THE future of York’s Park & Ride is clouded with uncertainty after it emerged that no satisfactory bids to manage the service have been received by City of York Council.

The authority says that when it opened a tender process for bus operators to bid for a new contract to manage the service, it was confident it would attract a number of high profile bids to continue offering the best possible deal for residents and visitors.

But although there was ‘strong interest,’ no responses meeting the council’s financial expectations against the specification tendered had been received.

A spokeswoman said the authority was confident an operator would be secured in coming months to run what was one of the UK’s most successful Park&Ride services, which had more than four-million passenger journeys each year.

“Following dialogue with a number of bus companies, options for addressing the concerns of potential suppliers will be developed,” she said.

“Subject to executive approval on October 13, the results of this review will be brought before the council’s executive in December, prior to the issue of a further invitation to tender.”

She said councillors would be asked to determine which elements of the specification they would wish to alter at December’s Executive.

“This could include alterations to the frequency of service, type of bus used on the service and fares charged.”

She added that the council had negotiated a six month extension to the current contract with First York, whose contract is due to expire at the end of next January.

“This will ensure that residents and visitors experience no changes to the Park&Ride and will continue to receive the same level of service until a new operator is in place. “ Transport executive member Cllr Ian Gillies said the council had already approached operators to establish what alterations to the specification might be required to enable them to bid again.

He said: “Whilst it’s disappointing that no compliant responses were received at this stage of the process, we’re confident we will secure a new operator who will work with the authority to provide a service, which will work towards achieving its targets over the length of the contract.”