Improvements to Bus Services

East Sussex County Council has received £41.4m from the government to implement its Bus Service Improvement Plan (BSIP).

The plan sets out to offer residents and visitors the highest possible quality bus services, that are frequent and have a comprehensive choice, reduce congestion, and make a positive contribution to better air quality and decarbonisation.

Below are some of the improvements to your bus services in 2023.

Bus Service improvements

A significant number of bus service improvements were made in East Sussex from Sunday 23 July.

This will see improvements to the frequency of some services, the later running of others and improvements to some weekend services. These service enhancements will run to the end of March 2026.

Most are funded through East Sussex County Council’s successful bid to UK Government, in support of our East Sussex Bus Service Improvement Plan (BSIP). Summary details are shown in the links to the right hand side of the page.

These also include changes to other services that have already been made or are planned. In respect of the upcoming changes, further detailed timetable information will be available on the websites of the bus operator(s) concerned over the coming weeks.

We also draw your attention to the lower fares that have been introduced as part of the County Council’s BSIP and you can read more about these here: www.eastsussex.gov.uk/roads-transport/public/bus-service-improvement-plan/lower-fares-on-east-sussex-bus-services. This is in addition to the Government’s ‘Help for Households’ fare cap (currently £2.00 for a single journey) about which more detail can be found here: www.eastsussex.gov.uk/roads-transport/public/buses/2-bus-fares

Many of you will be aware of the introduction of FlexiBus by the County Council. Operating in the rural areas of the county, this initiative aims to deliver the BSIP’s objective of providing residents in rural areas of East Sussex with access to a bus service to enable residents to access services such as health, education and retail or to connect to the wider bus or rail network. You can read more about FlexiBus here: www.eastsussex.gov.uk/roads-transport/public/flexibus

Please use the links in the box below for downloadable documents of the bus service improvements across East Sussex and in each of the district and boroughs. The same information is accessible at the other links on this page.

Some of the more significant improvements to bus services can be found below:

New hourly daily service between Heathfield, Blackboys, Uckfield, Lewes and Brighton (route 29A).
New half-hourly Monday to Saturday daytime service linking Eastbourne, Hailsham, Bulrush Lane, Laughton, Ringmer, Lewes and Brighton (route 28). Evening and Sunday journeys to run between Hailsham and Brighton.
Routes 254, 304 and 305 relaunched as ‘route 1066’ with additional evening journeys and a new Sunday service. The service links to and from Hastings and Tunbridge Wells.
Eastbourne Loop service doubled in frequency between Langney shopping centre and Eastbourne town centre via the Sovereign Centre and Seaside. Up to 15 minutes on weekdays and up to 30 minutes on Sundays.
Significantly more evening and Sunday services including in and around Hastings, Bexhill, Rye, Hailsham and Eastbourne.