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Fare deal under attack
Page 26
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• Plans by Ribble Motor Services and Lancaster City Transport to revise fares and services have been attacked by both Lancaster City Council and Lancashire County Council. Following complaints, the Office of Fair Trading is investigating. After two and a half years of intense competition on Lancashire routes, both operators have now registered an agreement to co-ordinate routes on the Halton and Wharton corridors from October. Both companies will save resources while offering co-ordinated frequencies. Return tickets will be inter-available, but child fares will rise to 58% of full fare as an interim step towards 66%. LCT's sole shareholder, the City Council has complained that the agreement is anticompetitive and against the spirit of the Transport Act. The County Council perceives use of monopoly power in raising children's fares, and fears repetition in other parts of Lancashire. Up to now the County Council has refused to subsidise half fares, relying on bus operators to provide them on a commercial basis. LCT had warned a year ago that it was losing money on them.
Intense competition between the two operators followed a co-ordination agreement in pre deregulation days. Ribble moved a fleet of minibuses into the area and challenged LCT on most of its urban routes, LCT established long-distance services during 1987 and also started local routes in Kendal.
LCT closed its Kendal depot last month and will now withdraw most of the competing long-distance routes.