List of guided busways and BRT systems in the United Kingdom

This is a list of the past, present, planned or abandoned guided bus systems or bus rapid transit schemes in the United Kingdom, including segregated busways. Not included are bus priority schemes, bus lanes or local authority bus company quality contracts that do not involve guidance, significant segregation from the public highway or other bus rapid transit features. The UK does not have any implementations or proposals for rubber tyred trams such as Translohr or Bombardier Guided Light Transit.

UK busways

Present systems
Cambridgeshire Guided Busway
Leigh-Salford-Manchester Bus Rapid Transit
Luton to Dunstable Busway
  • Bradford Manchester Road Quality Bus Initiative Bradford end, including 1 mile (2.3 km) of guided busway[8]
    • A641 Manchester Road, opened October 2001
  • Crawley, West Sussex, Crawley Fastway, operated by Metrobus, a 15 miles (24 km) two-route system with segregated lanes and 1 mile (1.5 km) of guided busway.
    • Southgate Avenue, opened August 2003.
    • Fastway, opened December 2004.
  • Tyne & Wear
    • Centrelink was an infrastructure project including an exclusive busway on the south bank of the River Tyne, for bendy bus services from Gateshead to the Metrocentre, operated by Go North East[9]. In 2020, bendy bus services are long gone and the Centrelink project turned out to be a bus lane along the river with no priorities.
  • Luton, Bedfordshire
    • The Luton to Dunstable Busway runs between Luton Airport and Houghton Regis via Dunstable following the Dunstable branch line, which closed in 1989, running parallel to the A505 (Dunstable Road) and A5065 (Hatters Way). t runs for 6.1 miles, of which 4.8 is guided track with a maximum speed of 50 mph. The £91 million scheme opened on 25 September 2013.
  • Cambridgeshire Guided Busway, a BRT corridor incorporating "just over 16 miles"[10] of guided busway, using the alignments of the former Cambridge and Huntingdon railway and also of the Varsity Line.
  • South East Hampshire Bus Rapid Transit, 3 miles (4.5 km), unguided, between Gosport and Fareham, Hampshire, constructed by Hampshire County Council using the route of the former Gosport to Fareham railway line to reduce congestion on the parallel A32.[14] The scheme was proposed following the collapse of the light rail scheme using the same route and funding was approved in July 2009 for the £20m scheme. It opened in April 2012 with services provided by First Hampshire & Dorset using specially branded "Eclipse" buses.
  • Leigh-Salford-Manchester Bus Rapid Transit, from Leigh and Atherton to Manchester via Tyldesley and Ellenbrook. The 29-stop scheme extends a total of 22 km; and makes partial use of a former railway line to form a 4 miles (7 km) guided busway together with pedestrian, cycle lane and bridleway between Leigh, Tyldesley, and Ellenbrook relieving heavy congestion. It then joins the East Lancashire Road running in a dedicated a bus lane. A Park and Ride site has been constructed where the road reaches the M60 motorway and buses continue through Salford and into Manchester city centre along 9 miles (15 km) of segregated bus lanes; continuing through the centre along Oxford Road to the University of Manchester and Manchester Royal Infirmary. The route is 80% segregated from highway along its length. Costs were £68m for the guided busway and £122m for the total project. Road junction works began in late-2011 and the full busway opened on 3 April 2016.[15] It forms part of the wider Manchester Quality Bus Corridor (Manchester QBC) and Cross City Bus network.
  • Sheffield Bus Rapid Transit North running a 9 km route between Sheffield Interchange and Rotherham Interchange, that opened in September 2016. The route designated 'X1 Steel Link' runs every 10 minutes at peak. Total cost was £29.8m, most of which was for the construction of an 800m road link under the Tinsley Viaduct at Meadowhall. Otherwise the service runs over a similar specification route to those provided for stopping buses.[16]
  • Bristol: Bristol City Council, in conjunction with the West of England Partnership, approved three MetroBus routes which consists of Ashton Vale to Bristol Temple Meads station (AVTM) and two routes from the North Fringe towards Bristol City Centre and Hengrove Park respectively; and opened in May 2018.[17] Only the Ashton Vale to Temple Meads route runs along a guided busway track; on the other two routes the BRT services share buslanes with stopping buses - except for a newbuild junction onto the M32 motorway, which is reserved for Metrobus services only.
  • Leeds, Swansea and York

Past systems
A Lothian Buses guided bus traversing the former Fastlink guided busway in Edinburgh (alignment now used by Edinburgh Trams)
A First York operated Wright StreetCar
on an FTR bus rapid transit scheme in York
  • Birmingham. Tracline 65 was an upgraded route with the first guided busway in the UK. There was a 600-metre section of guideway in Erdington. It opened in 1984 and closed in 1987.[18]
  • Edinburgh, Edinburgh Fastlink operated by Lothian Buses. Originally called WEBS, the West Edinburgh Bus Scheme, a group of bus priority improvements that included a 1 mile (1.5 km) section of guided busway.
    • Stenhouse - Broomhouse, opened in December 2004, designed to be used for Line 2 of the Edinburgh Tram Network.[19] In January 2009 it closed to enable conversion to tramway. The two bus services using the guideway were re-routed.

Future systems

Under construction
  • Belfast: Since 2008 Belfast has been formally exploring the idea of a rapid-transit system. This quickly settled down to be a high-quality bus-based system, with modern vehicles with a tram-like feel with off-vehicle ticketing and fast journey times that hinge on the use of a dedicated traffic lane that is not used by general traffic. The ultimate ambition seems to be for routes running from the city centre to the north, east, south and west with an additional line to Titanic Quarter. The network is in the middle of being constructed and is planned to be opened by 2017/18.[20]

Planned or proposed

Abandoned proposals
  • Leeds, following refusal of funding the proposed Leeds Supertram, a replacement system was proposed by the government,[27] which included a three-line 12 miles (20 km) trolleybus network.[28] 38% would run on guideways or on bus lanes.[29] The scheme received a negative assessment from the inspector at a public inquiry, and approval was refused in May 2016.
  • Bath, Somerset, the Department of Transport approved funding with 1 mile (1.4 km) of busway,[30] but this has been abandoned.[31]
  • London
    • Millennium Transit, a segregated busway intended to link the Millennium Dome with Charlton and Greenwich railway stations, part of which was to include a 1 mile (1.3 km) section of electronic guidance.[32] Intended to be operational when the Dome opened, the electronic guidance technology was abandoned following concerns that neither the system nor the driver was in a position to avoid sudden obstacles.[33] The busway remains in use, unguided.
      • Route M1, Charlton - Millennium Dome
      • Route M2, Greenwich - Millennium Dome
    • Greenwich Waterfront Transit, planned for completion by 2011, abandoned in 2008 due to cancellation of Thames Gateway Bridge.
  • Stoke-on-Trent Streetcar, primarily to link the railway station to the city centre, but would have also linked the rest of the city's six towns and neighbouring Newcastle-under-Lyme and Kidsgrove. Major destinations included both universities, the hospital and both major football stadia.

See also

References
  1. Simon Smiler. "Kesgrave - The First 'Serious' British Installation". Garden.force9.co.uk. Retrieved 8 September 2016.
  2. Simon Smiler. "Bus Priority Systems web page, 2006 information update sub heading". Garden.force9.co.uk. Retrieved 8 September 2016.
  3. Halton Council website page about development of Runcorn New Town Archived 16 February 2007 at the Wayback Machine
  4. "Description of the Runcorn Busway" (PDF). Retrieved 8 September 2016.
  5. "Runcorn buses enthusiast site detailing the busway" (PDF). Members.lycos.co.uk. Archived from the original (PDF) on 13 September 2016. Retrieved 8 September 2016.
  6. "Runcorn New Town - 7.3 Transport". rudi.net. Archived from the original on 18 October 2014. Retrieved 24 July 2020.
  7. "Leeds, United Kingdom" (PDF). Retrieved 8 September 2016.
  8. "First group Bradford guided busway page". Firstgroup.com. Retrieved 8 September 2016.
  9. Tyne and Wear PTE (Nexus) Centrlink page Archived 31 December 2007 at the Wayback Machine
  10. Cambs County Council - Other guided busways Archived 12 November 2009 at the Wayback Machine
  11. "Cambridgeshire County Council's guided busway site". Webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk. Archived from the original on 18 February 2011. Retrieved 8 September 2016.
  12. Cambridgeshire News: Growing fears that guided buses won’t run until 2011 Archived 3 July 2010 at the Wayback Machine
  13. "Cambridgeshire guided busway opening date announced". BBC News Online. 9 June 2011. Retrieved 7 June 2011.
  14. Archived 12 March 2009 at the Wayback Machine
  15. "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 15 April 2016. Retrieved 28 November 2012.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  16. £29.8 million Bus Rapid Transit scheme set for launch Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council 2 September 2016
  17. "MetroBus | Travel in the West of England". Travelwest.info. Retrieved 17 August 2014.
  18. City Transport.info web site, Bus Priority Systems page Guided Buses In Britain section
  20. "Belfast Rapid Transit System". Wesleyjohnston.com. Retrieved 17 August 2014.
  21. "Transforming Public Transport".
  22. Sprint Website Route Alignment page Archived 7 April 2008 at the Wayback Machine
  23. Glasgow Council Fastlink description
  24. "BBC Ministers approve Glasgow Fastlink". Bbc.co.uk. 5 October 2011. Retrieved 8 September 2016.
  25. Archived 19 February 2009 at the Wayback Machine
  26. Ikonen, Charlotte. "Direct rail link between Watford and St Albans could be ripped up and converted into busway". Watford Observer. Archived from the original on 13 July 2015. Retrieved 12 July 2015.
  27. Department for Transport Leeds BRT statement Archived 7 April 2008 at the Wayback Machine
  28. "West Yorkshire Metro - Projects and Plans - New Generation Transport - Trolleybuses". Archived from the original on 7 December 2008. Retrieved 23 January 2009.
  29. "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 19 July 2011. Retrieved 23 February 2009.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  30. https://web.archive.org/web/20090715110006/http://www.bathnes.gov.uk/BathNES/transportandstreets/transportpolicy/plansandstrategies/bathpackage/Newbridge%2BBRT.htm. Archived from the original on 15 July 2009. Retrieved 23 February 2009. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  31. "Bath drops BRT route and Eastern P&R site". Transportxtra.com. Retrieved 17 August 2014.
  32. "London Bus Routes, route 486, successor to the Dome link". Londonbusroutes.net. Retrieved 8 September 2016.
  33. "Specification Change to Create Havoc for Millennium Transit Engineers". Ivsource.net. Archived from the original on 21 November 2008. Retrieved 8 September 2016.
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