Sheffield transport bosses announce New Year price hikes for bus and tram passengers

Transport bosses have announced price hikes for bus passengers buying multi-operator tickets in Sheffield and South Yorkshire.

All changes to tickets will come into force on Tuesday January 2, 2018.

A Sheffield CityBus ticket - which allows passengers to board any bus in the city on a particular day - is going up from £4.30 to £4.50.

A weekly CityBus ticket is set to rise from £15 to £15.80 while a monthly pass will increase by £3 to £59.

CityWide passes, which include Supertrams, will rise from £4.50 a day to £4.80 and weekly tickets will rise 80 pence to £16.80.

Transport bosses said the price hikes have being implemented following an 'extensive price review' and are 'intended to help continue to offer a high-quality public transport service for passengers in South Yorkshire'.

They claim the prices are still some of the 'best value' multi-operator and multi-modal tickets in the country with passengers in some cases 'paying over 30 per cent more for equivalent tickets in Leeds and up to 50 per cent more in equivalent tickets in Manchester'.

Matt Smallwood, general manager of TravelMaster, said; “Increasing the cost to customers of our products is always a difficult decision.

"These changes have been introduced to ensure that our range remains sustainable for us and local operators and that we can continue to offer South Yorkshire’s transport users some of the best value multi-operator tickets in the country."

Many have reacted angrily to the news on social media.

Jenny Binley said: "I've had to start walking to work instead of catching the bus because they changed it to every hour and it never even turns up on time! Start making buses more reliable and maybe the prices might be justified."

Claire Lion Smyth posted: "Shocking..it's almost five pounds to get to town and back and they wonder why people are turning to online shopping rather than the high street."

Lauren Connor added: "Would not mind it going up if buses turned up. The 56 bus, never known anything like it."