No 1 bus Stagecoach Sheffield: Crucial Stagecoach school bus keeps getting cancelled at last minute, says parent

The No.1 Stagecoach service from High Green to Batemoor is now the only service for many students to reach Ecclesfield Secondary School since their First Bus service was cut in the summer. The double decked runs every 15 minutes for the morning rush and, without it, pupils face a 50 minute walk from High Green.

But a Sheffield mum says, in the last six weeks, her daughter and dozens of other children have put up with last minute cancellations, reduced services and only a single-decker bus turning up. Services that do run can be overly busy, and parents are having to make sudden arrangements to get them to school.

A spokesperson for the bus company said the route is being affected by a shortage of drivers.

Samantha Lister, from High Green, says she now spends most mornings with an eye on the Stagecoach app to see if her daughters’ bus will be cancelled, sometimes with only 15 minutes notice.

She said: “I’m sick and tired of it. Every morning I’m sat looking at the app, even after my daughters have left the house, thinking ‘is it cancelled, is it cancelled?’.

“In the past six weeks it’s got atrocious. It’s often cancelled or they only send a single decker bus. When it’s overcrowded, I think it’s causing a lot of grief between normal passengers and the children too. If nothing else, it’s teenagers being left out in the cold waiting to see if they’re wasting their time.”

The school has reportedly also held pupils back in detention for being late in the morning over the issue, and in texts home to parents reportedly said they would just have to make other arrangements. Ecclesfield Secondary School has been contacted for a comment.

Samantha said: “It’s typically better in the afternoon, but there’s only one bus stop outside the school on Wortley Road, and I think it’s unsafe when I see all the children packed on one road.

“I’m lucky as I can normally take them in the morning if the bus gets cancelled, but I know for other parents it’s really stressful. It’s been stressful for one of my daughters in particular, too.”

Stagecoach said the No.1, and many other services nationwide, are currently being affected by a driver shortage, and it was working to recruit more.

A spokesperson said: “Along with many other industries, bus operators across the country are experiencing a shortage of staff, leaving the company with not enough drivers to run all journeys each day. Our teams are working incredibly hard, but sadly we’ve had to cancel some journeys, sometimes at short notice.

“We’re working as hard as we can to recruit more bus drivers to improve our service and we’re very sorry to any customers who have been affected by this.

“We’d advise customers to use the Stagecoach app for the very latest on their journeys.”