The Daffodil Line is blooming

Tuesday 7th May 2024

There are some great examples of community organised bus routes around the country. Perhaps most famous are DalesBus and MoorsBus where volunteers oversee bus networks serving the two National Parks (Yorkshire Dales and North York Moors) with financial contributions and sponsorship from local businesses as well as support from local authorities.

They’re characterised by passionate and dedicated community minded people committed to public transport taking a lead and delivering on the ground rather than simply campaigning.

Another great example of the genre is relatively new bus route 232, branded as the Daffodil Line, which provides a daily service connecting the small town of Newent in Gloucestershire with its neighbouring market towns, both over the border in Herefordshire, of Ledbury and Ross-on-Wye.

As you can see the route also serves the Herefordshire village of Much Marcle as well as the Gloucestershire villages of Dymock, Gorsley and Kilcot along with Upton Bishop, also in Herefordshire (this is real cross border territory).

The route has just celebrated its milestone first anniversary, having begun operating on 2nd April 2023, and, with reports in the national and local media indicating it’s doing well, I travelled over to Gloucestershire last Thursday to take a look at the service and find out more about its background.

The ‘Daff’, as its affectionately known, came about through the endeavours of Clare Stone, an enthusiastic and passionate Newent resident. Clare was determined to find a way of reinstating bus links withdrawn by Stagecoach as part of the major rehash of its Gloucestershire bus network back in February 2022. This severed commercially operated bus routes 32 and 132 which had previously run hourly from Gloucester to Newent with extensions to either Ledbury or Ross-on-Wye. Aside from a school journey, the cuts reduced the 32 to run just between Gloucester and Newent leaving the town adrift from both Ledbury and Ross-on-Wye.

The County Council stepped in with funding for a very limited replacement, route 632, comprising a shopping journey to both towns on Wednesdays and Fridays operated by Newent Community Transport from April 2022 but Clare and other local residents were determined more could, and should, be done to reconnect these communities.

Clare founded the Buses4Us group, establishing a website – “Community Action For Better Public Transport” – and set about raising the profile of the need for a regular replacement bus service for the withdrawn routes 32/132. She became a councillor on Newent Town Council, held discussions with both Gloucestershire County and Herefordshire Councils as well as Town and Parish Councils and visitor attractions along the route which could be served by the bus in this beautiful part of the country in the Vale of Leadon and Forest of Dean.

“We quickly realised if we waited for the Government, or even the County Councils, to solve our problems we would be joining the back of a very long queue. Public transport was in crisis right across the country. So we decided to sort it ourselves and set out to find a way to get our buses back on the road and reconnect our communities.” Clare explains on the website. 

Clare’s enthusiasm and commitment for the bus route was quickly evident as we chatted on the phone at the weekend and it soon became obvious her local connections and her sheer tenacity has given the route a likely successful future that eluded Stagecoach.

For example, having received positive indications and support from both Gloucestershire County and Herefordshire Councils in summer 2022, Clare set about raising funds from Town and Parish Councils including using social media to let residents know when meetings were being held so they could attend and contextualised the amount being asked for in easy to understand terms such as £3 per voter for Town Councils and £2 per voter for Parish Councils.

She got the biggest Town Councils on board first – that’s Ross-on-Wye, Newent and Ledbury…

… then set about contacting the Parishes. For example, here’s an entry from the Buses4Us website from November 2022 when the funding was being requested. I’ve highlighted the key aspects.

Other Parish Councils along the route certainly did follow suit with financial pledges thanks to the community campaign and residents attending meetings to demonstrate to councillors support for the cause was there. Local businesses got on board too. The Malvern Bookshop in Great Malvern donated £5,000 and a pledge of £10,000 came from Hellens Manor, an impressive Tudor Manor House in Much Marcle which hasn’t had a bus service for many years but is now included on the route.

The aim was to raise enough money – circa £250,000 – to secure the service for three years and by early 2023 enough funds had been raised for a contract to be awarded to respected local operator DRM Bus with the help of Gloucestershire County Council overseeing the tender administration.

Clare pointed out to me the route includes a link to Ledbury’s railway station whereas Stagecoach only ran as far as the Tesco Superstore, a seven to 10 minute walk away. In the first weeks of operation it became obvious this new link was making the service too tightly timed with consequent late running whenever roadworks or other problems arose, so the route and timetable was quickly adapted from last July to include a one-way circuit around Ledbury ensuring the main parts of the town, including the station Market Hall and Deer Park, were efficiently served.

The Daffofil Line was born in the form of route 232 in April 2023 with one bus providing a seven-days-a-week, two-hourly frequency between Ledbury, Newent and Ross-on-Wye as well as two return evening journeys on Fridays and Saturdays. The timetable also includes a morning journey into Ledbury for around 08:30.

DRM are using a branded Enviro 200 on the service with a £2 maximum adult single fare applying even though, as a new service, it doesn’t qualify for DfT funding as part of the Government’s £2 fare initiative in England.

However, by a happy coincidence, the local MP for Forest of Dean is none other than Secretary of State for Transport, Mark Harper, and I understand he hopes the scheme can be amended in July to allow new services to be included. Interestingly, I hear he was also surprised to learn the reimbursement rate for concessionary passes is as low as 40% of the adult fare – the things you learn when you’re a Secretary of State and talk to constituents eh?

After the first six months of operation 20,914 journeys had been made on 1,040 trips between Ross-on-Wye, Newent and Ledbury. 37% of running costs had been covered by ticket sales/pass reimbursement compared to the average for a rural bus service in the area of just 30%. Clare worked out with passengers spending an average £38.80 at their destinations, “meaning in the first six months passengers have spent £405,000 in local businesses”.

A “Kids Go Free in August” scheme saw a 300% increase in young people using the bus, many for the first time. Another interestingly statistic from the onboard research carried out is 42.5% of passengers had a car available for their journey.

The Daffodil Line celebrated its first birthday last month with excellent national coverage in The Guardian when freelance travel writer Phoebe Taplin wrote an extensive piece for the newspaper as part of ‘Car-free UK’ identifying all the many attractions that can be visited along the route.

After all that, as you can imagine I was very much looking forward to my ride along the route on Thursday and, with a generous 37 minute connection at Ledbury station between train and bus, was relaxed as I arrived at Paddington to catch the 09:52 to Hereford. Except once we were all on board, 09:52 came and went with no sign of any movement and even more disconcerting, no onboard announcement.

And, yes, as captured on the above photo, the large analogue clock on platform 1 is three minutes fast.

To cut a long story short, the train crew had been delayed on a late incoming journey, we left 20 minutes late, when an announcement was finally made explaining the situation and as we arrived into Malvern Link station it was announced we were terminating short at the next station, Great Malvern, three minutes away, at 12:34, where we should have been at 12:12. A following West Midlands Railway train arrived at 12:53 (six minutes later than its scheduled 12:47) making for an arrival into Ledbury at 13:04 (instead of my original 12:28) with the bus due to leave at 13:05.

A quick dash down to the bus stop and keeping fingers crossed the driver would see me in his nearside mirror and wait, which he kindly did, and the day was saved.

There were five passengers onboard…

… who all alighted as the bus pulled into Ledbury’s market square a few minutes later picking up a replacement five passengers.

We left Ledbury via the Deer Park residential area, where there was a driver changeover, and then headed off on the delightful rural route…

… taking in Much Marcle where one passenger alighted, on to Dymick where two boarded, arriving into Newent where four alighted…

… leaving two travelling all the way on to Ross-on-Wye.

Clare is about to update everyone with news on how the second six months of operation has gone as well as year-on-year results now available as route 232 is into its second year. I gained the distinct impression she was quietly confident the increase in passengers travelling would be encouraging, and if so, it will be a deserved result for all the hard work she and others have put into making the service a success.

It’s a great example illustrating the outcome when instead of just moaning about cuts to rural bus routes, the community, led by a motivated individual gets on and does something about it.

So well done to Clare who deserves appropriate recognition for her excellent endeavours.

And why the Daffodil Line? As Pheobe Taplin explained “in the early 20th century, daytrippers used to come by train to see the displays of wild daffodils that carpet the forests and meadows of the so-called “golden triangle” on the Gloucestershire–Herefordshire border. The railway (now long gone) became known as the Daffodil Line. Clare’s group channelled the spirit of the early Victorian investors who had raised the funds to build the railway: “They wanted the railway so they decided to get on and do it themselves,” she tells me.”

Long may the Daff continue to bloom.

Roger French

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