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Wheels fall off the Nightrider buses
A bus that makes sure revellers don't have to walk home in the early hours is to be scrapped.
Gosport Borough Council said it can no longer afford the night bus service, which operates between midnight and 3am on Saturday and Sunday.
The service is now being axed as not enough people are using it.
Last year an average of just 14 people used the Bridgemary and Fareham route on any night, while just one person went to Lee-on-th-Solent.
Gosport council's head of community safety, Amy Ford, said: 'Sadly this clearly shows it is not financially viable to continue to operate the night bus. It has become prohibitively expensive to operate the service for so few passengers.
'To continue to do so would not be a prudent use of public money, so the decision has been made to drop it.'
The night bus was originally set up to reduce the number of drunken fights at the taxi rank opposite Falkland Gardens.
The lack of taxis available for hire led to huge queues by the taxi ranks with brawls breaking out between drunken revellers.
To cut the trouble the council was handed £30,000 from the Government Office of the South East in 2004 to set up the Nightrider bus routes.
However last year the council opened up the taxi market in the town, meaning there are now more cabs than ever before.
Council leaders say drinkers falling out of pubs and nightclubs will now be able to hop straight into a waiting cab, meaning they will have less chance to get frustrated in the queue and end up in punch-ups.
Mrs Ford said: 'We feel that recent changes made regards the delimitation of taxis, there should be more taxis available late at night to get people home safely.'
The night buses will stop running after the last bus on Saturday, April 14.
March 2007 Portsmouth News
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