EVENING bus services will continue to serve Littlemore after a new operator stepped in to replace Stagecoach’s 12C service.

Last month the Oxford Mail reported that Stagecoach would stop running the 12C soon after its contract to operate the route ends on May 30.

Thames Travel said its T2 service will now connect Littlemore and Sandford-onThames with Oxford city centre until 10.23pm from Monday to Saturday, with the last bus leaving the city centre to return to Littlemore at 10.10pm.

The T2’s new evening timetable will start on a trial basis on June 29, after it was confirmed the 12C would stop running on that date.

Bus campaigner Hilda Beesley welcomed the decision.

The 87-year-old, of Bodley Road, said: “It is thrilling, it is very good news.

“I think it is a good idea and people will use it because the summer is coming.

“It is definitely a good thing that people cared about it enough to campaign and ask the bus companies to keep it running.

“I think it will be good for young people.

“Not everybody can afford to pay for taxis.”

The 12C ran in a loop from the city centre through to Littlemore, Sandford-onThames and through Greater Leys and Templars Square in Cowley.

The bus stopped outside The George pub in Sandford Road, Littlemore, every hour from 7.23pm to 11.23pm on weekdays. The T2 will stop in the same place.

Thames Travel spokesman Phil Ashworth said the company stepped in after requests from several Littlemore residents who wanted to see the area continue to be served by an evening bus service.

The company’s general manager Stefan Soanes said: “We’re delighted we’ve been able to help the people of Littlemore and Sandford with a trial evening service on our T2 route linking the Cowley Centre, Sandford-on-Thames, Littlemore and the Science Park to the city centre.

“It will fill the gap left by the withdrawal, by another operator, of the 12C service.

“We are running the journeys commercially and if people don’t use the service we won’t be able to keep it running.”

Oxford City Council member for Littlemore John Tanner said it was important people in the area used the buses to make sure they were commercially viable.

He said: “I am very pleased that we might be keeping some of our bus services but really we do not just want to keep what we have got.

“We need a big improvement for bus services in Littlemore.

“We need buses at all times of the day so that people can go out in the expectation that a bus will turn up, as in Rose Hill and Blackbird Leys.”