Andy Burnham has announced a major shakeup to public transport throughout Greater Manchester.
The Greater Manchester mayor was speaking alongside Oldham Council leader Arooj Shah and others at an event in Rochdale this morning (June 23).
The changes will see First bus gone from Oldham, with Stagecoach and Diamond set to run all local services from 2024, as part of the unified Bee Network bus scheme, which will see all Greater Manchester buses brought under one unified system.
First Bus will still run some services in Rochdale but it has effectively been removed from Oldham.
@theoldhamtimes Mayor Andy Burnham announced a lot of measures relating to the Greater Manchester #BeeNetwork today, including fare reductions for combined bus and tram tickets, and plans to integrate rail into the system. Read more about the detailed changes on The Oldham Times website.
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Additionally, the bus fare cap, which currently sees bus tickets capped at £2 and a day ticket capped at £5, is to be extended until September 2024.
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The mayor announced 20 per cent cheaper ‘Bee AnyBus + Tram’ tickets coming on September 24, which allow ticketholders to use buses and trams under one ticket price.
For now, passengers will still have to decide whether to buy the ticket in advance of travelling.
However, in January 2025, after Greater Manchester buses in every borough have been brought under the system, passengers will be able to tap-in and tap-out across all buses and trams without having to decide on a ticket in advance, with fares capped at the ‘Bee AnyBus + Tram’ price, similar to the system which has already been in place in London’s transport system for years, as well as many other major cities across the globe.
In response to a question about keeping cash on buses, Mr Burnham said there was an argument both ways, saying a decision had not been taken, but that most felt it would be safer and speed up journeys to go cashless – though he added that the the more than 100 new electric buses set to come in have been built with cash trays in place.
The mayor added that the funding is secure to deliver the Bee Network from September but called on the government to do more to fund local transport systems. More than
Mr Burnham said: “You can’t will London-style public transport outside of London without funding it.
“We have got to have this debate, it’s time to give people outside of London the same benefit that those have had within it, and that will require a different funding model for public transport out of London.
“The idea you can run it without subsidy – that doesn’t happen anywhere in the world.
"Nowhere in the world. It’s time for us to have a debate about a fair funding approach for public transport outside of London.”
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The cost of a peak time one-day travel card valid on any bus and in three tram fare zones will fall by £2.40, from £11.10 to £8.70.
As an example, the mayor showed that a trip from Oldham to Manchester Royal Infirmary using Metrolink from Oldham to St Peter’s Square and then changing to a bus, would see a saving of £1.40 for an adult travelling in peak times.
Also announced at the event was a new Bee Network app, which will allow passengers to buy tram, bus, and multimodal tickets. The app will also show stops and departure information. Tickets will still be available from Travelshops and PayPoint.
Oldham to have more of a say
Cllr Shah said that she often hears complaints about unreliable services when Oldhamers are trying to make a bus journey to important meetings, interviews, and medical appointments – something which she says the accountability of local authorities taking control of the services will fix.
Another common complaint is that Oldham’s public transport only serves to take people out of the town – with travel inside the borough still often far too difficult.
Cllr Shah said: “The most exciting opportunity for me is that we’re creating a Bee Network committee.
“This means we’re going combine local leaders with members of the community. We’re going to be able to influence the routes that are most important to them.
"We know in some places you can get from one place to the other but you have a really long walk on the other side of the journey.
“That committee will then feed into the Greater Manchester committee and decide on more routes that will help local people make the important journeys in their life.”
Mr Burnham said: “When you combine bus and tram in a single system, it starts to work very differently for people, it allows people to move across the boroughs more and make very different journeys to the ones they make today and much cheaper journeys.
“This definitely is going to be cheaper than car travel, for too long car travel has been competitive with the cost of public transport here, because it’s been so high, but by moving to an integrated system we can lower the cost of public transport and then give people an incentive to make different journeys, but also to get a financial benefit from doing that.
“The cost of the integrated tickets, that will be really beneficial for Oldham residents, will be less than two or three hours’ parking in Manchester city centre, that is a big benefit for people.”
Contactless on trains
Also announced was a pilot of contactless tap-and-go payment on Greater Manchester rail services.
In 2025, the system will launch on two rail lines: Stalybridge to Victoria, and Glossop to Piccadilly.
The system will mean travelling on these lines will only have to tap in and tap out using their contactless card, rather than having to choose a specific ticket.
Transport bosses are looking to bring all of Greater Manchester’s rail system into the system by 2030, with fares simplified and capped across bus, train, Metrolink, and cycle hire, subject to government approval.
Transport commisioner Vernon Everitt said: “It’s a faster, more convenient way to travel – you don't have to think in advance, the week before, what tickets you're going to buy. You just get up, tap, and you go.”
Asked why it was taking so long to integrate the system, Mr Burnham said: “It’s frustrating to have the rail industry where it is, I personally believe that privatisation and all of the fragmentation that came with that has left the rail industry in the wrong place, because it can’t face up to the integrated future that we all know public transport needs.
“However, we do now have the main operators in the north of England, TransPennine and Northern, under public control, and that starts to allow us to get our hands on the system a bit, and start to shape it and mould into what we’re doing here.
“So it is a significant step that today we’re confirming we’ll be the first contactless pilot on rail outside of London, between Stalybridge and Victoria and Glossop and Piccadilly in early 2025, and that will be pre-cursor to bringing rail lines across Greater Manchester, by 2030, into the Bee Network.
“It’s been frustrating, we’ve all felt that with rail, haven’t we.”
This article was updated on 24/9/2023 to change a statement that Stagecoach and Diamond would take over services from 'September 2024' to '2024'.
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