Schoolchildren have been campaigning to keep a bus service that links their village to the city from being axed.
The service in question is the 93A service which runs from Carlisle to Bowness-on-Solway and vice-versa, which is going to be cancelled by provider Stagecoach on June 11 this year.
The schoolchildren who attend Kirkbride Primary School in the titular village have been working hard interviewing residents – asking questions about how they feel about the axing of the service, and what the consequences may be – and subsequently writing letters to Stagecoach describing their disappointment.
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The schoolchildren, aged between eight and nine, also took part in a peaceful protest in the village while holding signs and chanting ‘save our bus’.
One such letter read: “I am writing to you to express my devastation on you ceasing our local bus service.
“Also, we are worried about dentist, hospital, shopping/food.
“At the moment, four buses are perfect a day, but what about our health?
“A lovely old lady came to visit Kirkbride Primary School and she told us how she doesn’t drive and how she needs to get places such as the bank, hospital, optician, dentist, and social events.
“As a small community, we don’t have all those services in our small village, so most of us really need this social service.”
The campaign has also seen posters being put up around the village, including the bus shelter, with ‘save our bus’ written on them.
The protest, while peaceful, was certainly loud and attention-grabbing, with the pupils of Kirkbride Primary School’s years four, five and six classes banging drums and tambourines as a rhythmic accompaniment to their passionate demands for their bus service to be saved from being chopped.
There is no other reliable public transport service to and from the area.
A Stagecoach spokesperson said: “Withdrawing a service is not a decision we enter into lightly and is only considered as the very last resort.
Regretfully, with such low passenger numbers we are no longer in a financial position to continue operating the 93/93A service at a loss.”
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