Bolton: Warning as mindless yobs hurl bricks at bus

It comes after reports that bricks had been thrown at a bus recently and led to services being diverted.

A resident recenlty shared that bricks had been thrown at a Vision Bus, and they were concerned over elderly people, and children’s safety when getting home at night.

The incident is the latest to affect buses in Bolton.

An evening service has been forced to diverted away from Leverhulme Park for almost a year following several serious incidents, including at least 12 smashed windows and a bus driver sustaining an eye injury.

In July of this year the 36 Diamond bus was suspended for a time after missiles were thrown at the bus in Little Hulton.

Kate Green, TfGM’s TravelSafe Partnership Manager, said: “Passenger and staff safety is of paramount important to us, and these types of incidents are absolutely unacceptable as they can have a significant impact on law-abiding customers wanting to use public transport safely.

“We will make every effort to work with partners like Vision Bus to track down and prosecute anyone foolish enough throw objects at public transport.

 “The consequences of this type of unthinking behaviour can be extremely serious for transport staff and passengers, but also for offenders.

“A moment of madness or showing off could lead to them being banned from the network or potentially prosecuted.”

Figures released by TfGM last year show that Bolton has the third highest number of attacks on buses in Greater Manchester.

Anti social behaviour on buses has continued to be an issue for some time

The issue of missiles being thrown at buses is also long-standing across Greater Manchester’s public transport network.

Between April 2021 and March 2022, there were 305 reported incidents of missiles being thrown at bus services, with 21 further incidents of damage to windows where the cause is known.

Incidents of damage to buses that are known to have been caused by a passenger(s) onboard are not included in these figures.

Greater Manchester Police, with the support of the wider TravelSafe Partnership, has recently conducted a major force-wide operation, AVRO, which treated public transport and active travel networks as its ‘11th District’, with officers covering buses, interchanges, trams, trains, roads, and active travel routes.

In Farnworth, police stepped up patrols in March of this year following reports of recent attacks on buses.

The TravelSafe Partnership takes a three-pronged approach to tackling anti-social behaviour and reassuring the travelling public: engagement, education and enforcement.

Transport staff and police dedicate more than 5,000 hours per week patrolling the Metrolink and bus networks, day and night, seven days a week. 

The partnership also runs an extensive youth education programme in schools to promote safer travel on public transport, while also warning of the dangers, impacts and consequences of crime, antisocial behaviour and fare evasion.

During the 2021/22 school academic year, partnership representatives spoke to over 50,000 young people.

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