I am forwarding a letter I have received from Swestrans with regard to our two petitions requesting the return of evening bus services to Locharbriggs, Heathhall and associated routes from Moffat Road up the A101 to the town boundary. In total these petitions were signed by over 1000 residents , although as they were online only we would get a much larger number if we created a paper petition in addition and put it in shops etc. and went round doors.

As you can see there are three points we would ask you to consider.
1) If you are in the town after 5pm you cannot get a bus back home to our communities for nearly two hours. Many people work in the town or get to the town centre from other buses and trains or want to get into the town from our communities for work or social reasons.
This is an obvious gap in provision which is bound to be popular.
2) We note that Houston’s were persuaded to run a bus to Lochside at 10pm It seems fair to us, a much larger community and a mile further from town with only one instead of two roads that we should get a bus at this time at the very least.
3) There is no doubt in our mind that evening buses would make a profit. Previously there was a bus every forty minutes until 1140 during the week and 1210 am at weekends. A slimmed down service once an hour at say 9, 10 and 11 pm would find a lot of customers .Please consider a trial period for such a service. Without the 10000 people who live on this route being able to get to town businesses in the town centre will continue to suffer  from customers and staff, as will hospitals and cultural centres.
Please give us a shot by reinstating buses on this route and if they aren’t profitable we will try to bring the matter up with the Council and Government as suggested, but we do not think this would be necessary.
Best wishes
Arthur Ramsay
Coordinator, Bring Back Evening Buses to Locharbriggs and Heathhall.