Many students of Aquinas College and Stockport College from Hayfield and New Mills are reliant on the 358 bus service to get to college for their education, as members of a rural community that is offered little public transport.

As of now, these students are forced to wake up in the early hours of the morning (some as early as 5-6am) as to reach the 7am 358 bus from Hayfield to Stockport to get to college before 9am, when their lessons begin, as many live as far as half an hour walk from a bus stop.

For some, this is all five days of the working week, which becomes damaging and leaves students exhausted. This bus also arrives an hour early for college, leaving students feeling as though they are wasting an hour they could have spent catching up on sleep or caring for themselves.

You could argue, why not catch the bus an hour later? They would love to, honestly, except the following bus is at 8:15am and as a result, leaves students 15 minutes late for their first lesson, which amounts to an astounding 1 hour, 15 minutes of missed education a week. That is approximately 46 hours of missed education an academic year, or more than two whole days. 

All we ask is that the 8:15 358 service from Hayfield to Stockport be adjusted to 8:00am so that students can gain an extra hour of sleep without missing out on precious education. Although we understand it is not as simple as just “changing the times”, we would be ever grateful you could make our college days less intense, tiring, and draining with this one simple adjustment. 

Thank you for reading