Please be aware that the shuttle bus service, which operates between Royal Preston Hospital (RPH) and Chorley and South Ribble Hospital (CDH), is no longer in use.
Over the last month, this has been communicated on our Trust website, in local media and via the general office where patients previously purchased their tickets.
The service was originally put in place for staff members to travel between sites but was also made available to patients for a small fee during off-peak hours only.
We appreciate this may be disappointing news for some, however as a Trust we are required to make £60m of savings this year and we’ve been clear with our local communtiies that this will involve some difficult decisions.
It’s important to be clear that we do not get funding to provide the shuttle buses which cost around £200k a year to run and after exploring a range of options we have come to the conclusion that this is no longer financially or environmentally sustainable.
Several audits have taken place to assess the shuttle’s usage which has found that:
Inter-site travel for same-day work reasons was limited
Overall usage outside of peak times was limited
Patient usage (restricted to off-peak hours only) was limited
Stagecoach offer a regular 125 service between RPH and CDH, with more information, including a full route timetable, available on their website. The service currently operates seven days a week and begins earlier and finishes later than the existing Trust shuttle service.
