The owner of a Jurby tourist attraction has hit out at a reduction in bus services that began this week.

Changes to the service were announced on Thursday last week and came into effect yesterday (Monday) giving commuters no business days advance warning.

The new timetable sees all services from Ramsey to Jurby, Andreas, Smeale and Bride dropped through the morning until mid afternoon and replaced by the on demand minibus service connectVILLAGES.

That means anyone wanting to take a bus from or to these areas to Ramsey between 8.40am to 2.30pm must contact Bus Vannin the day before to book a minibus.

This has been criticised by owner of Isle of Man Motor Museum, Darren Cunningham, who believes the change will hit his business, but also affect people in the area.

Mr Cunningham said: ’Speaking to Bus Vannin, they said that if we ring up and there is a bus in the area with space then you might be able to book it and get on it.

’That is all very well saying might be but we have tried to ring them last week, by the time they got back to us, those customers had booked a taxi and gone. While they were able to do that, others aren’t.’

Mr Cunningham told the Examiner that Jurby was a ’very different area’ from Andreas, Bride and Smeale from a socioeconomic stand point, which meant it needed to have a regular bus service.

He is also concerned how the new service will impact Jurby, including his museum and the transport museum, as well as the other businesses in the area and how the changes will affect visitors during TT who use the bus services to get around the north of the island.

Mr Cunningham was also critical of the Department of Infrastructure over the changes, which come after it announced it would spend £1m on shipping containers and infrastructure to improve Jurby.

He said this was the DoI ’giving with one hand just to take away with the other’.

Minister Ray Harmer last week told the House of Keys that cutting rural bus routes was ’unacceptable’.

Mr Cunningham said this was ’exactly what he has done’.