Public service vehicles: April 2016 to March 2017

Main points

• There have been decreases in the number of people employed and the number of vehicles in operation in the local bus industry in Wales in 2016/17 compared with the previous year.
• In 2016/17 the local bus industry in Wales employed 4,592 staff and had 2,360 vehicles in operation as of 31 March 2017. When compared to 2015/16, the numbers employed decreased by 8.2% and the numbers of vehicles decreased by 13.0%.
• There have been decreases in the number of passenger journeys and vehicle kilometres travelled on the local bus services in Wales in 2016/17 compared with the previous year.
• During the year 99.6 million passenger journeys were undertaken on local buses which travelled 100.3 million vehicle kilometres. Of these journeys commercial services accounted for 78.9% and subsidised services accounted for 21.1%. When compared to 2015/16, passenger journeys and vehicle kilometres travelled have decreased by 0.7 and 4.3% respectively.
• Bus fares in Wales increased from 2016 to 2017.
• Bus fares in Wales increased by 0.5% from 2016 to 2017, which is lower than the general increase in consumer prices (as measured by the Consumer Prices Index including owner occupiers’ housing costs - CPIH), over the same period. 
• Taxi registrations have decreased (1.1%) whereas private hire vehicles have increased (15.1%) in 2017, when compared to 2015.
• In Wales, 5,085 taxis and over 4,770 private hire vehicles were licensed as of March 2017.