Passengers' fury as bus route is cut back in Bognor Regis

The Stagecoach number 60 bus will no longer call at the town's railway station during the daytime from Mondays to Saturdays.

The Richmond Road entrance to the station has been the 30-minute service's starting and stopping point for decades.

But this Sunday sees a new timetable come into operation which makes the High Street the beginning and end stops on mornings and afternoons six days a week.

Regular user Barbara Cowie (57) has used the station bus stop five days a week for the past seven years to go home to Pagham from her shop job in the north of the town centre.

"All the passengers I have spoken to are quite angry the bus is being taken away from the station," she said.

"It means everyone who works around here is now going to have to go down to the High Street, where there is going to be a lot of people trying to get on.

"People who have been out on the train for the day also don't want to have to walk all the way through the precinct just to catch a bus."

Chichester resident Ruth Gilbert (51) has caught the number 60 for a door-to-door service from her shop job to her home five days a week for the past four years.

She said: "I leave at 5pm and can only just about catch that service from the station. By the time I have walked to the High Street, I will have missed it, which means I've got another 30 minutes to wait.

"On some nights, there are about six of us waiting at the station at 5pm."

Jean Lowry (77), of Rose Green, has used the bus stop at least three times a week for four years.

She said: "It's really convenient to have the stop at the railway station. People come here with their luggage from the trains.

"It's also just around the corner from the bingo hall. You know you are going to get the bus when you come here because it's so close."

The number 60 route is one of only two bus services which connect Bognor with other places. It runs from the railway station through Aldwick, Pagham, Runcton and North Mundham on to Chichester and ends in Midhurst.

The soon-to-be-axed section of the journey between the railway station and the High Street is timetabled at five minutes going towards Chichester and three minutes in the other direction.

Stagecoach commercial director Edward Hodgson said the company had been reluctant to reduce the route.

"It is something we didn't want to do. It's a source of great frustration to us and we know it will be to some of our customers," he said.

The decision had been made to improve the service's reliability.

"It has got to the point where punctuality has become a real problem for the service," he said.

Two main reasons accounted for this. One was the general increase in road traffic.

The other was the lengthening amount of time the number 60 spent at both level crossings in Chichester city centre.

He said: "These are factors outside our control but we have got to deal with the consequences of them and we have to strike a balance between the needs of a few customers and the reliability which everyone wants."

One way of overcoming the problem would be to run three buses an hour on the 60 route instead of two.

But Mr Hodgson added the company was unable to do that while it was in dispute with local councils about the amount of money it received for the free bus journeys enjoyed by the over-60s.

The 60 will continue to call at the railway station on weekday evenings and all day Sunday when it also serves Felpham and Elmer.

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