CACE Committee member Liz Bennett shares her experience using the Holme Valley Stotts Bus services supported by HVPC
Bus blog September 2024
I have been reliant on buses for transport for most of the last six months. It’s not easy to adapt after having a car. You have to pack less into a day, but that may be a good thing when we lead such busy lives. Getting the bus from Netherthong into Holmfirth (the 335) is fairly straightforward. The fare is not much more than the parking charge in Crown Bottom these days. One less car is one less bit of congestion at a time when Holmfirth is struggling with road works. One less car, one less bit of pollution, one step towards tackling climate change. What’s not to like? Well, actually quite a bit – as you will see as this blog progresses but I would love it if more people could make the effort to take a bus once in a while or once every week.
More people on buses means fewer cars and more money to support the bus provision. More money in – better services. Can we do this?
Bus blog October 2024
Now I have a car again and I’m surprised how many times I defer to the car despite my wish to be more ‘green’ and catch the bus. “It’s too cold”. “I’ve got to get back and do that other task”. “I can’t take my dog on the bus so it’s easier to take the car”. By the way, I have to apologise to all the terrified travellers who had to put up with said dog barking and yowling on the bus during the months we tried to get her accommodated to buses. We’ve now conceded that she can’t do public transport. She prefers cars.
I still manage to get the bus to my weekly art club in Holmfirth. Not hugely convenient because the first bus gets me there 40 minutes early. But when the traffic issues in Holmfirth meant it took 20 minutes to get along 200 yards of Dunford Road it firmed my resolve to keep to the bus.
Bus blog November. 2024
I got the bus from Holmfirth to Slaithwaite today to attend a Christmas sale at Globe Arts. A straightforward journey for me on the Stotts Bus 335. Just enough time there, an hour, to see all the stalls in the Globe and visit my favourite shop, Cobwebs. On the return journey, one of the passengers was a young man with twins in a double buggy. He manoeuvred it onto the bus very confidently and while the twins slept I asked him whether he chose a bus over a car or whether he had no choice. He said he was shortly to take his driving test but had caught buses around Milnsbridge, Meltham, Holmfirth and Huddersfield all his life. One of his most useful buses from Milnsbridge to the HRI was cut a few years ago. We agreed that every couple of years part of the service shrinks. If more people used the buses that wouldn’t be necessary.
Last week I was on a little Stotts bus and there was a buggy in the disabled place when a man in a wheelchair boarded. The buggy had to be quickly folded down. This chap wouldn’t have been able to do that. Two sleeping toddlers and a buggy to wrangle and only one pair of hands. But passengers are usually keen to help each other.
Holme Valley Parish Council makes a financial contribution to the Holme Valley bus service with Stotts to help improve accessibility in the Valley and support climate action.