One in five Greater Manchester buses are not on time

Almost a fifth of buses in Greater Manchester do not run on time, according to data from earlier this year which shows the reliability of services is reducing. The reliability of bus services in the city-region has now slipped below national standards, having dropped to less than 96 pc this year, a report has revealed.

It comes less than a year before mayor Andy Burnham brings buses under public control with the first franchised services to launch in Wigan and Bolton. Currently, around 80 pc of buses run on time - defined as between one minute early and five minutes late - according to samples of the network this year.

The overall punctuality of bus services between February and July 2022 was 81.58 pc, down from 88.8 pc during the same period in the previous year. Transport bosses have described this reduction in reliability as 'concerning'.

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And Stephen Rhodes from Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) told a bus services sub-committee today (October 7) the figures are still falling. He said: "The issues we've got are due to a combination of traffic congestion - especially in the regional centre, but also in some of the key towns - infrastructure work, whether that's planned or unplanned and also the driver shortfall across the industry."

Mr Rhodes explained that the national shortage of drivers has had an impact on reliability of services, but there was still a drop compared to the data from the same period in the previous year when Covid restrictions were in place. Between February and July 2021, the reliability of services - a measure of whether timetabled bus services are keeping to schedule - was 98.16 pc.

But