BORDERS Buses has announced it will make changes to its services next week after surveying the travel needs of customers during the pandemic.

Around a dozen services will be altered, according to the operator.

A spokesperson said: "We shall make a number of changes from Monday, October 19, bringing the level of service to roughly 80 per cent of pre-COVID-19 operations.

"This will mainly consist of increasing the volume of peak journeys operated and improving connectivity across the Borders Buses network."

The altered services include:

  • Service 51: morning and evening peak journeys added.
  • Service 54: will include three new journeys to Glenfield.
  • Service 61: Galashiels to Earlston and Oxton only – school journeys to reflect additional journeys on service 51.
  • Service 67/68: services are now operating through Tweedbank and serving Tweedbank railway station. Tweedbank now has a 30-minute frequency from Galashiels.
  • Service 61/67/68: serving the BGH every 20 minutes from Galashiels Interchange.
  • Service 69: the temporary Monday to Saturday service now withdrawn. The service reverts back to Sunday and will serve Langlee/ Tweedbank/BGH and Melrose – 70 service withdrawn Sunday only.
  • Service 90A/90B: additional afternoon journeys added.
  • Service 91: first morning departing five minutes earlier to connect with Lanark service at Biggar.
  • Service H1/H2: additional Burnfoot journeys to address growing customer numbers. H2 will now service Ramsay Road and service withdrawn from Stonefield.
  • Service X62: additional late journeys added and departure time from Edinburgh altered.
  • Service X95: additional late journey added.
  • Service 70: Monday to Saturday departure times amended

The company hopes the changes made to departure times for the 70/61/67/68 services will remedy parking issues at Galashiels Interchange.

On Monday (October 12) the Borders Buses app was updated to mirror the changes made to the above services.

The company's spokesperson added: "We recommend customers use our journey planner when planning trips and use our capacity checker to monitor the busyness of their chosen journeys.

"Both available from our mobile app and website."