Interest from local transport authorities (LTAs) in the second round of the Zero Emission Bus Regional Areas scheme (ZEBRA 2) in England is significantly higher than that for the first part of the fund, information published by the Department for Transport has shown.
58 expressions of interest (EoI) in ZEBRA 2 have been submitted by LTAs, compared to 35 previously. Of those 58 authorities, 12 – including via one joint bid – received funding from the earlier tranche. An EoI is no guarantee of a formal bid to the scheme being made, and no financial commitments were required as part of the process.
Of the £129 million available via ZEBRA 2, the first £25 million is prioritised towards rural LTAs, with a potential extension of that pot to £50 million. The remainder is prioritised for those authorities that received no funding from the first round.
A guide is available for LTAs to ascertain their rural classification, but among EoI submissions made to ZEBRA 2 are those from councils including Cornwall, Cumberland, Dorset, Devon, Somerset, and Westmorland and Furness.
Bids via the rural priority pot must show that any services to benefit predominantly serve communities in areas classified thus. For that stipulation, DfT has clarified that LTAs falling into the mainly rural, largely rural, and urban with significant rural categories will “be considered together and treated equally.”
All ZEBRA 2 funding will be awarded during FY2023/24 and FY2024/25, although allocation is front-loaded, with up to £89 million in the first of those financial years and up to £40 million in the second.
Under a timeline shared by DfT in scheme guidance at the launch of ZEBRA 2, the deadline for all applications to be submitted is 15 December. Decisions will be made in March 2024 and all buses must be ordered by 31 January 2025. Infrastructure is also in scope of funding.
Those local authorities to have submitted an EoI to ZEBRA 2 are:
Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council
Bournemouth, Christchuch and Poole Council
Brighton and Hove City Council
Buckinghamshire Council
Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority1
Central Bedfordshire Council
Cheshire West and Chester Council
City of York Council1
Cornwall Council
Cumberland Council
Derby City Council
Derbyshire County Council
Devon County Council
Dorset Council
East Riding of Yorkshire Council
East Sussex County Council
Essex County Council
Gloucestershire County Council
Greater Manchester Combined Authority1
Hampshire County Council1
Hull City Council
Isle of Wight Council
Lancashire County Council
Leicester City Council1
Leicestershire County Council
Liverpool City Region Combined Authority
Norfolk County Council1
North Northamptonshire Council
North Somerset Council
North Yorkshire Council1
Nottingham City Council1
Nottinghamshire County Council
Plymouth City Council
Portsmouth City Council1
Reading Borough Council
Somerset Council
South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority1
Southampton City Council
Southend-on-Sea City Council
Staffordshire County Council
Stoke-on-Trent City Council
Suffolk County Council
Surrey County Council
Swindon Borough Council
Tees Valley Combined Authority
Telford and Wrekin Council
Torbay Council
Transport for North East
Warwickshire County Council
West Berkshire Council
West Midlands Combined Authority1
West Northamptonshire Council
West of England Mayoral Combined Authority
West Sussex County Council
West Yorkshire Combined Authority1
Westmorland and Furness Council
Wiltshire Council
Windsor and Maidenhead Borough Council.
[1] Local authorities that received funding from ZEBRA 1; for Hampshire County Council, that was via a joint bid led by Portsmouth City Council.
