Goole to Scunthorpe gains a Sunday Service

Goole is not currently served by any local bus services on a Sunday, but from next week - 5th November - it will have four Sunday bus routes, thanks to East Riding of Yorkshire Council's Bus Service Improvement Plan Plus funding. In this post I take a look at one of those routes, the 361 to Scunthorpe.

The 361, a tendered service operated by East Yorkshire, links Goole and various East Riding villages on the south side of the River Ouse and west side of the River Trent with North Lincolnshire, where it diverts inland to operate via the small town of Crowle en-route to Scunthorpe. Associated service 360 operates a shorter route in North Lincolnshire by the banks of the River Trent serving Amcotts instead off Crowle. Monday to Friday there is an approximately two hourly service between the 360 and 361, with the 360 operating most peak journeys and the 361 mostly off-peak. On Saturdays the 361 operates approximately every three hours.

As off the 5th November, Sundays also gain a three hourly daytime service 361, with three departures from Goole at 0935, 1235 and 1535, returning from Scunthorpe at 1100, 1400 and 1700. For various villages - plus Crowle - this opens up the opportunity to visit Scunthorpe or Goole on a Sunday by bus for the first time in years. Passengers can spend either 6 hours 10 minutes or 3 hours 10 minutes in Scunthorpe, or 3 hours 21 minutes in Goole.

By way of historical context, my July 1980 'Lincolnshire' bus company South Humberside timetable book showed two Sunday Scunthorpe to Goole journeys plus various 'shorts' between Scunthorpe and Crowle that appeared linked to steelworks shift times. By 1982 this was three Goole journeys plus Crowle shorts. All these had gone though by the time my 1989 Humberside County Council Scunthorpe to Goole pamphlet was published. The Goole to Swinefleet section did regain a Sunday daytime service for many years in the 2000's and 2010's, interworked with other routes, latterly the Goole to Selby service, but not the bulk of the route between Swinefleet and Scunthorpe.

What is also notable here is that there is a significant benefit to North Lincolnshire. The villages of Gunness, Althorpe, Ealand, Eastoft, Luddington and Garthorpe all gain a Sunday service along with Crowle; some Keadby residents are also within walking distance of the Althorpe Station stops. There is no acknowledgement of funding from North Lincolnshire Council that I can find, so it seems the East Riding maybe paying the full cost. Scunthorpe is an important regional centre for Goole and the Ouse & Trent villages and operating the longer 361 route via Crowle - instead of the quicker 360 via Amcotts - will likely provide more passengers. As such East Riding of Yorkshire Council's decisions can be understood, although somewhat contrasting to the Monday to Saturday 88 from Goole terminating at the county boundary at Rawcliffe Bridge, as opposed to extending to Thorne or Doncaster in South Yorkshire.

The Sunday 361 means a 33% increase in the number of Sunday North Lincolnshire bus routes (the others being the 1A, 4 and 350) and will be the only Sunday bus service in North Lincolnshire to operate west of Scunthorpe.

At the same time there are minor timing changes to the Saturday 361 timetable. Whilst the Sunday service can keep perfect three hour intervals between journeys, Saturdays cannot. What was 0820. 1120, 1430 and 1735 from Goole becomes 0820, 1110, 1430 and 1745, whilst from Scunthorpe the 1015, 1315 and 1620 become 1025, 1310 and 1630 departures. Not perfect before, even less perfect from next month.