The table illustrates the percentages of people in the UK who travelled by bus for five different purposes between 2009 and 2011.
Overall, travelling by bus for shopping and work showed a clear downward trend over the period, whereas the proportions of people using buses for study, visiting friends and day trips generally increased.
In 2009, shopping was by far the most common reason for bus travel, accounting for 65% of users, followed by visiting friends at 19%. However, the figure for shopping declined steadily over the years, falling to 56% in 2010 and reaching 51% by 2011. Similarly, the proportion of people travelling to work by bus dropped from 5% in 2009 to 2% in 2010, before falling to 0% at the end of the period.
By contrast, bus use for educational purposes rose from 4% in 2009 to 9% in 2010 and remained unchanged in 2011. A similar upward trend was observed for day trips, which increased from 7% to 12% and then stayed stable. In addition, the percentage of people travelling to visit friends remained constant at 19% in 2009 and 2010, before rising noticeably to 23% in 2011.