Why is it important?
Public transport is necessary for accessing employment and education, services, shopping and leisure. It should be frequent, reliable, fast, accessible, safe, comfortable, and link up the places where people live and want to go. In order to provide a realistic alternative to cars, it is essential that public transport services are punctual, and have priority over general traffic to offer competitive journey times. When possible, we will seek to have the powers to enforce moving traffic offences, such as banned turns, stopping in box junctions and driving in bus and cycle lanes. These offences all impact the general operation of our network, including on bus journey times.
Public transport can encompass a number of modes, including bus, rail, e-bikes and e-scooters and mass transit, along with integrated ticketing solutions to allow users to plan, book and pay for multiple modes of transport at once. These multiple modes can be connected via multi-modal transport interchanges, or hubs, building on the concept of Park & Ride sites, but with access to a wider range of services.
The proportion of residents taking the bus to work in Bath, by comparison with similar cities, is shown below. These cities have been identified based on similarities to Bath, in terms of size and historic nature.
Proportion of residents taking the bus to work in Bath
As part of our public consultation in early 2021, more than half of respondents considered improved public transport options to be important, with the most supported concepts being as follows:
- Universal, integrated ticketing
- Provision of mobility hubs
Around half of respondents considered better bus services to be important, with the use of cleaner fuels and improved coordination of bus services as the most important concepts.
What are we doing about it?
Current projects
These projects have been implemented, are in development, or are in progress:
- Development of the Bus Service Improvement Plan
- MetroWest Phase 1
- West of England Combined Authority Ten-Year Rail Delivery Plan
Future projects
We are looking to deliver these projects in the future: