Archived press release

Date Published: 13/01/06

Aylesbury Vale’s older residents and people with disabilities are set to benefit from a new scheme to provide free bus travel. Under the new concessionary bus pass scheme all senior citizens aged 60 or over and people with disabilities will...

Aylesbury Vale’s older residents and people with disabilities are set to benefit from a new scheme to provide free bus travel.

Under the new concessionary bus pass scheme all senior citizens aged 60 or over and people with disabilities will be able to travel for free on local buses from April this year.

Aylesbury Vale District Council’s current concessionary fares scheme provides half price bus travel for the over-60s and people with disabilities. At a meeting of the district council’s cabinet this week, councillors agreed to expand the scheme in line with central government policy.

Countywide travel is included in the new scheme, which means there’s a lot more people can do with their bus pass. Holders will be able to travel the whole of Buckinghamshire for free after 9am on weekdays and all day at the weekends.

There are more than 4,000 senior citizens and people with disabilities across the Vale who currently receive half price travel concessions.

Residents who hold bus passes at the moment will be issued with new passes for countywide travel. The new passes will be credit-card sized in response to feedback from customers.

Councillor Pam Pearce, Cabinet Member for Community Matters, said: “This is great news and will help both the elderly and people with disabilities across Aylesbury Vale to make more use of public transport to access the local services they need. I hope the scheme will encourage more people to use the bus as a means of travel and so reduce the number of cars on our roads.”

A scheme for the re-issue of bus passes, together with arrangements for new applications, will be announced in due course. Whilst new passes will be valid from 1 April 2006, there will be an overlap period to the end of May when the existing passes will still be valid to allow the council sufficient time to issue all the new passes required.