What Can Rural Churches Learn from the Rural Passenger Transport Industry?

For many years before being appointed as the Rural Officer for the Diocese of Ripon and Leeds I was involved in the rural passenger transport industry. I didn't work for an operator but for the Community Council of Shropshire and then Cumbria County on projects to develop and fill the gaps left by the withdrawal of bus services following the introduction of the 1985 Transport Act.

Recently I have been reflecting on this experience and the possible lessons that rural churches can learn from the rural passenger transport industry.

The old National Bus Companies managers had become masters of managing decline and consolidating their operations. However this often resulted in complicated timetables that where difficult to use. 

When variations or new services where suggested to managers one reply I remember receiving was. “We have surveyed the passengers on our buses and they don’t want to go there.”  However as I used to point out I was more interested in the passengers that weren't on their buses and perhaps they should do a community survey. When these were done more often than not they threw up unmet needs and demands and when these were provided for people used the new facilities.

The lesson rural churches can perhaps learn from this is that we don’t just need to survey our existing congregations but that we also need to connect with and listen to those in our communities that are not attending our services.

Part of the reason that bus services and communities needs were mismatched was that the requirements of the local communities had changed over the years and the bus operators had failed to adapt and therefore passenger numbers had declined.

One of the things the old National Bus companies had become poor at was customer care and provided utility rather than comfortable and quality buses.  Seats where closely spaced with limited room for shopping and drivers would watch as people struggled on board with shopping or push chairs climbing up steep steps.

Contrast this today with forward looking companies like Harrogate and District who’s number 36 service runs between Ripon, Harrogate and Leeds and is thriving.  The buses have low floor access and the drivers stop centimetres from the curb so passengers can easily get on board. The leather seating is very comfortable and the buses are clean and warm with free wifi and are driven by courteous and helpful drivers.

How this contrasts to some of our churches, where access is via steep steps and the seating uncomfortable and the buildings cold and poorly lit.

Yet some churches are improving access: replacing hard wooden pews with flexible comfortable seating, installing low energy modern lighting, carrying out energy audits to reduce heat loss and installing modern low carbon heating systems such as biomass. (see story) In addition installing a kitchen to provide refreshments as well as accessible toilets.

One of the lessons we also learnt in the rural transport industry was that timetables needed to be simple to understand and easily remembered.  The complications that have been brought in to try consolidate operations with different times on school days, market days and during different seasons of the year, actually undermined services and people couldn’t remember when the bus ran. What was required was easily to remember timetables that you could carry in your head; such as the same time each day or the same time past each hour, with no exceptions.  When these were introduced passengers’ numbers crept up. The same is true in parishes where there is a service at the same time each Sunday; even if the format of the service may change it’s the same time each week and numbers are creeping up.

Another factor we learnt was that to sustain a rural bus service we needed to combine various uses or different markets. For example the well know post buses that combine the carriage of post with the carriage of passengers or the border courier in Scotland that combined the delivery of medical supplies to hospitals and rural Doctor’s practices with the carriage of passengers.

The same pattern is now emerging in rural churches with church buildings in use as multi-functional community buildings. Examples in the Diocese of Ripon and Leeds includes St Michael Church, Spennithorne near Leyburn (see story) that hosts the local library and All Saints Kirby Overblow (see story) which is also used for exhibitions, conferences, as a theatre and a place for community celebrations. In other areas church buildings host community shops, youth clubs and other activities, whilst still being used for worship at other times.