Arriva says it has carried out a review of timetables to services in Wales following the introduction of new 20mph speed limits in urban areas, and made adjustments to schedules as a result. A raft of changes were announced in December, with implementation dates throughout January.
Some routes have seen additional buses added, such as those between Bangor to Llangefni and Holyhead, Bangow an Almwch, and Llandudno, Bangor and Caernarfon, to enable more time to be given, resulting in a revised timetable but no change to the frequencies. On other routes, including from Llandudno to Rhyl, the operator added extra time to peak journeys, with no change to the frequencies.
Some services have been re-routed, such as routes 14 and 15 between Llandudno and Llysfaen, whilst others, including between Rhyl and Chester or Llandudno have been reduced to operate every 75 minutes with additional time to be given to each journey.
As part of the changes, Arriva announced that services 51 and x51, which run between Rhyl and Wrexham, will no longer call into Tweadmill Shopping Outlet, and on service x51 Llandegla will no longer be served, the bus instead remaining on the main A525 road. Public response prompted Arriva Wales to issue a further comment, explaining the decision.
A spokesperson directly attributed the service withdrawal to the change in speed limits, saying: “The withdrawal of this service in Llandegla is due to the impact of 20mph on the 51 and X51 services. To be clear this is not to say that Llandegla and its speed limits are the issue but now the service overall is taking longer to operate due to reduced speeds across the network.
“The consequences of this change in speed has been severe and has caused increased lost mileage and reduced punctuality. We have been open in raising our concerns with Transport for Wales, the Welsh Government and local authorities. There have also been press statements and questions raised in the Senedd about this on the basis of our concerns and the consequences.
“As a response to reducing speed of buses there are these options to reduce frequency: speed up buses by withdrawing the service from an area or increase the amount of resource in the bus service. This service is already operating at a low frequency and there is no funding to support increased resource going into services so we have had to amend the route with the time saved by not operating in the village. This time has been reinvested into the service to help it operate to time. These changes have taken place based upon a review of patronage and estimated time savings.”
