COMMUNITIES across Dorset are rallying together to find alternative transport arrangements following county-wide cuts to bus services.

A few schemes have started for a trial period over the summer holidays using a number of different bus operators.

A bookable Saturday mini bus service will run for a trial period between Blandford and Salisbury. It will collect from all the villages along the route diverting off the main road. It has been negotiated by local county and parish councillors with the charity NORDCAT.

Dorset Community Transport are providing a number of services during the summer holidays. These include a number 88 service through Sturminster Marshall, Wimborne, and Colehill, and a 97 service through Fordingbridge, Cranborne, and Verwood.

Dorset County Council slashed their transport budget by 50 per cent in 2016 to save £1.5million following a reduction in their funding.

The budget for school transport was also reduced by £850,000 in an attempt to balance the books.

However, it is now offering a community transport fund to help kick-start alternative transport schemes.

There are currently over 60 schemes covering 91 per cent of the county. These arrange transport for social events, medical appointments and getting people to work. They can run to regular timetables and are sometimes bookable, or they can be one-offs to take people to local events or attractions.

Cllr Daryl Turner, the county council’s cabinet member for natural and built environment, said: “In the current financial climate the role of the county council in subsidising public transport has had to change. Instead of imposing timetables, we are working with communities to help them find solutions that fit better and are not reliant on future funding.”

Last month, a leading watchdog warned that extensive cuts to Dorset’s bus services would be “hugely damaging to people and communities across the region”.

David Redgewell, one of the national directors of Bus Users UK, said: “We’ve never seen this level of cutbacks. It’s an extraordinary amount of cutbacks.”

He added the level of service reduction in Dorset was “some of the deepest I’ve seen in the south of England” and would mainly affect people in rural communities.