ARRIVA VISIT
This week I caught up with Kim and John from Arriva’s Darlington depot. Having the opportunity to meet with both the regional and operations director gave me the chance to learn more about what the company is doing to overcome ongoing recruitment challenges and possible plans to retire unreliable gas buses.
I raised concerns about unreliable services across the region and I was keen to hear how the Arriva stands to benefit from the Government’s Bus Service Improvement Plan.
The quality of bus services before the pandemic varied greatly across the country and the Government is determined that great bus services should be available to everyone, everywhere.
The Bus Services Act 2017 provides the tools needed to deliver this and the Improvement Plan commits £3 billion of new funding to support this. The pandemic has resulted in stronger and closer cooperation between LTAs and their local bus operators and we need to capitalise on this good work going forward.
