Dinnington residents urged to take part in bus route consultation

RESIDENTS who tackled a transport manager over poor bus routes to areas of employment have been urged to take part in a public consultation which closes next week.

Dinnington residents told the South Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive’s (SYPTE) principal public transport manager, Roy Mitchell, that youth unemployment was high and the area needed faster links to Sheffield and Meadowhall.

Mr Mitchell visited the town council last Monday and urged councillors and residents to take part in SYPTE’s public consultation, which closes on Monday.

He was told that bus services to the area were not good enough, with one route described as a “magical mystery tour”.

SYPTE opened the consultation on November 4 and said its proposed network changes would give better co-ordinated timetables and increased services to some areas.

But Mr Mitchell said the authority could only help to solve issues if customers told them what their problems were.

Resident Lewis Sadler said: “We are keen to get the motorway buses back, X3 and X4.

“I asked recently if you can get them back, but SYPTE said it can’t subsidise a service like that as it would compete with the X5.

“So we have 20,000 people in Anston and Dinnington and no major link to the nearest city. The X5 takes over an hour, I call it the magical mystery tour of Swallownest.”

Mr Mitchell said there needed to be enough demand for a more direct bus to consider entering talks with First, who run the X5.

Mr Mitchell said the changes to the network would begin no earlier than April.

The questionnaire is online at rotherhambuspartnership.co.uk or is available on most buses or from Travel South Yorkshire Information Centres in Rotherham, Dinnington and Meadowhall.