Bus Passenger Survey

The inclusion of passenger opinion into decision making processes helps bus operators to develop the best services. BVA BDRC has undertaken a number of research programmes for bus operators, focussing on passenger thought and satisfaction, one of BVA BDRC’s research specialisms.

A key example of this is the Bus Passenger Survey (BPS), which BVA BDRC conducts on behalf of Transport Focus. In Autumn 2014, we surveyed just over 50,000 bus passengers, measuring passenger satisfaction with a representative sample of bus services in many local areas in England and Scotland.

These larger satisfaction results can then be supplemented with more localised research to develop effective improvements to services. One bus operator approached BVA BDRC wanting to find out which variations to an existing set of local routes were most appealing to customers. Research into which groups were using different bus routes, for example students or commuters, enabled the operator to make changes to meet the specific needs of each group. Other work that we have helped individual operators with includes the development of new ticket product and mystery shopping.

Read more about the Bus Passenger Survey on Transport Focus' website.