Students who may wish to travel by bus to Castle School

Although many students live within walking or cycling distance from The Castle School, a significant proportion are reliant on either buses, coaches or taxis to get to and from school.  Students under the age of 16 who require transport and live within the school’s designated catchment area are provided with free transport by South Gloucestershire Council. 

Other students are able to pay to use commercial service routes that run from Bradley Stoke, Stoke Gifford and Severn Beach.  These services stop at the school.  The buses come into The Castle School car park at the end of the school day to collect students. These services arrive at different times and all depart from 3.00PM.  Some of these buses pick up students from another school before coming to The Castle School.

All students need to be ready to  board their bus at 3.00 pm. Students do need to have a method of communicating with parents/carers if they have any issues with their buses after school and parents/carers should contact the providers of the bus services with any issues.

There are also public transport bus routes from Yate, Filton and Patchway and the surrounding areas but these do not stop at the school and will only stop at designated bus stops in Thornbury Town Centre, Gloucester Road or Park Road depending on each particular route. Parents/carers and students are responsible for checking the accuracy of this information as they can change.

All bus travel to and from school by students is a choice between parent/carer and child and with the bus provider.  The basic legal responsibility for children’s travel to school rests with the parents/carers.  The school does not commission any bus services or hold any contracts with any bus service.  

Commercial Bus Route

A route that is run by a commercial company. The commercial services may be predominantly used by school students but can also be used by members of the public. For safety reasons The Castle School allows some of  these buses to enter the school site to pick up and drop off students for this service. Students pay for this service.

Applegates 

Applegates is a commercial service and uses a cashless ticket system. If your child plans to use the Applegates bus service,  please go online and purchase/reserve seats for transport.

The CS7 bus serves The Castle School and Marlwood school. This is a dedicated school transport which means services are used only to carry pupils to school. 

South Gloucestershire Transport

South Gloucestershire Council contracted transport (Free of charge to students in the catchment)

Students who are under the age of 16 and require transport to and from school and live within the school’s designated catchment area are provided with free transport by South Gloucestershire Council. Students eligible for this free transport are provided with passes. Any issues regarding bus passes should be communicated to Client Transport at South Gloucestershire Council -Tel 01454 863924(5) or (6) or Tel 01454 863929, Email AdmissionsAndTransport@southglos.gov.uk.   All other students can choose to travel to school by bus using a commercial service or a public transport bus service for which the student will pay themselves.

We have been asked to request that all parents/carers  communicate all transport related issues from these services to the South Gloucestershire Council office, not the contractor. This will enable them to best manage the contracts. 

Public Bus Service

Public transport bus services are generally based on regular operation of transit buses along a route calling at agreed bus stops according to a published public transport timetable. Students pay for this service.

Public transport responsibility has  been transferred to the West of England Combined Authority (WECA) and so all emails regarding this service should be directed to them.

Information on services run by commercial, public providers or South Gloucestershire and Gloucestershire Councils