As far as possible, we aim to keep you up to date on our website.
As far as possible, we aim to keep you up to date on our website.
This includes:-
- Pool Valley brought into use.
- Route 20 to start.
- Service 49 cut back.
- Other service changes.
- Cashless trial.
- 11X is not being reintroduced this year.
- Exceat Bridge woes.
- A23 Bus lane complete.
- Buswatch meeting
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There are still deep concerns about Brighton and Hove Council's LTP5 City plan, and likely problems with the Valley Gardens scheme,
especially with regard to disabled access to buses.
Click here for a new update, in late May 2026,
offering a viewpoint on Valley Garden issues.
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General bus information:
The headlines:
- Several new night bus routes have been announced, in Brighton.
- Service 125 ended on the 28th April, Cuckmere Bus will provide a limited replacement.
- Flixbus are offering a new Brighton to Milton Keynes service- serving three Airports.
- While mentioning airports, there is a new 24 hour-a day service from Gatwick to Eastbourne.
- Several local bus companies have won a number of awards over the past year.
All our information is thought to be correct to 9th June 2026.
To slightly simplify our front page, some information has been removed. This can still be found on our News page.
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Information by Bus Company:
Brighton & Hove Bus Co.:
As can be seen from our June Newsletter, services 18 and 50 are about to
merged into a new cross-city service 20- serving Queens Park and Hollingdean.
With new journey opportunities, hopefully better reliability, but still managing to save a bus.
Also from this time, the service 49 will be reduced to a 20 minute service at its western end- leaving as little as a 10 minute service
along the important Porland Road. This also substatially reduces what has upto now been a major high frequency cross city service.
On the positive side; Night services N12 & N14 will see substantial improvements.
After an excellent launch celebration, most journeys on the service 7, are being run using the new 100% electric buses
(also see May's Newsletter). These buses can also be seen on the service 6 on Sundays.
April also saw the Brighton & Hove Bus Company launch its new night services N29 and N48. This means both Lewes and
Moulsecoomb/Bevendean will gain a 24 hour- 7 day a week service. At the same time, the service N1 was extended past the County Hospital,
to serve Whitehawk and Woodingdean; so again offering a 24 hour 7 day a week service. These (and others) join the N1, N25 and N700, in
offering a round the clock 24 hour hour service.
At the same time, summer journeys were added to 'Breeze services' 77, 78 & 79 (also see April's Newsletter).
Click here for Brighton & Hove Bus Company's main website.
Stagecoach: Covering the area between Littlehampton, Worthing, and Brighton (and towards Horsham).
The service 700 from Brighton to Durrington was enhanced to run 24 hours a day, seven days a week!
Metrobus, south and mid Sussex:
The big news locally is improvements to the service 271/272 (etc.), including better evening services, and for the first time
Sunday services are extended to Crawley, via the major gardens at Wakehurst Place (which includes the Millenium Seed Bank).
Wholly outside our area: the new service 500 has been launched. Replacing several bus services, this offers a 24 hours a day service-
from Gatwick, through East Grinstead, Uckfield, and Hailsham, to Eastboune. If only we could say the same from Brighton!
Compass Travel:
Runs many services including the service 16, 37/37B, 47 and 52.
Click here for the Compass Travel's website.
For their real-time information:
Click here.
CTLA & Cuckmere bus services:
We do not generally list changes to Cuckmere Bus services, but are providing the following information:
The Cuckmere Valley Rambler bus 47 has restarted at weekends. Funding cuts in late April saw the service 125 withdrawn.
Instead Cuckmere Bus will run their service 25 additionally on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Its service 26 links Seaford to Eastbourne, via Alfriston, on Sundays. The bus company
also runs other services in this area- which may be useful, including the Art shuttle.
Flixbus are offering a new Brighton to Milton Keynes service, via Gatwick, Heathrow and Luton Airports;
in addition to the Brighton to London and Cambridge service.
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May we welcome new members and supporters reading
our news for the first time.
We are independent from bus companies and local authorities. Our policy
is to influence decisions by building relationships and working with others.
We have meetings four times a year with bus companies and Council representatives
where members concerns are discussed. They also have an opportunity to
explain future proposals.
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Some other recent newsletters are available here.
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What we do:
Brighton Area Buswatch deals mostly with strategic issues affecting
lots of people. We campaign for improvements to bus services and fares
on behalf of bus users. Our policy is to build relationships with local
Councils, local interest groups and bus companies to find out about their
plans, so we can make suggestions and try to influence them.
We are lucky to have excellent bus services in much of our area which
are well-used and very few require public subsidies. Recently around 50
million passenger journeys were made by bus in Brighton & Hove which
compares with under 20 million journeys in Southampton or Portsmouth which
are similar in size. This is a tremendous achievement but we recognise
that people's expectations are always rising and there are always improvements
that can be made.
If you have a particular problem regarding a bus service or an incident
on a recent journey we advise you in the first instance, to contact the
bus company concerned. In our experience most local bus companies are
keen to receive feedback and will do their best to help if they can. Our
partners at Bus Users UK can deal with appeals if a customer is not satisfied
with the response from a bus company or local authority.
What we have achieved in the past includes:-
- We suggested a one-hour single ticket, which has been introduced,
so enabling passengers to change buses without needing to pay again.
- We successfully campaigned for Saver tickets, Key Card and m-tickets
to be valid on all Council supported bus services in Brighton &
Hove.
- We rejoined the Council's Quality Bus partnership, enabling us to
influence planning decisions affecting all local bus companies.
- We suggested improvements to late night services to Goldstone Valley
and to Lewes; and have been pressing for improvements to route 37 to
Meadowview and the Bristol Estate; plus later Sunday evening journeys
to Worthing.
- We have expressed concerns about the revised Valley Gardens scheme.
We are associated with Bus Users UK.
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