Taking the Bus: How You Could Save 1000 a Year

As crazy as it sounds, but did you know you can save about 1000 over a year by taking a bus instead of driving your own car? The habits we have developed over the years make it almost a necessity to jump into the car to go anywhere – whether it’s work or to a social event. In fact, it’s become so common to drive that almost all teens start to learn as soon as they can. It’s so easy to book a test now through a driving test cancellation website that it’s no wonder teens are learning from as young as 16, but £1000 is a lot of money to save. 1000! Honest! Does that sound like a good return for a change of habit?

Research done on this shows that by not getting into your car to commute to work and travelling to some select social events, the savings equate to about 95 a month.

Saving money and the environment

People are becoming more conscious of the environmental footprint they are leaving every time they take their car out for a drive. Don’t even count the cost of fuel for this exercise because that’s a ‘given’. You take the bus you are not using any fuel. The bus is, yes, but buses these days have been made with the environment in mind. Pollution in cities where there is a lot of traffic is becoming a community conscious problem of which we are all aware. More than half the people surveyed stated they were concerned about traffic pollution. This suggests that maintaining a clean environment rates highly in people’s minds.

Savings by region

Stagecoach came up with some surprising results after examining 35 key commuter routes in England, Scotland and Wales. They looked at the difference in cost between paying for fuel and parking every week and getting the bus.

Scots love to save money they say, so they will be happy to know that for those living in the West of Scotland make a greater saving. It calculated out to 2,800 annually for those who pay for bus fares. That’s almost 3 times the national average savings of 1000, mentioned earlier. Looking at the logistics, if more people take the bus there would be less traffic congestion and less of a reason to raise fares with so many extra bus commuters.

It’s also a good story for those living further south to the North East of England. There is a 73% saving on the Newcastle to South Shields bus route compared to the cost of driving your own car. In the West, commuters in Merseyside travelling between Heswall and Liverpool could save 1400 every year by switching to the bus. The least amount of savings occurred in Greater Manchester, with commuters saving about 740 a year for travelling between Reddish and Manchester. Still a handy amount of money in anybody’s books.