Figures from First Bus show that 2024 was the busiest year for York’s park & ride since 2017, with the total number of journeys exceeding 4.5 million, almost one million higher than in 2023. December saw the most trips for a decade, the operator reports, recording nearly 500,000 journeys, a 3.5% increase on the previous highest monthly total set in December 2016. The City of York Council estimates that people boarding at the park & ride sites in December resulted in over 61,700 cars not travelling into central York.
The city’s Enhanced Bus Partnership, which oversees £17.2million of government funding for the Bus Service Improvement Plan, ran a marketing campaign to promote the park & ride as well as direct bus services for six weeks before Christmas. Working with Make It York and all bus operators, the social media posts and adverts reached over 2.2million people in a campaign targeting towns and cities where previous research has shown visitors to the city’s Christmas Market come from.
Councillor Kate Ravilious, Executive Member for Economy and Transport at City of York Council, said: “Just shy of half a million journeys in one month is an incredible milestone to reach, so thank you to all the residents and visitors for using the park & ride, and thank you to First Bus
for increasing the number of buses available during this incredibly busy period.”
Commercial Director of First Bus North & West Yorkshire Kayleigh Ingham added: “The superb performance throughout 2024 is a tribute to the commitment and high standards of service delivered by the First Bus team. We’ve demonstrated that bus is an easy and sustainable way to travel into York. We’re attracting more customers due to good value fares, zero-emission buses, and our service, which is delivered with a smile. The benefits this brings, with cleaner air and quieter city centre roads, contributes to York’s environmental targets.”
Cllr Ravilious continued: “The numbers are phenomenal but we do also need to recognise that York still experienced congested streets in the run up to Christmas, so while we are delighted, we continue our work throughout the year to support and promote the city’s bus services as well as other sustainable forms of transport.
“Our young people’s ticketing and marketing campaigns, which and are funded by central government, have over the last 12 months helped make bus use more attractive and given more people more options, and we will soon be consulting on improvements to the park & ride sites.”
