Back in November we got an anonymous tip/rumour that Southern Vectis might not be providing the buses for the 2012 Bestival.
The person alleged that there’s a “rumour that Stagecoach will be taking the Bestival contract for buses next year, bringing around 100 buses to the Island specifically for it.”
They continued, “I have heard that the Bestival organisers weren’t happy with Southern Vectis last year for leaving a lot of their visitors stranded when Southern Vectis took their coaches elsewhere to do school runs!”
Healthy competition?
They finished up with, maybe it’d be “giving Southern Vectis some much needed healthy competition and possible lower prices?! (We can always hope!)”
Southern Vectis: Vague reply
We wrote to Southern Vectis to ask them. They replied …
We hold an appropriate operators’ licence to operate any services we choose to register on the Island, and indeed have current valid service registrations permitting us to operate directly between Ryde and Robin Hill, and from all other ferry ports via Newport to Robin Hill.
Not exactly a strong rebuttal we thought, so we asked for a more direct answer. They didn’t directly answer the question, just suggested that we ask Bestival.
Bestival: Tender for bus provision in new year
Since then, we’ve distracted with other things, so we only got around to asking Bestival this month.
Their response also isn’t conclusive …
The traffic management plan for the 2012 event will be signed off in the new year and it will be at that time that companies will be invited to tender for the provision of bus services to the event.
Looks like the old adage, Time Will Tell, will reveal all.
Other Island media have chosen not to run
Bestival told us that other Island media had also made enquired about, but to date, we’ve seen none of them report on it.
