The Truro St Austell corridor has been served by the no. 27 service for over 15 years by First Bus on a commercial basis Monday to Saturday daytime. The evenings and Sundays/bank holidays have been covered by a service subsidised by Cornwall Council. From time to time, First has extended the service beyond Truro bus station to Treliske and sometimes Truro College but those parts of the service have generally been dropped after a short time and the service has reverted to its core of Truro bus station to St Austell. At one time, the service was extended from St Austell to Bodmin, but this was also short-lived before being dropped. As at March 2024, the 27 service is primarily Truro bus station to St Austell with a short circular route within St Austell (Carclaze and Bethel).
As from 31 March 2024, it is all change again. The First service between Truro and St Austell will become an extension of the St Ives to Truro T2 service and First will drop the 27 number. The service will continue to be an hourly service on Monday to Saturday daytimes although the timetable will diverge a bit more from regular clock face times. An advantage for residents on the Truro-St Austell corridor will be that they will be able to take a bus directly through Truro to, for example, County Hall, Treliske (bus will stop in the layby on the main road, not in the hospital grounds), Truro College, Threemilestone, Redruth, Camborne etc. However, it is likely that the service reliability will reduce because there will be more places where the bus could get held up. The short circular route around St Austell is being dropped apart from a few services first thing in the morning and late afternoon. Note also that a few of the timings on Saturdays differ slightly from the Monday-Friday times. The First services will depart from stand K at Truro bus station whilst the Go Cornwall services will continue to use stand E.
The evenings, Sunday and bank holiday services will continue to be provided by Go Cornwall Bus subsidised by the local transport authority (Cornwall Council) on the same timetable as currently, running under the number 27E.
Timetables for the services from 31 March have been published on Traveline, see T2 St Ives, Truro, St Austell (incorporates the T1 and T3 services), and 27E Truro St Austell.
For Grampound residents, I have produced a composite of the two timetables to make it easier for passengers to use, see Grampound timetable 31 March 2024. Although it is labelled Grampound timetable, it could also be useful for residents on other parts of this route, e.g. Sticker, Hewas Water, Probus.
Update
18 March 2024
Note: the Grampound timetable has been slightly amended to correct a couple of minor errors in it. If you downloaded the timetable before, please download the amended version again from the same link above.