25 signatures reached
To: First Essex Buses
Extra bus route needed for Noak Bridge
We need an extra bus route to serve the area of Noak Bridge. At the moment there are two bus routes which serve the area of Noak Bridge. One bus, Route 100 which runs from Lakeside Shopping Centre to Chelmsford City Bus Station serving one average every 20 minutes and hourly on Sunday. Route 10 which runs from Basildon Hospital to Wickford Broadway serves every 2 hours Monday to Saturday with no Sunday service.
I am looking to either petition for a brand new route or have one of the existing routes in Basildon extended to serve the area of Noak Bridge.
First of the suggestions would be to extend current Route 5 which runs from Pitsea Tesco’s to Basildon Bus Station and extend it to Noak Bridge.
The second suggestion would be to create a new route which runs from Festival Lesuire Centre to Billericay Station via Basildon Bus Station, Noak Bridge and Barleylands.
Or I am open to a different option but it would need to link up Basildon and Noak Bridge.
Why is this important?
Route 100 is very prone to delays as the route from end to end can take from 1 hour and 30 minutes to sometimes over 2 hours. Because if the route it takes it can get caught up in traffic which runs via the A13 and A127 which can have frequent accidents.
Other areas of Basildon such as Pitsea and Laindon have 3 buses or more that serve their respected areas. Noak Bridge needs reliable bus routes as it is not served by trains and taxi fares can be quite expensive to travel into central Basildon or Basildon Hospital or any other surrounding area.
Route 10 runs every 2 hours from 8am to 6pm. This is not adequate for an area which has a lot of elderly residents and it does not serve the area directly but only passes the outskirts of the area.
First Essex Buses do have a reputation for being unreliable and have been known to cancel routes or not provide alternative solutions. I’m not expecting a London Bus style overhaul where we have buses running frequently at all times of day and night during the week but I feel that we would need a definite solution to the problem that myself and many other residents would very much welcome.
