Bus industry calls on next Welsh Government to speed up services
A third of people in Wales would use public transport more often if buses were faster, polling commissioned by the bus and coach industry shows.
The findings, published less than a week before the Senedd election on 7 May, accompany a manifesto from the Confederation of Passenger Transport Cymru calling on the next Welsh Government to commit to a 10% increase in average bus speeds.
The poll of 1,000 people across Wales found 32% would use public transport more if journey times by bus were faster.
Among under-30s, that figure rose to 51%.
CPT Cymru, the trade body for bus and coach operators, says a 10% improvement would lift the average speed of a Welsh bus to 13.6mph.
It says the target could be met through more bus lanes in urban and inter-urban corridors, giving buses priority at traffic lights, and better co-ordination of roadworks.
The polling, carried out by Findoutnow, also found that respondents who voted Conservative at the 2024 General Election were the most likely to be regular bus users, with 22% travelling by bus multiple times a month.
Among Plaid Cymru voters, 21% used buses regularly, compared with 17% of Labour voters.
Reform UK voters were the least frequent bus users, with 62% saying they never travel by bus and 15% using buses regularly.
Graham Vidler, chief executive of the Confederation of Passenger Transport, said: “There’s a great deal of pent up demand in Wales for public transport. Large parts of the country have good bus services, but too often they’re hampered by slow speeds.
“People are ready and willing to catch the bus and would do so in larger numbers if we could simply speed up journeys by giving public transport more priority on the roads.
“This isn’t rocket science – if the next Welsh government were to back more bus lanes, priority at traffic lights and better co-ordination of roadworks, we could get millions more journeys onto buses. That would cut the number of cars on the road and generate fare revenue to invest in more frequent services.”
Asked what other measures would encourage more bus use, 47% of respondents pointed to a wider range of local routes, 43% more frequent services, 39% more reliability and 38% cheaper fares.
The CPT Cymru manifesto sets out five demands for the next Welsh Government, including a five-year funding settlement for operators, targeted action on fares when the under-21s bus scheme ends, and a national target to increase bus speeds by 10% by the end of the next Senedd term.
It also calls for a value-for-money assessment in each region of Wales before bus franchising is rolled out, and for local authorities to provide drop-off, pick-up and parking facilities for coach tourists.
The Senedd election takes place on Thursday 7 May.
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