Bus funding will improve services and support city families

Around £9 million will be spent in the next 12 months on improving city bus services and keeping fares affordable for families in Brighton & Hove.

Cabinet members will discuss our Local Authority Bus Grant (LABG) Delivery Plan for 2026/27 tomorrow, Thursday 19 March.

A key priority will be to keep fares affordable for those families who rely on bus travel to access school and those most in need of affordable transport.

Members of the Cabinet will be presented with a report which will recommend spending £5.5 million of the LABG on fare offers and supporting and enhancing key bus services across the city, including:

• £750,000 on fare offers for families, young people and people on low incomes (an additional £700,000 carried over from 2025/26 will mean a total of £1.4 million for fare offers).
• £3.3 million on support for socially necessary bus services, and the Breeze Buses to the Downs.
• £760,000 on enhancing several services to improve reliability and punctuality
• £80,000 to extend the opening hours of customer services.

Further detail on the fare offers and our plans for keeping bus travel affordable in the future will be presented early next week.

This will be in addition to the more than £10 million we will be spending again this year on free bus passes for Older People and Disabled People, paid for by surplus from council fees and charges.

Improving bus journeys for all

Another £3.1 million of the LABG will be spent on projects aimed at making bus travel better and increasing passenger numbers.

• Making bus stops more accessible with new dropped kerbs, ramps and layouts
• Continued funding support for express bus services
• Improving key bus corridors, including Lewes Road, Eastern Road and Upper Rock Gardens
• Installing cameras on buses for enforcement of bus lanes
• Strategic mobility hubs, including Park & Ride
• Targeted service changes improve bus journey times and reliability

The money will strengthen and build on Brighton & Hove’s excellent bus network. The city has some of the highest passenger numbers per capita outside of London.

Councillor Trevor Muten, Cabinet member for Transport and City Infrastructure, said: “We have a great bus network in Brighton & Hove, but we’re always looking for ways to improve bus travel and keep fares affordable, working creatively to support those who need it most with the limited funding we have.

“Buses are a lifeline for linking our residents with hospitals, GP surgeries, shops, work, education and their communities, so subsiding fares and supporting services that wouldn’t otherwise be commercially viable is vital.

“We want to encourage people to travel by bus which is why we’ll also be improving bus stops, key routes and funding express services to get people where they want to be faster.

“By improving our bus network we encourage more people to use public transport which helps reduce congestion and help us achieve our air quality and Net Zero goals”.

Local Authority Bus Grant and BSIP

Since 2022, Brighton & Hove has received around £37 million from the Department for Transport in Bus Service Improvement Plan (BSIP) and Local Authority Bus Grant (LABG) funding.

Nearly £11 million of that funding has been used to subsidise fare offers, including £3.9 million specifically benefitting under 19s since 2024.

We’ve also improved bus priority, bus stop accessibility, and network resilience, as well as introducing new express services, supporting higher frequency and better reliability on existing routes.