manchester foe logo

Show your support in the buses consultation!

take action

Add your voice to the Greater Manchester Bus Consultation.

On Monday 14th October, Greater Manchester became the first city-region to consult on a proposed bus franchising scheme.

Buses are vital for Greater Manchester. They’re used for three-out-of-four public transport journeys and thousands of us depend on them to get to work, the shops or services like our local GP. But bus use is falling. 

If you would like to read the Consultation document (160 pages) or the Technical Assessment (660 pages) these are available on the Consultation website. Along with the short survey form (12 pages)

This consultation is our biggest chance to tell the Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham loud and clear: we want and need better, publicly controlled buses.

If you would like Greater Manchester to have better, publicly controlled buses – the Better Buses for Greater Manchester campaign have created an easy-to-use email response that should only take 2 – 3 minutes to complete. The consultation runs until 8th January 2020… but best not to delay !

Please fill out the Better Buses for GM consultation response now, with your personal stories and thoughts too, to show your support for better buses.

If we can win in Greater Manchester, it will set a precedent for the rest of the UK to follow. 

For more information see “Ten ways regulating your buses will make them better.”

See also: Transforming public transport: Regulation, spending and free buses for the under 30s.

In February 2019, Friends of the Earth, along with researchers at think-tank Transport for Quality of Life released new research: Transforming public transport: Regulation, spending and free buses for the under 30s. 

The findings highlighted that for climate change reasons at least a 20% reduction in car journeys is necessary, even with a faster switch to electric cars and a more rapid decarbonisation of the electricity grid. This reduction requires a radical re-imagining of transport which would also realise the numerous other benefits of traffic reduction, for example to public health.

Dozens of cities across the world offer some form of free public transport. It would cost around Β£3 billion a year but this is a fraction of the money spent on roads. Three times more journeys are by bus than train and they are the main means of transport for the car-less quarter of the population. What we are seeing instead is bus fares rising 75% over the last 15 years, and over 3,300 services reduced or removed since 2010 in England and Wales.

Free bus travel for the under 30’s at first, before widening the scheme, would make for more livable cities and cut damaging greenhouse gas emissions.

Find us on

Facebook

Support Us

Donate or join us using a standing order or PayPal.

Twitter @foemcr