A number of Stewartry bus services are set to be permanently cut back.
South West of Scotland Transport Partnership (SWestrans) is getting ready to tender for bus routes across the region.
And with passenger numbers still well below the levels they were at before the coronavirus crisis, that could see reduced timetables brought in during the pandemic adopted permanently.
A paper for Friday’s SWestrans meeting reveals there were just over 2.5 million passenger journeys on the region’s buses in 2021 – a 46 per cent drop on the 2019 figure of more than 4.7 million.
The number of concession passengers has dropped by half with the number of youngsters using buses falling by 41 per cent. The level of adults is 17 per cent down.
The hardest hit Stewartry route is the 503 Castle Douglas to Dumfries service where usage is down 40 per cent.
A number of bus routes are due to go out to tender next week ahead of the new contracts coming into force in August.
In the Stewartry, it is proposed the 372 Dalbeattie to Dumfries service is scaled back to 86 per cent of its old timetable with the 373 Shawhead to Dumfries service cut back to 90 per cent.
The 501 Kirkcudbright to Dumfries, the 502 Kirkcudbright to Castle Douglas, the 505 Dalbeattie to Kirkcudbright, the 520 Carsphairn to Castle Douglas and the 521 Laurieston to Dumfries services would all return to the pre-pandemic timetables.
