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South East Hampshire Bus Rapid Transit is a 2.8 miles (4.5 km) unguided busway between Gosport and Fareham, Hampshire, sponsored by Hampshire County Council using the route of the former Fareham to Gosport Line to reduce congestion on the parallel A32 between the towns. The scheme was proposed following the collapse of the light rail scheme using the same route and funding was approved in July 2009 for the £20m scheme. The route opened on 22 April 2012 with services provided by First Hampshire & Dorset using specially branded "Eclipse" buses on all routes utilising the busway.
Contents
Overview
In 1998 Hampshire County Council and Portsmouth City Council proposed a Light Rail System to link Fareham and Portsmouth via Gosport. Funding of £170m was approved in 2001 but withdrawn in 2004, a decision that was confirmed in 2006. Following this decision, a cheaper, shorted BRT scheme was proposed.
Route
The busway follows the route of the disused railway from Redlands Lane to Tichborne Way.
Services
Two existing bus routes were replaced by the new Eclipse Bus Rapid Transit network and one was modified to use part of it. Buses on routes 86 and 82 became Eclipse routes E1 and E2 and at peak times route 88 (as the X88 service) was diverted to use part of the busway between Wych Lane and Redlands Lane. On 18 November 2012 service 88 was replaced by service 9 / 9A.