Thank you for your petition submitted to Norfolk County Council regarding the Earlham Green Lane to Clover Hill Road Bus Lane in Norwich.

There is a bus scheduled to use this bus lane every 15 minutes. The removal of the bus lane and allowing cars to use it would increase the journey times for these buses as they would have no priority for a quick journey and would be held up by congestion caused by other traffic. This in turn would have a detrimental impact on existing passengers and punctuality, ultimately leading to the need to deploy additional resource on the route to maintain bus journey time reliability. This either increases costs to provide the same level of service or reduces the service provided to passengers to maintain costs. Delays and increased journey times also lead to a reduction in passengers over time, potentially making the service unsustainable and leading to its possible withdrawal in the future.

The Council is committed to increasing the use of more sustainable forms of transport, e.g. public transport, and to provide more reliable services. Removal of a well-established bus priority measure so that more car use is encouraged is therefore not something that fits within our Transport for Norwich policy.

Although you may consider the above disappointing, I hope it explains the Council’s position regarding the Earlham Green Lane to Clover Hill Road Bus Lane.