First fares up on 5th Jan

First Essex are putting their fares up on 5th January. Full details here. Here are the main changes to tickets covering Brentwood:

• Some single & return fares will rise
• FirstDay Brentwood will be cut to £3.50
• FirstDay Basildon Outer will increase to £6.20
• FirstWeek Basildon Outer increases to £25
• FirstMonth Basildon Outer increases to £88
• FirstDay Essex remains unchanged, as do the Essex-wide weekly and monthly tickets.

New timetable for 351 from 3rd Feb

First 351 to Chelmsford is having its timetable changed from 3rd February 2014. Here are the details from their website:

We'll link to the new timetable as soon as it is available.

Christmas & New Year buses in Brentwood

Of all the bus companies serving Brentwood, only First and TfL has advised what their service levels will be over the festive season. Here's what First will be doing:

Monday 23rd December: Normal weekday service
Christmas Eve 24th December: Normal weekday service
Christmas Day 25th December: No service.
Boxing Day 26th December: No service.
Friday 27th December: Saturday service.
Saturday 28th December: Normal Saturday service.
Sunday 29th December: Normal Sunday service.
Monday 30th December: Saturday service.
New Year's Eve 31st December: Saturday service.
New Year's Day 1st January: No service.
Thursday 2nd January: Normal weekday service.

TfL will have the following service levels on their London Bus Network, which includes the 498 from Brentwood:

Monday 23rd December: Normal weekday service
Christmas Eve 24th December: Saturday service.
Christmas Day 25th December: No service.
Boxing Day 26th December: Sunday service.
Friday 27th December: Saturday service.
Saturday 28th December: Normal Saturday service.
Sunday 29th December: Normal Sunday service.
Monday 30th December: Sunday service.
New Year's Eve 31st December: Saturday service.
New Year's Day 1st January: Sunday service.
Thursday 2nd January: Normal weekday service.

To find out what the other local bus companies will be doing, please contact them directly.

Tell the council not to cut your bus!

Essex County Council are having what they call a 'bus review'. That's a posh way of saying they're looking at which subsidised bus services they can cut in order to save some money to pay for the bankers' mistakes.

This could affect many routes serving Brentwood, especially the few evening and Sunday services we have. If you want to keep them, then go to this website to take part in the 'review' and tell Essex County Council how important bus services are to our town.

You have until 9th December to respond, after which they will presumably stop listening and start deciding where to wield that axe.

The following Brentwood bus services are subsidised by Essex County Council and could be at risk if not enough people defend them in this consultation:

• 73 (evening & Sunday journeys to Warley and Pilgrims Hatch)
• 80A & 80C (Sunday service to Hutton & Shenfield)
• 251 (Sunday service to Warley, Billericay and Southend)
• 261 Doddinghurst
• 268 & 269 Grays
• 351 (Sunday journeys to Chelmsford)
• 565 Ingrave, Herongate

Direct buses to Upminster

UPDATE: The 848 service no longer runs. See this more recent post for more details. The below post is now out of date, but has been left online as a record of what ran for a short time.

Travel With Hunny have quietly launched route 848 linking Brentwood with Upminster. It serves stop E on Brentwood High Street and also stops outside the railway station before running through Warley. It terminates at Upminster Station, returning from stop B, just outside Wimpy:

See the route map here and as a pdf here.

Here's the timetable:

...and a list of stops served in each direction:

Please note the 848 only runs on weekdays and is not a TfL route, even though it goes into Greater London, so Oyster is not valid.