THE boss of Morebus has called for Christmas shoppers to be offered free bus travel instead of free parking as an incentive to visit town centres.
BCP Council infuriated traders by axing the free car parking which had become a tradition on Thursday nights and Sundays in the run-up to the festive season.
The council cited budget pressures for the decision, but said it was “working closely” with Morebus and Beryl bikes to support alternatives to the car.
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Andrew Wickham, managing director of Go South Coast – which owns Morebus as well as bus operators in Southampton and Salisbury – pointed to the example of Worcester, which recently introduced free bus travel instead of free parking.
He wrote on Twitter: “Paging local authorities, BIDs (business improvement districts) etc across our area. Please come and talk to us – there’s still time – doing this could make a big difference to high streets – and carbon emissions.”
Mr Wickham told the Daily Echo: “The standard local authority reaction to ‘What can we do to support town centres?’ is free car parking.
“We want things that support town centres because we think it’s really important to the fabric of society – they’re really important to us.
“But I don’t think free car parking is well thought through, in that most of our local authorities have declared a climate emergency and therefore encouraging people to jump into their car is diametrically opposed to that plan.
“It’s wrong on that level and vast swaths of the population don’t have access to a car for many reasons, through age, choice, medical condition or they don’t have a driving licence – whereas buses are accessible to all ages, wheelchair users and all sorts.
“We’re not saying it should be forever or anything like that but perhaps a couple of Saturdays before Christmas might be quite a nice way for people to support the high street.
“We’d be happy to talk to anybody about anything.”
Mr Wickham said buses were a convenient way for most people to visit high streets across the BCP Council conurbation and beyond.
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“The M1 and M2 are every seven and a half minutes. The former Yellow Buses routes are generally every 15 minutes. We’re planning to increase those,” he said.
He rejected the idea that free parking is needed to attract people to towns, saying Brighton is “one of the most car-restrictive places in the country” yet its shopping areas have been “absolutely rammed” ahead of Christmas.
BCP Council has been approached for comment.
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