Why Abolish The Half Price Bus Scheme?
(Now Re-Named: The Medway Youth Pass)
A Personal Case Study
On Monday 30th January 2012, I went to the Arriva Buses Kiosk in Chatham and asked for the cost of a bus pass for a child travelling from The Co-op, Jeffery Street, Gillingham, to The Grammar Schools, Maidstone Road, Rochester, a journey requiring two buses. I was told that if I had only required one bus, I could have used the Medway Youth Pass which would entitle a child to pay half the adult fare on each bus; ie £1.20 instead of £2.40 per single journey.
However, because I would need to use two buses, I was immediately informed that it would be cheaper for me to buy a bus pass that would cost £17 per week, or £50 per month, because, she informed me, the cost of the child bus pass would work out to be dearer. When I asked her to tell me how much the child bus pass would actually cost, she opened a "ledger", and calculated that the child bus pass would cost £19.20 per week! (I did not go on to ask her to work out the monthly cost, as obviously, it would be much higher than £50!)
She then added that the £19.20 “child bus pass” would restrict the child’s travel to that particular journey/route only, and that it could not be used on any other bus(es); whereas the £17 or £50 Bus passes would give unlimited travel in the Medway Inner Zone!
The £17 and £50 bus passes referred to above are actually the Medway Inner Zone bus passes which are used by Adults in Medway; in other words, children living in Medway are expected to pay Adult prices for unrestricted Bus Passes!
Arriva Buses, she continued, do not issue “Child Bus Passes” that give unrestricted bus travel within either the Medway Inner Zone (mainly covering the town centre), or “Medway Zone” (which covers both the Medway Inner Zone and the surrounding areas)!
* * *
This means that in Medway, we have the ridiculous situation where:
. a child aged 11, 13, or 15 year old, who needs to travel to school by bus, cannot buy a cheap, weekly/monthly child bus pass offering unrestricted bus travel around either Medway Zones.
. children, who do not work or have a regular income, are forced to buy Adult weekly/monthly bus passes, in order to get unlimited travel within either Medway Zone(s).
. the “child bus pass” that is available to children is severely restricted; it is calculated for a particular journey only, and sets out which bus(es) is/are to be used, and via which route(s). It cannot be used on any other bus(es) or route(s)
. the children’s weekly/monthly bus passes offered by Arriva Buses, and which give severely restricted travel in either Medway Zones, are actually dearer than the unlimited Adult bus passes, which give unlimited travel.
(Incidentally, with Arriva, “one month” actually means “four weeks”, or “28 days”; so it is usually necessary for children to have to buy an extra weekly bus pass, and/or to pay daily on each bus, at the end of each month/term to make up the difference.)
To be fair, I did some research, and found that there is in fact a “school” bus that travels from Gillingham to The Rochester Grammar Schools, on which a child could take advantage of the Medway Youth Pass; however, that bus – and there is only the one bus – leaves Gillingham Bus Garage at 7am every morning, arriving at The Grammar Schools at 8.10am! . It does not go into Gillingham town centre. So we now have the scenario where, for example, children beginning their journey from, Medway Park in Gillingham, would have to walk to the Gillingham Bus Garage – a 20-minute brisk walk at least, to ensure that they catch the bus at 7am. On some winter mornings, parents might be forced to drop their child off at the Gillingham Bus Garage, because if the child were to take a bus to the Bus Garage, the “advantage” of using the Medway Youth Pass would be lost! (Click here for: Rochester Schoolsl Bus Timetables)
Does Medway Council really believe that it is perfectly acceptable for young children to be walking the streets of Gillingham at around 6.40am every morning, to get to the Gillingham Bus Garage to catch the 7am bus, just so that they can take advantage of using the Medway Youth Pass, and arrive at school, on time, nearly two hours later, at around 8.15am?
On the return journey, the child will arrive back in Gillingham at around 4.40pm – approximately 1½ hours, after leaving school; and will then possibly face another 20-minute walk home!
If the answer to the above question is “Yes”, then I suggest that Medway Council have seriously “lost the plot”; we are talking about:
children travelling to and from school in Medway,
not
paid, working adults, commuting to/from work!
* * *
MEDWAY IS THE ONLY COUNCIL IN KENT
THAT HAS NOT JOINED
THE KENT FREEDOM PASS SCHEME.
Because of this, we could now be faced with the ludicrous situation where children, who live in Medway, and who each pay over £50 per month to travel to and from school, might find themselves sitting next to their classmates, in the same classroom, who live outside Medway, travel much further, but pay only £100 a year for their travel passes!
DOES MEDWAY COUNCIL REALLY THINK THAT THIS IS ACCEPTABLE?