Southern Vectis route 4

Southern Vectis route 4 is a bus service operated on the Isle of Wight by Southern Vectis between Ryde and East Cowes via Haylands, Binstead, Wootton Bridge, Whippingham and Osborne House. The general daytime frequency of the route is every 30 minutes in each direction. Double deck buses are normally used, although single deckers can sometimes be seen.

It is one of the only main bus routes run by Southern Vectis not to serve Newport, the hub of the island's bus network.

History

Route 4 itself was run before the 2006 network change with single deck buses in the old oxford blue with striped livery, which in 2005 changed to a lime green livery with flying triangles, resembling the old Southern Vectis logo.

Routes 4 and 5 have previously been marketed as The Victoria Line. By the summer of 2003 the Victoria Line branding had been dropped .

Little has changed on the route the bus takes. From the timetable change on 1 October 2006, it was re-routed to no longer serve Haylands and to travel directly to Ryde, [...] a large amount off the overall journey time. A new route 15 was created to serve the Haylands area. However, with a cut in subsidy paid to Southern Vectis for free travel, it was decided that from 16 March 2008, route 15 would be amalgamated with route 29, then operated by Southern Vectis, which was then remerged into route 4 again from 20 April 2008. The route stopped serving the Red Funnel ferry terminal from 16 March 2008.

However in November 2008 Southern Vectis announced that due to this, the journey time from Ryde to East Cowes was once again increased. This damaged the end to end traffic on the route, made by full-fare paying customers, resulting in the route significantly under performing. This provides a potential threat of a complete service cut to the Haylands and Binstead Estate area. A replacement bus service could be put in place for this area, depending on the future payments for free travel to Southern Vectis.

Services

A half hourly service is operated in each direction during the daytime. There is no late evening service with the last bus from East Cowes at 20:14. A Sunday service is run with an hourly daytime frequency.

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See also

• List of Southern Vectis bus routes
• Transportation on the Isle of Wight

External links

• Southern Vectis website - islandbuses.info
• Southern Vectis route list
• Southern Vectis route 4
• Full timetable