I published a story about a new temporary Go Cornwall Bus 7/7A service scheduled to run on the Saturday and Sunday prior to the late May bank holiday, and the Saturday and Sunday at the end of that week, see 7/7A service.
At the time, there was nothing on the Transport for Cornwall website about this service. On 6 May, a news story was published on the website promoting this service with a link to the proposed timetable. The timetables for the services have changed from those published on the Traveline SW website:
• It seems that the services will run on the bank holiday Monday (Traveline timetables said no services that day)
• On the two Saturdays, there will not be a 7 service from Penzance to St Ives (but this route is well covered by the existing no. 17 anyway); the no. 7 from Lands End to Penzance shown on the Traveline timetable will not run but this route is covered by the existing 1A anyway.
• On the two Saturdays, two 7A services will run through from Penzance via Lands End to St Ives presumably meaning that a passsenger could buy one through ticket for £3 - the Traveline timetable had shown the two legs of Penzance to Lands End, and Lands End to St Ives as separate services meaning a passenger would have to buy two tickets. On the bank holiday Monday and the two Sundays, one through 7A service will run.
• On the bank holiday Monday and the two Sundays, two no. 7 services will run through from Penzance via Marazion to St Ives and on to Lands End as one timetabled service.
Overall, very confusing! However, my assumption is that the latest timetable published by Go Cornwall Bus is the correct one and passengers should ignore what is on the Traveline website for these services.
Meanwhile, over the Tamar, in Plymouth, a service that is of interest to residents of south east Cornwall is the Citybus 34 service that runs from the city centre via the Stonehouse peninsula and Devonport (stop by the Torpoint Ferry) to Derriford. It is used by those Cornish residents who cross the Tamar on foot on the Torpoint Ferry or the Cremyll Ferry. There has been for a few weeks, and likely to continue for some time, a problem on Durnford Street with an unsafe building meaning that the usual circular flow of traffic on the Stonehouse peninsula cannot operate and the stop/start on Cremyll Street causes long delays and severe disruption to the no. 34 service. Citybus has, therefore, very sensibly revised services so that the no. 34 avoids the Stonehouse peninsula and, instead, a no. 34A service runs just between the peninsula and Union Street (Palace Theatre).
Unfortunately, the information published for these amended services has been confusing to say the least. On the Citybus website timetables page, the interactive timetable shows for the 34 service what I assume are the correct times for the services which do not call at the Stonehouse peninsula. However, the link to the pdf timetable brings up the outdated no. 34 timetable from last October which shows services calling at Admirals Hard.
Citybus provided the Rame Peninsula Public Transport Users Group with what was supposed to be a combined 34/34A timetable with the new times. Unfortunately, the leaflet had a date of 24 April 2022 on it and we are not sure that the times are correct.
However, back on the timetables page of the Citybus website, right at the end of the timetables listing (instead of immediately after the 34 service) is a link to the interactive timetable for the 34A service. I assume that these times are correct. And the link to a pdf version of the timetable is probably the correct one, see 34A timetable. However, passengers using the Cremyll Ferry note that the service runs from the Royal William Yard, not from Admirals Hard.
Update
9 May 2026
I emailed the commercial manager and the managing director of Go South West pointing out the above issues. This was the response that I received from the commercial manager:
"Morning Bob,
As you will be aware both of these have come as emergency amendments.
The 7 timetable is correct, but they are displayed in different ways. We have shown the through journeys. Having to adapt the service to just run the two weekends, due to road closures.
The timetable is correct.
The 34A has been put in place due to the size of bus needed to navigate the new road lay out. The website pulled an old 34A timetable at the same time, when we checked the box to display 34A. This was not deleted from the back end from way back.
Both 34 and 34A timetables are correct.
The only issue was The Rame Users getting the wrong timetable, which was rectified by Jason swiftly and redistributed by Geoff.
To call this a ‘timetabeling schambles’ is really making a mountain out of a mole hill. The team are working extremely hard to make sure we are providing all the information on changes that are out of our control.
Best Wishes”
The Citybus timetables page has now been updated so that the 34 and 34A timetables are combined on to one interactive page and a pdf link is provided to the correct versions of these two timetables.
Whilst the 34A timetable was put together because of genuine emergency (the unsafe building in Durnford Street, Plymouth), I don’t know what the emergency was with the no. 7 and 7A timetables in west Cornwall.
Update
21 May 2026
There is now a further update on the saga of the 7/7A timetables and the different versions of them. Despite the commercial manager of Go South West assuring me that the published "7 timetable is correct” (see update 9 May above) they have now revised it again and the link to it from the News item now produces a timetable that shows no. 7 services from Penzance to St Ives on the Saturdays 23 May and 30 May. For the latest version of the timetable, see revised timetable. The online interactive version of the 7/7A timetables on the TfC website is still showing out of date information about the Sennen-St Just service that ceased in April, so please ignore that.
Essentially, with the latest version of the timetable, Go Cornwall Bus has now brought it into line with the original Traveline versions. The only exception is that the Traveline version showed no services on Bank Holiday Monday 25 May, whereas the latest GCB version says that services will run on that Monday using the Sunday timetables.