastically reduced timetable was introduced.

“Bluestar is receiving £200,000 of public subsidy over the next year to support the number 9 bus, which serves Calshot, and we believe it could afford to give the village the better bus service it desperately needs.”