Changes to service 61 from 20th April 2015
Arriva have decided to alter service 61 from 20th April 2015 so that it will terminate in Dunstable and no longer continue beyond to Luton Town Centre. This follows a service review which indicated that most passengers are actually travelling on sections of the route covered by other services and that within the unique section only served by service 61, between Dunstable and Tring, passenger numbers were very low. Passengers will still be able to travel onward to Luton & Dunstable Hospital, Luton Town Centre and Luton Airport via high frequency connecting services from Dunstable.
As well as revising the route Arriva is also making a number of timetable changes designed to improve punctuality and better match journeys to the number of passengers actually travelling.
The revised service will follow the current route to Dunstable town centre, serving the existing stop in Church Street (known as the Winston Churchill) and then divert to terminate at the ASDA store in Court Drive. Return journeys from Dunstable will start from ASDA, serve the existing stop in West Street and then follow the current route back to Aylesbury.
Within Dunstable, passengers will be able to make same-stop connections onto either service A, which provides a fast link via the Busway to Luton Town Centre and Luton Airport, or onto service 31 to the Luton & Dunstable Hospital. Both services run up to every 15 minutes and through tickets will be available. Passengers towards Luton should change at Church Street (Winston Churchill), while those travelling back from the Luton area should change onto service 61 at ASDA.
Although the overall frequency of service 61 is generally unchanged, the timetable has been completely revised and contains some major changes including:
Mondays to Fridays
- A new early morning journey from Aylesbury at 0540, providing connections arriving in Luton at 0656 and at Luton Airport at 0707
- The 1230 and 1330 departures from Aylesbury will be replaced by a new 1305 journey
- The 1455 departure from Aylesbury will run 20 minutes EARLIER
- Journeys from Aylesbury after 1700 will run 20 minutes LATER
- To improve reliability, the 0820 (0815 on school holidays) arrival into Aylesbury is retimed throughout
- The 0900 journey from Eaton Bray to Aylesbury will now start from Dunstable with connections available from Luton
- The 1337 from Dunstable to Aylesbury will no longer run
- The 1822 journey from Dunstable to Aylesbury will be replaced by a 1900 departure, starting from Dunstable ASDA and providing a later connection from Luton
- Evening journeys from Ivinghoe to Aylesbury are retimed to run LATER throughout
Saturdays
- A new journey from Aylesbury to Dunstable at 1335
- The 1400 and 1500 departures from Aylesbury will be replaced by a new 1435 journey
- Evening journeys from Aylesbury to Ivinghoe will run 20 minutes LATER
- The 0820 journey from Dunstable will now start from Ivinghoe at 0840 and has been retimed
- A new journey from Dunstable to Aylesbury at 0855
- The 1836 journey from Dunstable to Aylesbury will be replaced by a 1857 departure, starting from Dunstable ASDA and providing a later connection from Luton
- Evening journeys from Ivinghoe to Aylesbury are retimed to run LATER throughout
From the same date, the frequency of Arriva service 500 to Hemel Hempstead and Watford will increase on Mondays to Fridays to operate every 20 minutes, providing additional buses between Aylesbury, Aston Clinton and Tring.
A copy of the timetable showing suggested connections is attached and will be made available on our website http://www.transportforbucks.net/Buses-and-trains/Bus-timetables.aspx. Arriva will shortly be producing new timetable leaflets and will also be providing information on their buses.