Postwick Park and Ride to remain closed

A decision has been made to keep the Postwick Park and Ride closed until passenger numbers across other Norwich Park and Ride services are back up to 75% pre-covid levels.

When covid-19 restrictions were first implemented in March 2020 all Norwich Park and Ride sites were closed due to extremely low passenger numbers. Shortly after this the Postwick site was leased to the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) to be used as a covid testing centre.

Since the reopening of the other four sites that serve the city centre (Airport, Thickthorn, Harford and Sprowston) passenger numbers have struggled to recover and whilst general local bus services have recovered to on average 75-80% of pre covid passenger figures, the Park and Ride service sits at around 35-40%.

Councillor Martin Wilby, Norfolk County Council's cabinet member for highways and infrastructure said:

"Although disappointing, keeping the Postwick Park and Ride site closed is the right decision for the Council. The Park and Ride is an important part of our transport strategy and so we are doing what we can to keep the service running by subsidising the other four sites while passenger numbers remain low. However, we also need to minimise the cost and financial commitment to the Council. Re-starting the service from Postwick would add between £100-200,000 to that subsidy - something which we simply cannot afford in these difficult financial times.

"We are working hard alongside all of our bus operators to increase passenger numbers across all services with campaigns such as our recently launched 'Choose the bus' campaign and working to deliver our bus service improvement plan for the County."

The decision means that:

• Postwick Park and Ride site will remain closed until passenger numbers across the other four sites hit 75% of pre pandemic figures.
• The subsidy for keeping the service running does not increase and remains at approximately £500,000 this financial year. This figure reduces the more passengers the service gets.
• For people coming from the east of Norwich this means that their nearest Park and Ride site is Harford or Sprowston both of which are only a further 2.5 miles to drive.
• A taxibus service which has been running successfully in Postwick will continue to run.