Shoreham's road closure and the 421 bus

Earlier in the summer concerns were raised with me about the change in route through Shoreham of the 421 bus, operated by Go Coach. This route is subsidised by KCC.  The bus ceased to go along the High Street and turn at Mill Lane, instead picking up at the junction of Church Street and High Street. Go Coach felt that the narrowness and presence of parked cars along High Street made it impossible to stick to its schedule and insisted that it remained committed to a service in Shoreham.

Fresh concerns have now arisen because of a closure of Station Road at the railway bridge, starting on 15 September and projected to last for seven weeks. This is for Network Rail works to be carried out on the bridge - but among other things it blocks the route currently taken by Go Coach into the village. 

The closure is under the permit scheme, which came in a couple of years ago (Kent was a pilot for the scheme before it went national). The basic premise is that utilities and others requiring a road closure for their works have to get a permit from the highways authority (in this case KCC) to operate at and within an agreed time. However, KCC does not have powers under this to refuse permission for the works to be carried out (so long as the application is made three months before the proposed time for these works, which I understand this was). In that sense, the local authority's room for manoeuvre is quite limited. 

The seven week timetable for the works to take place is based on the experience of similar works carried out by Network Rail on a bridge elsewhere in the County. In that case it was done by only a partial road closure - however, the section of Station Road under the bridge is too narrow for that to be done here. The hope is that seven weeks is a pessimistic assumption, but it is clearly going to be quite a number of weeks. 

I have spoken with Go Coach, who  are keen to provide a continuing service for Shoreham during the time of the closure. This may require some further discussions with Kent Highways, which I will seek to ensure take place.

I will provide further updates on this issue.