Taverham bus Feature

Services to Taverham date back for many years, the furthest reference I've got is a timetable from October 1971 showing services 525, 526 and 528, these operated from Cringleford to Taverham (526, 528) and Drayton (525). Moving ahead another thirty odd years and many of these services still exist as First Eastern Counties 29 operating to Taverham via Hellesdon Asda and the 29A operating via Hellesdon Mill Corner, some of these journeys continues to Elsing. Two journeys a day would continue to Fakenham via Lenwade, Bawdeswell and Pensthorpe.

Drayton was served by the 12, this service was contracted to Anglian Bus and continued until April 2011, during this time it had been renumbered as the 125, probably to fit in with other Anglian services in Norwich like the 121, 123, 124 etc. The 12/125 took 33 minutes to get to the city from Drayton running via Reepham Road, Herucles Road, Boundary Road, Old Palace Road and Bank Plain before arriving at Castle Meadow. In 2011 when Anglian's contract ran out, First was awarded the contract, they rerouted the 29 to run via Drayton village not Hellesdon Mill Corner, it then ran into the city centre via Reepham Road, Aylsham Road and Anglia Square. This lead to thwo problems; there was no bus service serving Hellesdon Mill Corner or the City View Road area of Hellesdon. Local residents of the Mill Corner ares were unhappy about having no bus service to the city unless they walked to opposite Hellesdon Hospital.

The locals campaigned and soon after First came up with a solution, The 28A. This service only departed Mill Corner three times daily (Monday to Friday) and the last departure to the city was 14.21, this only runs on a school holidays. The locals are still unhappy about the service and as many may or may not know the residents of the area are still campaigning for a better bus service.

First then started with the 27A that served the City View Road area of Hellesdon, this runs once an hour and the locals appear to be quite happy about this service. Because of this then new service, the frequencies of 26 and 27 were reduced to every 30 from 20 minutes.

So the routes that replaced older routes are as follows:
29 (Norwich-Reepham Road-Drayton-Taverham), replaced Eastern Counties 525/526/528 and Anglian 125
27A (Norwich-City View Road), replaced Anglian 125
28A (Norwich-Hellesdon Mill Corner), replaced First 29 and Eastern Counties 525.

Article By Kieran Smith