Background to the Mere Wigglybus

1 Public Meeting

A successful meeting of 35 people was held in the Mere Lecture Hall, on Thursday morning, 20th May 2004. The latest proposals were explained and people put forward their ideas for where the service should go and what sorts of new journeys it could make possible. This feedback was used to finalise service proposals which went out to tender. The services are by their nature flexible and there will be close monitoring of the service. This will allow changes to be made during the current operation which has been funded by the Government's "Rural Bus Challenge" fund until March 2007.

Salisbury & District Council are also supporting the project and following the public meeting the community is closely involved in developing this new Wigglybus service.

If you require further information please contact:

Tim Reynolds, Wigglybus Manager

Tel: 01225 713371

e-mail timreynolds@wiltshire.gov.uk

2 Original consultation proposals

Once our bid for funding from the Government's Rural Bus Challenge was accepted we started to develop a new Wigglybus service for the Mere area starting in 2004. The Wigglybus is a bookable service that comes off its main route to pick you up or drop you off on demand.

Wiltshire County Council and MTRU undertook preliminary route planning work and suggested a two zone system with a bookable/hail and ride link to Gillingham or Shaftesbury from Mere. A survey was carried out in the potential service area. Further input from local people and a consultation meeting (see above) was organised. Even though the service has now started we are still open to any suggestions you may have.

For a chat about the new service please call Tim Reynolds, the Wigglybus local manager, on 01225 713371, email: timreynolds@wiltshire.gov.uk.

As with the original Wigglybus:

Your bus will carry you on a door to door basis, when journeys have beenprebooked by telephone.

The bus could spend roughly 30 minutes in each zone shown on the map depending on demand before travelling back to Mere.

You will have one fully accessible bus that easily carries wheelchair users, people with buggies and those with shopping trolleys.

If you want to see a full screen map of the two zones in which the bus was originally intended to operate, please click the map below. For the current service areas click here for Zone 1 and click here for Zone 2.

Click on the Wigglybus to go back to the home page!