Primary Times - the definitive what’s on and where to go family guide of activities and events for children of primary school age. Things to do with your kids during the school holidays including arts and craft activities, music and theatre for children, parties, competitions, days out, and family attractions along with term time drama schools, dance classes, after school clubs and sports activities. Things to do at a place near you!
Wiltshire Catch the Bus Month this September
This September is Catch the Bus Month when Wiltshire Council will be encouraging people to make more journeys by bus and celebrating bus travel as sustainable, inclusive and accessible. Throughout the month the council is promoting a range of positive aspects of Wiltshire bus travel. These include free bus passes for the elderly, promotional tickets, and bus tracker apps which allow you to track bus departures and arrivals in real time.
Wiltshire Council already provides a number of services that are being highlighted as part of Catch the Bus Month. These include concessionary bus passes for the elderly and disabled, Wiltshire Day Rover Tickets which allow unlimited travel on local bus routes and the Connecting Wiltshire website. Throughout September elderly and disabled concessionary tickets will have their time limits removed, allowing anyone with such a ticket to travel whenever they want from the first of September.
The council is also working on a Bus Service Improvement Plan to meet the Department for Transport’s National Bus Strategy whereby local government authorities have to form more developed relationships with their local bus operators. Across the county the council are working with Salisbury Reds, Stagecoach, First West of England and Faresaver to increase passenger numbers after the pandemic. The plan will provide a range of benefits to Wiltshire families and residents such as better access to commercial areas to aide economic growth, improve services for the vulnerable and elderly, and increased support for local leisure and tourism services.
Buses help reduce congestion, improve the quality of the air and provide access to a greater level of opportunities for residents. A standard double-decker bus takes up to seventy-five cars off the streets. If we took just one journey out of every twenty-five journeys by bus instead of by car, we would save up to two million tonnes of CO2 emissions.
The Chief Executive of Bus Users UK, the charity behind Catch the Bus Month, Claire Walters says: “Buses make a huge contribution to all our lives socially, economically and environmentally. They are also a lifeline for communities providing access to education, work, healthcare, shops and leisure. We want to see more people get on board this September to protect these vital services for future generations.”
To find out more information about Catch the Bus Month, Connecting Wiltshire, the BSIP or public bus services across the county then please follow the links below.
Catch the Bus Month - https://bususers.org/catchthebusmonth/
Connecting Wiltshire - https://www.connectingwiltshire.co.uk/
Bus Service Improvement Plan - https://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/article/4882/Bus-Service-Improvement-Plan
Public Bus Services - https://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/transport-public-transport-bus
