Stratford upon Avon park and ride

Since my last trip to Stratford upon Avon, Warwickshire County Council has extensively revised the park and ride services in Stratford upon Avon. Previously there was just one service, the 222, which ran every fifteen minutes between Stratford town centre and the park and ride site at Bishopton. Now, there are two routes serving this site, the 221 and a revised 222, both operated by Johnsons of Henley in Arden. Service 221 runs between Bridge Street in the town centre and Bishopton, including doubling back via a large retail park called the Maybird centre. The total journey time for the 221 is twenty-two minutes, including the Maybird centre double back, compared to just twelve minutes on the 222, and the service runs just every thirty minutes. Because of this, the service is more of a local route; there were seven people on board on departing Stratford upon Avon but non remained upon our arrival at the park and ride site. Instead, passengers should take the extended service 222 which is every fifteen minutes between the town and Bishopton, and alternate journeys extending from the town centre to Trinity Mead.

A new park and ride site has also opened to the south of the town, at the Rosebird Centre Waitrose. Johnsons also operate this service (number 333), which runs every thirty minutes with a PVR of one. This site is currently very underused; on both my outward and return journeys I was the only passenger. Despite the low PVR and the council subsidy, I cannot see this service surviving in the future, unless the Rosebird Centre expands to offer more than just a Waitrose.

Something that marks all three of these park and ride services out as special is that they offer local communities a frequent, modern, low cost bus service at minimal cost to the council. In the case of the 222 and the 333 this is not done at the expense of journey times. With the exception of stop dwell times, which would be removed if the service was limited stop, there is no time penalty caused by serving these communities, and it allows passengers greater flexibility in where they board and alight. On the 221 the route is extended, but this provides a good frequency of service to residential areas and schools, and allows funding for the service to be allocated from the park and ride budget, although the ethics of this is questionable given that, such is the frequency of the 222, you would arrive sooner if you waited for a 222 than took an earlier but lengthier trip on the 221. A similar question would arise from the extension on the 222 from the town centre to Trinity Mead; arguably this is a local service in disguise. The important thing though, is that a high quality service is provided, including to two out of town shopping centres which are traditionally hard places to serve.

Despite the low usage of all services, there is great potential to grow these routes into a network of town services, spanning Stratford and providing links for small housing estates which are traditionally costly to run and in need of subsidy. The 333 especially could be extended to serve a greater proportion of the local area, perhaps as a circular route with a quick journey one way (for the park and ride) and a slower journey in the other direction to serve local residents. There is also the potential for a train station at Bishopton, which would result in more use of the park and ride site, an economy of scale with the management costs of the site, and an increase in intermodal connectivity. More hail and ride sections like on the 221 and 222 would also be useful, as would a multi operator ticket to allow travel on Stagecoach, Johnsons and perhaps even Travel de Courcey or Red Diamond.