More than 500 Stoke-on-Trent residents battle to get buses back to their estate
By Kerry Ashdown - Local Democracy Reporter
17th Jul 2023 | Local News
More than 500 people are battling to get buses back to their estate after First Buses withdrew its services from Sandford Hill four years ago.
Residents now feel isolated and struggle to get to medical appointments, a community leader has said.
Councillor Joan Bell, who represents Sandford Hill, has presented a petition to Stoke-on-Trent City Council calling for a bus service to be brought back, calling at Longton and Hanley. She told fellow councillors at a meeting on Thursday (July 13) how residents of all ages had been affected by the lack of buses.
She said: "I'm presenting this on behalf of the residents of Sandford Hill. It won't surprise you to know it is on a hill and that means people find it very difficult to access facilities around the area without a bus.
"The loss of a bus service has quite literally changed people/s lives. During my election campaign residents were continually telling me how much they missed the bus service.
"Elderly residents told me they have become isolated, hardly ever leaving their homes. One person told me that before the bus service was taken off, the only time they went out was to visit a knitting circle, and now they couldn't reach that without a bus so they were staying in their house all the time completely isolated.
"They also told me how difficult it was to get to their GP appointments in Longton, and even more difficult when they have to go to the hospital – in fact it was quite impossible without hiring a taxi. The elderly were not the only residents who told me how the removal of the bus service had affected them.
People of all ages told me how difficult it was to get to work in Longton, Stoke or Hanley without a bus service. Young people who have to go to college need a bus if their parents haven't got transport, so they were finding that difficult too.
"We also have to consider the detrimental effect taking a bus service away has had on our town centre economy. The bus service in an area like Sandford Hill is not a convenience, it's a necessity."
The full council agreed unanimously on Thursday to note the petition and it will now go on to be considered by a scrutiny committee. It was not debated at Thursday's meeting however because it contained fewer than 1,000 signatures.
First Potteries said in April that it has no plans to reinstate the route. A First Potteries spokesman said: "Our routes around the Sandford Hill estate were withdrawn in 2019 due to very low customer demand.
"They were replaced by another operator which also withdrew the service after a period of time again due to low patronage. We currently have no plans to reintroduce a service to the estate as we focus on recovering our existing network."
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