A bus service between Richmond and Darlington facing the axe could be replaced by an on-demand service.

In May this year, Arriva North East decided its service 34 between the towns was not financially viable.

The bus runs between Richmond and towns like Moulton, Middleton Tyas and Scorton, then Darlington.

North Yorkshire County Council feared the towns on the route would become isolated without the bus link.

So, it agreed a short-term funding package to continue running it until the end of July. It is now holding talks about the service's future to try to find a long-term solution.

Officers from the county's integrated passenger transport section have met parish councils and county councillors in the affected area.

The county council says one problem is that service 34 has low numbers of users, particularly between 9am and 5pm.

Catherine Stead, a passenger transport integration manager at the county council, said: "We took it over as we didn't want to leave people in the lurch and there is some demand for it.

"We wanted to look at the passenger numbers and the decision to stop it was at short notice. One option is community transport where people need to register to use the service and request it stops in their village.

"The provider then would pick people up in the villages where they were requested to, but it would not necessarily be the same route each day.

"We run community services in other areas like Harrogate and Ryedale and it's one of our targets to increase the number of passengers on it.

"We use it in areas where we can't get commercial services to go and pick people up."

Councillor Michael Heseltine chaired the meeting between the parish and the county's officers.

He said: "There was cautious optimism for this type of service for some section of the route.

"However, more details are required before we can be sure.

"Officers have been asked to prepare some detailed proposals as soon as possible.

"I'm very pleased we have also agreed that the existing service will be retained until a suitable alternative has been agreed."

11:20am Tuesday 1st July 2008

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