Greater Manchester’s Bee Network is changing the way people get around the region and is delivering benefits to communities across the region.
A new report, ‘Delivering Better Bus Services for Greater Manchester’, sets out the story so far since bus franchising was launched in September 2023, including the wide-ranging positive impacts for passengers and communities.
By bring buses back under local control as part of the Bee Network, services are now more punctual than those they replaced and, with affordable and integrated ticketing with Metrolink, more people are choosing to travel by bus in a massive vote of confidence in Greater Manchester public transport system.
Here’s what’s changed since franchising began:
- Increasing patronage: the number of bus journeys has increased by 14% year on year in the first franchising areas.
- Improved punctuality: regularly exceeding our target of 80%, compared to c.66% pre-franchising, in the first franchising area. In March 2025, on-time punctuality across the whole network was 75.8% compared to 71.6% in March 2024 (when only around 20% of the network was franchised).
- Better connected communities: around 84% of residents are now within a five-minute walk of a half hourly service (Daytime, weekday bus or tram services, up from 78% in November 2022)
- More affordable fares: single fares have been held at £2, and day tickets at £5 since September 2022. Value weekly, monthly and annual ticket products have reduced the cost travel further still, with passengers able to spread cost with a credit union loan at no extra cost.
- Convenient and integrated ticketing: customers can tap and go across both bus and tram services, unlocking seamless travel under a single, simple and affordable fare structure.
- Increased focus on safety: 113 TravelSafe Support & Enforcement Officers introduced, collectively providing a presence on board Bee Network services and at bus interchanges and Metrolink stops.
- Cleaner and greener buses: 75% of the Bee Network bus fleet is less than four years old and 17% of the fleet is zero emission, compared to below 2% pre-franchising.
- Improved capacity: More buses with 20 additional buses added in Wigan and Bolton with a further 20 in Oldham and North Manchester at peak times to increase capacity on selected routes
- Service improvements: Changes have already been made to around 75 routes to provide earlier, later, more frequent and better-connected services, while a new Bee Network service – the 615 connecting Wigan and Bolton and serving Middlebrook shopping centre – has also been established
- Night bus: Pilot of 24/7 bus services launched, reinstating nighttime connectivity to the north-west of Greater Manchester for the first time in a decade.