Renewed call for 'adequate' town bus service in Letterkenny

Letterkenny is in need of an upgraded bus service with the current model branded as 'inadequate'.

There have been calls for greater awareness and promotion of the service and for it to be extended to other areas of the town for many years.

The issue will be raised again on Tuesday at the April meeting of the Letterkenny-Milford Municipal District by Councillor Kevin Bradley.

The Independent representative has tabled a motion that the Letterkenny Bus Service is 'put out to local tenders to provide adequate bus services'.

“The current service is inadequate for the size of the town,” Councillor Bradley told Donegal Live.

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“Letterkenny needs to have two buses running constantly, one serving the north side and one serving the south side of the town.

“At this stage, it should be put out for public tender because we need a proper service in the town. The whole thing is away to the one side at the minute.”

The current Letterkenny Town Service covers two routes, one which sets off at 8.27am from Skittle Alley and another route is timetabled to depart from Mountain Top at 9.15am.

“The bus is starting when a lot of people are already at work,” Councillor Bradley said. “In reality, it's the middle of the day for a lot of people.

“I see it in Derry or Strabane when I'd be in, people are stepping on and off buses regularly – why isn't that happening in Letterkenny? If we got a proper service, you would really see a benefit.

“We have had four different workshops about this, but we keep talking about workshops and all it's doing is kicking the ball further away.”

Councillor Bradley believes Letterkenny's ongoing gridlock and car parking issues could be alleviated with the introduction of a new public bus service.

He said: “You only have to look at the amount of people going to the college or the hospital, paying for parking because they have to. What if those same people had a proper bus service that they knew was coming and going on a regular basis?

“It would be a huge help for OAPs and there is no reason that children going to and coming from school couldn't use this service, too, if it was going at the right times and was properly signposted for people. These are the exact people a town service should be provided for.”

The current service doesn't cater for the Oldtown area and an incident in 2019 led to a cessation of the bus going to the Long Lane area.

“It's a very simple solution,” Councillor Bradley said. “Look at the different places around the world who have things like a red route, blue route, purple route and so on. If we had a service for the north and south sides of Letterkenny, it could make some difference to the town.”