Before the pandemic there was a combined  bus service , Nos.1 and 2, in the evenings every 40 mins. from Dumfries town centre to the village of Locharbriggs and the suburb of Heathhall which ended at 1140 pm during the week and 1210 am at weekends. These communities and the two roads to them have a total population of 8,000 and there are newly opened and planned expansions which will take the population up over 9,000.

The service was stopped at 820pm during the pandemic and has never been restored. These communities are three  miles from the town centre and miles further from such leisure and educational centres as the Crichton Estate, the local hospital, and many other suburbs and communities.

So if you do not own a car or you do but you do not want to drink alcohol or you find it difficult to walk six miles or more, you cannot access Dumfries town centre and thereby you are being excluded from pubs, restaurants, music and arts venues, social and political meetings, and all the other cultural and social activities that make life worthwhile. In addition you are being excluded from working in the town and from meeting friends and family from other parts of the town.

Previous letters to local newspapers and petitions to the local Council and councillors and their transport arm Swestrans have met with little response.So these communities are being treated as social outcasts in an Apartheid manner and yet the political parties and individuals expect us to vote for them in elections both local and national.

note from the comments on the petition on social media that some regard the situation at present as good enough. In particular it has been suggested that you can always get a taxi out to our communities and therefore don't need to get the bus service back.

Apart from the fact that using that logic we should get rid of all public transport and leave all travel to the private sector taxis, which is ridiculous, there are several obvious points to make:

1) Taxis are not cheap and many of us are in a cost of living crisis and could not afford them.

2) My experience and that of others is that we certainly cannot depend on getting a taxi during these hours. In particular if an event is on the demand for taxis is such that you have to wait a long time and on some occasions never will get a taxi.

3) Most taxis in Dumfries are private cars and you do not have to get a special licence to drive them as is the case with taxis in many towns and cities. Bus Drivers have to pass a PSV driving test and are on the whole good to excellent at their craft. Some taxi drivers can be rushed so they can make more money and some have other jobs and may be tired. 

4) Buses are necessary for disabled people, the elderly, groups of people who want or need to stay together. Buses are part of public transport, which we and our families and ancestors have paid for and it is our right to be provided with a decent and affordable bus service at least during the day and evening. In fact most UK cities and in many towns around the world you can get a bus even overnight.

5) This savage cut to the bus services to Locharbriggs and Heathhall is part of a long sequence of cuts and deterioration to buses in the region and all over the town. This is due to the privatisation of public services and the massive cuts to public transport provision caused by cuts to the taxation of very wealthy people and virtual freezes to their Council Tax bills over many years. We see the same cuts to our health housing and other public services by people who do not to need to use a bus, who have good privately owned houses and private medicine.

6) Obviously it causes much less damage to the environment to share transport in the form of buses rather than us all be in private cars.

No doubt everyone has their own story of how the removal of our bus services has impacted on their life so please share the petition and encourage others to do so and feel free to get in touch with anyone who might sign and ask them to do it.

Thanks

By signing this petition you are asking for this bus service in the evening to be restored as there is no other way to get back and forth to the town centre and beyond.