Mayor appoints new advice: bus line 115 is abolished!

Mayor appoints new advice: bus line 115 is abolished!

In the most recent meeting of the city council in Syke, significant decisions were made that affect both local politics and local public transport. Mayor Suse Laue has signed Wolfgang Kaeding as a new member of the council after Ralf Eggers (CDU) had to resign for health reasons. While Eggers was not present, his farewell is to be made up for in a later session. Lars-Heuer Brockhoff was unanimously elected as the new deputy of the council chairman Andreas Schmidt.

The focus of the session was the official decision on the deletion of additional bus line 115. In the future, this line will only act as a school bus, since it had less than one passenger per trip, as the city administration stated. Jochen Harries from the UWG expressed his disappointment about the lack of connection of the Syker south to public transport.

public transport in criticism

The decision to delete additional trips followed extensive discussions within the committee for fire brigade, civil protection and mobility. Christian Eilers (CDU) described the meeting as the "local council meeting XL", whereby the expansion of bus line 115 in particular came up. The expansion (public transport) in the region, which has been decided since 2022, should strengthen the latest passenger counts that the line remains significantly below expectations.

Since the introduction of additional trips on weekdays and at the weekend, the use has only risen marginally. The city of Syke pays an own contribution of 27,368 euros annually for this expansion, which the city administration now considers no longer justifiable. The committee unanimously recommended the termination to be implemented in the next council decision.

future of the mobility concept

Another point of the session was the commissioning of the city administration to create a development concept for the hinterland development in rural districts. This concept is intended to determine clear criteria for building in the second row and has been presented positively within the local councils in recent months.

In addition, a call collection taxi (AST) was put up for discussion, which should only drive as needed and at the request of the citizens. As part of this redesign of the public transport, 160 desired stops are to be taken into account, of which 76 remain due to distance rules. The district will subsidize a branch with 50 percent, which raises additional questions about taxi companies and the total costs.

These developments are in the context of current challenges in local public transport, which are also discussed in the annual report of the Association of German Transport Companies (VDV). The report focuses on the current issues in public transport and the need to develop new mobility solutions in rural areas. The VDV emphasizes the importance of feedback on VDV statistics to further strengthen the industry.