Caroline

Caroline lives in South Oxfordshire and works for Oxford University Hospitals. She mainly travels to the John Radcliffe, and the nearby Churchill and NOC, but sometimes travels to the Horton in Banbury. 

I used to drive to the JR, but the traffic is so awful, and the parking is difficult, so I swapped to using the Park & Ride at Redbridge. As a staff member at OUH, under a new scheme I get free parking at the Park & Ride and then free bus travel to the JR. This was the prompt I needed after considering changing for a long time but not quite getting round to it. 

Before I started, I was worried about the bus not turning up and losing the flexibility that the car gives me. However, these worries didn’t actually happen in real life! Sometimes the bus is cancelled at short notice and that is irritating, but overall, it has worked out very well for me. The buses are frequent enough that the flexibility is still there, and when I need to go to the Horton I still drive – estates have a temporary permit there for me. 

One really nice thing is that I have some travel buddies – people on the same bus - and we chat every day! The other major advantage is that I use the time on the bus to catch up on lots of things I never normally have time for such as life admin, sorting emails, etc.

For anyone else thinking about this, I would say do it! People say they don’t have time, but time spent on the bus is much better than circling the car park for the millionth time. Not having to park is a huge, huge relief. I’m glad I swapped.