On-demand bus service to tackle social isolation in Worcestershire

ITV Central reporter Ravneet Nandra took a trip on the new on-demand buses to see how they work

A new on-demand bus service has launched in Worcestershire for people to get around the rural areas of the county more easily.

Worcestershire on Demand is an alternative to the fixed route traditional bus service. It works by using an app to request a bus at a flat rate of £2.50.

It covers Wythall, Alvechurch, Stoke Pound, Stoke Prior and Bromsgrove with the aim of getting residents out of their rural areas and allowing them to visit tourist attractions and businesses that may have been harder to reach.

These destinations include Beckett’s Farm, The Transport Museum, Attwell Farm Park, Lickey Hills Country Park and many more. The service will also be available to and from the Princess of Wales Community Hospital.

Worcestershire County Council hope it'll also help people travel out of the county to Birmingham and further afield by covering train stations at Barnt Green, Shirley and Whitlock’s End.

Bradley Thomas, MP for Bromsgrove wants this service to tackle social isolation and give older people the confidence to travel on the buses on their own.

"We know that the population in Worcestershire is ageing. That's above average. It's around 25% in my constituency and wider Worcestershire that is over the age of 65. We know that social isolation is increasingly a problem.

"I want everybody in the constituency, but particularly older people to be able to live vibrant, thriving lives where they're able to access the services that they need.

"The benefit of this is it sort of says to people, look, you can live an active like. You don't have to feel cut off because bus services aren't perhaps what they were once in the past, but my focus is also going to be we have that connectivity, not just south into Worcestershire but also north into Birmingham as well so they can access great services across the whole of the region and beyond the county of Worcestershire."

Since trialling the service three years ago, the app has racked up over 65,000 completed trips in the Bromsgrove area.

Mike Village is a resident in Wythall and says he can't wait to use the service as much as possible."There's various places for example there are some nice pubs outside the area and on the fringes. It's great for social gatherings and so on, getting together. They're quite difficult to get to where this bus will be able to drop us off those sort of places.

"Villages like Alvechurch are a bit further out. If you're going to a place where driving is difficult, parking is difficult, you'll probably end up getting a taxi, which can be quite costly."

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