Bus fares feed sustainable funding pot and helps fragile communities stay connected

Bus fares are helping a little go a long way for fragile communities

Did you know by getting on board a public bus in Orkney you could help support transport improvements in the county - including community transport in some of our most fragile communities?

That’s because income from fares on subsidised public bus routes contracted by the Council – that’s every public bus route bar the X1 which is run commercially by Stagecoach – are fed into a special pot of funding called the Sustainable and Green Transport Fund (SGTF).

The aim of the SGTF is to support improvements to local transport such as additional bus services, bus shelters, community transport projects and active travel.

This year, it’s provided match funding to ensure six transport initiatives could go ahead in isles communities - an extension of community transport in Hoy; the continuation of the out of hours boat service between Papa Westray and Westray; support of services in Shapinsay; and completely new community transport services established in North Ronaldsay, Rousay and Stronsay.

(Read more about the Rousay project, here).

It’s estimated the 2023/24 financial year will see a total of around £75,000 from fares having been set aside into the Sustainable and Green Transport Fund.

Other improvements supported in 2023/24 by the SGTF include:

• The extension of a trial of evening bus services around the east mainland, west mainland, Kirkwall and Orphir on a Friday and Saturday evenings - giving people in these areas a means to attend social and leisure activities after timetabled commuter services end for the day.
• Upgrades to existing bus shelters including new glass/perspex and timetable display cases, printed timetable booklets, and improvements to Kirkwall Travel Centre.

Looking ahead, £25k of the SGTF has been allocated towards Active Travel during 2024/25 to be used as match funding for improving infrastructure such as paths.

The Council is also looking to purchase an electric minibus in coming months, to introduce a trial community transport service in South Ronaldsay and support existing community transport operated by Orkney Disability Forum with the view to open up services to the wider community.

Chair of the Council’s Development and Infrastructure Committee, David Dawson, said: “Orkney’s public bus passenger figures continue to grow and every additional trip is not only cutting carbon emissions from private cars - still a huge CO2 contributor in Scotland – it's also directly contributing to transport improvements for the Orkney community.”

North Isles Councillor Melissa Thomson adds a little has gone a long way, especially for isles communities: “Through the SGTF, we’ve seen a number of Trusts rolling out community transport projects in fragile island communities.

“Our isles communities are well used to exploiting their know-how to make every resource count – so I'm delighted to see the SGTF empower the isles to pursue low cost high impact transport services for their communities.”