One million trips on the Hop! service - May 2025

The success of the Hop! service continues with over one million trips being made on the service as of May 2025. The service launched in April 2023 and over 100,000 trips were made in the first 5 months of launching. Passenger numbers have been steadily rising with an average of 2,070 trips being made a day, with Haymarket Bus Station, Nelson Mandela Park and the Railway Station being the most popular stops on the route.

Stagecoach launches 41 electric buses - May 2025

Stagecoach have begun launching electric buses on the 148 (Leicester to Coventry) route as part of the Coventry All Electric Bus Town + Warwickshire ZEBRA scheme, helping to bring the Leicester Buses Partnership one step closer to having a fully electric bus network.

£1.3m of Major Resurfacing Works

£1.3 on major resurfacing works have been carried out over the last 12 months, helping to make bus journeys more comfortable. Resurfacing works have been carried out on the following roads:

• Melton Road (Checketts Road/Loughborough Road)

• Narborough Road (Dumbleton Road/Winchester Road)

• Uppingham Road (Trocadero)

• Saffron Lane (Cyprus Road)

• University Road (Lancaster Road/Welford Road)

• Gleneagles Avenue/Kincraig Junction

• The Portwey

Orbital Service Change - April 2025

The Orbital service has been split into two sections to help improve reliability. The service now operates as 40N Northern Orbital between General Hospital and Glenfield Hospital, and 40S Southern Orbital between Hamilton, Tesco and Beaumont Leys. The services operate on an hourly basis Monday to Saturday in both directions.

Passengers travelling directly between Hamilton and Leicester General Hospital, and Beaumont Leys and Glenfield Hospital, will have the benefit of an increased frequency by being able to travel on either service.

New Red Route Along the A6 - April 2025

A red ‘no stopping’ route has been introduced along the A6 from St Margaret’s Way and Abbey Lane to help with unauthorised parking which causes traffic congestion affecting the reliability of buses. There are a number of buses along this corridor which should see an improvement to punctuality including the 303 Birstall Park and Ride, 54 City Centre to Beaumont Leys, Skylink Leicester to Derby, 154 Leicester to Loughborough, 25/26 Mowmacre Hill to City Centre and the 74 Leicester to Anstey. All of this services support a number of student and work movements in and out of the city.

Arriva launches 25 electric buses - April 2025

Arriva have launch an additional 25 Streetdeck Electroliner buses to their fleet. This has been funded under the DfT’s ZEBRA 2 scheme as part of Leicestershire County Council’s bid. Leicester City residents benefit from this scheme as the buses are used on services that operate into and out of the city. This brings us one step closer to electrifying our network, with 159 buses now being electric!

£9.45m BSIP24 funding awarded from the DfT

We are pleased to confirm that we have been awarded £9.45m of funding from the Department for Transport (DfT) to help us deliver our projects under our Bus Service Improvement Plan 2024 (BSIP24) for 2025/26.

The projects we are planning to fund and details of our delivery plan are shown below: