January Round Up

First have released their new timetable booklet for Southampton, which takes effect from next Sunday 21st January. See it here. With the withdrawal of route 12, their network map now looks like this:

Compare it with September 2009 to get an idea of just how far First have run down their services in our city:

Passengers who rely on First 12 can switch to Bluestar 7 from 21st Jan, which is being extended to Lordshill via the 12's route. See the new 7 timetable here.

Much of the reason for First's long term local decline has been the intervention of the University of Southampton in the local bus market. They were unhappy with how First were serving their staff and students, so worked to bring about an alternative: Unilink. For several years, the Unilink routes have been operated by Bluestar and therefore integrated into the wider Bluestar network. The University are clearly happy with the job Bluestar are doing, as they've just renewed their Unilink contract for another 10 years. This makes any return of First to Swaythling and Bassett highly unlikely.

In other news, Stagecoach 66 has a new timetable since 8th Jan due to roadworks in Romsey.

Stagecoach 39 in Havant gets a new timetable from 28th Jan with only minor changes.

From the same date, some fares and ticket prices are going up on Stagecoach. Don't forget you can pay less by switching from paper tickets to their Smart card or mobile app.

Yellow Buses have revised times on their Uniline U6, U9 and U10 routes from Sunday 21st January. Details here.

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