On Wednesday 1st April 2026 at 18:30, the first ordinary meeting of the Northumberland Branch of NEPTUG took place following the founding AGM on 4th March 2026. Please read below for more information about the meetings and what the group intends to do, but if you’d like to get involved, please feel welcome to join using the information below!
The speaker at the meeting, Geoff Wade, Community Bus Engagement Lead at the North East Combined Authority (NECA) gave a presentation on the work NECA is doing primarily on the bus network that carries around 70 million people each year to make the system better such as realtime information systems that are so good, you can see a bus negotiate a roundabout such is the clarity of the data, and making major improvements to thing such as bus stops too.
Public Transport and Active Travel as a holistic system, not just one mode in isolation.
As a wider organisation intending to cover the whole of the North East, ‘NEPTUG campaigns for an integrated, sustainable, publicly-accountable transport system connecting Tyne and Wear, Northumberland and County Durham.
It also supports walking, wheeling and cycling.
The Northumberland Branch of NEPTUG, at the last meeting on Wednesday 1st April 2026, decided to take forward a list of projects which included a mix of rail and bus proposals, with a few examples below:
Rail campaigns included but were not limited to:
- Improved services to Chathill Station.
- Local rail service on the ECML.
- Development of the new N.C.L. rail route (Newcastle to Berwick/Edinburgh via Bedlington).
Bus campaigns included but were not limited to:
- Improved bus rail integration at railway stations.
- Improving reliability of buses across Northumberland.
- Support the roll-out of real-time information for bus passengers.
- Meeting with the Northumberland Local Bus Board.
These campaigns dovetail nicely into existing ones such as this campaign for the new Northumberland Coast Loop north-south rail route along the Northumberland Coast and into North Tyneside, but also the campaign to improve bus services between Alnwick, Alnmouth Station, Warkworth, and Amble.
Want to get involved?
If you’d like to get yourself involved with the work of the Northumberland Branch (or indeed other North East Branches!) membership is FREE, and can be done via the Join NEPTUG page on their website.
At present, the group intends to meet monthly, with meetings held on the first Wednesday of the month as a general rule. Meetings are a proposed to be a mix of online and in-person, with the next meeting on Wednesday 6th May 2026 proposed to be online via Zoom, then the next one on Wednesday 3rd June 2026 proposed as an in-person meeting (location yet to be set).
Hope to see you soon!
The Northumberland Coast Loop 