Full Report

Material Realities - Transport

Once young people could both drive and had access to or owned a car, their experience of life in the Northern Fells improved and they were much happier about living there. All, apart from one, of the 18-24 age group could drive and had access to car. Being able to drive opened up the Northern Fells (and beyond) and widened the potential range of work and training opportunities. Much of the discontentment of the 14-17 year group was rooted in their inability to drive. Whilst public transport services are limited in the Northern Fells (see Section 2), there was considerable confusion over bus routes and timetables. Where knowledge of these did exist, bus timetables were deemed infrequent and inappropriate to the needs of young people. To fill the gaps of public transport provision, young people were innovative. Getting to places for work, education or social activities required elaborate planning and help from family (usually parents) and friends with travel arrangements. Some also required the help of schemes organised by the Northern Fells Group. These include the Northern Fells Community Bus and the Voluntary Car Scheme. Most young people were aware of the community bus service. Whilst some had used it and found it very helpful, many associated it with ‘old people’, which deterred them from using the service. Few young people were aware of the voluntary car service, but those who had used it highly valued it.

7.1 14-17 and unable to drive

The 14-17 age group was marked by discontent mainly because they aspired to greater independence but were simultaneously dependent on others to travel anywhere. In the following discussion a group of young women (14-17 age group) talked about the difficulties of being their particular age:

Once you can drive I think everything's done and sorted really. You can go anywhere you want, whenever you want. It's kind of just our way, just kind of like

In limbo

Yeah kind of like from year five until you can drive you're kind of stuck. But before then you don't really mind, but after you can drive it doesn't matter (Frankie and Gertrude, 14-17 age group)

Public transport services failed to ease the discontent of this age group. This was either because there was little knowledge of the times and routes of services or bus timetables and routes were deemed inappropriate. The following comments were common:

I’m sure there is a bus but I wouldn’t know when it was or I don’t think it would be a good time

The bus that goes past my house is at like 8 o’clock in the morning but I’ve never caught it

Yeah, it’s always a ridiculous time (Jeff and Dalle, 14-17 age group)

7.2 Alternatives to public transport

To fill the gaps of public transport provision, young people had two routes of action open to them. The first was family and friends. The second was services/facilities that the Northern Fells Group has developed.

7.2.1 Friends and family

Not being able to drive required detailed planning and help from others to get to work and social activities. Most young people needed transport to somewhere every day and their jobs and social lives meant multiple journeys each day. When asked about her movements and need for lifts during her half-term week, this is what one young woman said:

Saturday I had to get a lift into Caldbeck and Sunday morning I had to get a lift back

What, what were you doing in Caldbeck?

I was just staying with friends. Sunday as well I would have had to get a lift to work and a lift back but I didn’t go in because the oven broke. Monday I had to get a lift to work and a lift back. Tuesday a lift into Carlisle, a lift back. Wednesday stayed at home. Thursday, today, had to get a lift to work and a lift back and then a lift here. Tomorrow I’m going to Carlisle so I’ll have to get a lift. Wigton and em, a lift to Caldbeck and then on Saturday morning a lift back here and then to work. A lift there and back. On Sunday. Work. A lift there and back. So pretty much every day I have to get lifts (Connie, 14- 17 age group)

Many young people were quite clever at devising strategies to ease the car-driving load of their parents or to get to places when their parents were unable to give them a lift. One way in which they did this was to work out who travelled to particular places on a routine basis and to devise their needs around them. Another common strategy was to get a lift to a mid-way point, like Dalston or Wigton, and then go by public transport for the remainder of their route:

(A)lot of people do work at Carlisle so there’s always someone going back and forth. I usually get a lift with my Dad or something like that or just like other people’s Dads and Mums. Like I’ve got friends whose Mums are nurses and they’ll be going to the hospital. And I’ve got a friend whose Dad’s a solicitor and he goes back and forth to his office every day so, and I’ve got friends that work, car salesman for instance (Charlie, 14-17 age group)

You can get to Dalston and then there’s buses there like every hour or every half hour or something.

Right, so Dalston’s the sort of centre of the network? You get there and if…

Yeah, if you want to get to Carlisle it’s easier to get to Dalston and then get the bus or the train or something (Dalle, 14-17 age group)

My Mum usually doesn’t take me all the way to Carlisle. She’ll take me to Wigton; I’ll get the train or something from there or, yeah, stay back at a friend’s house and then my Mum will pick me up in the morning or something (Connie, 14-17 age group)

7.2.2 The Northern Fells Community Bus/Cumbria County Council Voluntary Car Service

The alternative to asking friends and family for lifts is the Northern Fells Community Bus or the Cumbria County Council Voluntary Car Service. These schemes are potentially useful to all young people unable to drive or without access to a car in the Northern Fells, but are/could be especially helpful to those who have recently moved into the Northern Fells or feel excluded from particular networks of friends and family. Most young people knew about the Northern Fells Community Bus, fewer people knew about the Voluntary Car Service. Many of those who had used the voluntary car service and community bus valued it because it helped them to get to places when their parents were busy and it was cheap to use:

Well, it does Saturday trips and if you book it in time you can say, arrange it to go whenever you want with as many people as you want and they just charge you. They make about a £1 or something. It's really good. But you've got to cope with the embarrassment of sitting in the ambulance going into town (Adrian, 14-17 year age group)

My Mum and I regularly used that (voluntary car service) because we only used to have one car and Dad was often (at work)……We always used to love the voluntary car service because it was so, like cheap and it just, it was a superb service……And I used to use it on my own if my Mum and Dad weren’t able to give me a lift for whatever reason if I was out and going to a party or things like that (Adrian, 14-17 age group)

Young people, however, often strongly associated the community bus with ‘old people’. Some young people thought it was only available to older age groups:

It generally is a hospital bus because it takes old people to hospital (Gertrude, 14-17 age group).

I didn’t realise it was actually for young people. I thought it was for old people. Not in a nasty way, I just did (Urban Angel, 14-17 age group)

I suppose you just imagine it being for the older generation people. Not for the younger ones (Emma, 18-24 age group)

Others associated it with old people because they perceived older people’s needs to be prioritised over their own:

It's awkward because if you go to town, but then if you say right can you pick me up at five o'clock, yeah, it's all good and then some old lady falls down the stairs and puts her hip out, it's like can you get your own transport back? Yeah, I'll start walking. That's what they do, they prioritise the route which is fair enough like but I mean it's not really a solution is it to a young person's problem because you're….like I say, if you're in town and then something happens and you've got to use it for something else then you're stuck. (Jim, 18- 24 year group)

Finally, in addition to its association with ‘old people’, the appearance of the bus and its slow pace was something with which few identified:

It's got this huge roof and it like chugs up the hills and like it does like go at like ten miles an hour (Gertrude, 14-17 age group)