How many bus lane Penalty Charge Notices Bury Council issues, how much it raises — from data released under Freedom of Information (refs FOI2627.564 and FOI2627.677).
11,314
PCNs issued in 3 years2023/24–2025/26
£400,186
gross income, 3 years£136,388 net of operating costs
3,070
PCNs in 2025/26
This page reports data released by Bury Council under the Freedom of Information Act — the penalty and income figures under FOI2627.564 (responded 12 August 2026), and the confirmation of how to read that income table under FOI2627.677 (responded 24 August 2026). Figures are the council's own. BusLaneCheck is independent and not affiliated with the council. Compare every UK authority →
Bus lane PCNs issued per yearGross PCN income per year
Bury's four cameras issued 11,314 penalties over the three years the council was able to report, and the trend is down: 4,230 in 2023/24, 4,014 in 2024/25 and 3,070 in 2025/26, a fall of more than a quarter. December is the peak month in all three years — 492, 520 and 355 — which is the Christmas shopping traffic through the town centre. The money tracks the penalties: £146,218, £148,953 and £105,015, which works out at £34.57, £37.11 and £34.21 a penalty against a £35 discounted rate. Bury is one of the few councils to give the cost of running the scheme as well as the take, so the net figure here is the council's own and not our arithmetic: after operating costs of about £114,000, £83,000 and £67,000 the cameras cleared £31,965, £66,126 and £38,296. The council supplied every one of these as a ledger entry with income written as a negative credit, and confirmed that reading in a follow-up answered on 24 August 2026; the same answer confirms that the two earlier years ran at a net cost — £21,652 of income against £94,471 of costs in 2021/22, and no income at all against £72,860 of costs in 2022/23. Those two years are left off the charts above because the council could not supply penalty counts to go with them.
Where the cameras are
Bury Council enforces four camera sites and named them all: Bolton Road and Manchester Road in Bury itself, Bury Old Road in Prestwich and Bury New Road in Whitefield. It holds no record of when enforcement began at any of them. We hold a fifth Bury lane page, Rochdale Road, which does not appear on the council's list. Because the council could not break the penalty counts down by site, there is no camera-by-camera table on this page.
The fine itself
A bus lane PCN from Bury Council is £70, reduced to £35 if paid within 14 days. It is a civil penalty — there are no licence points. £70, halved to £35 if paid within 14 days, taken from the council's own "Pay a bus lane fine" page and matching all five Bury lane pages. Note that 14 days is shorter than the 21 days most English authorities allow on a bus lane penalty, so the window to pay £35 rather than £70 closes a week earlier here than drivers may expect. The FOI response did not restate the penalty and its income figures are not yet usable as a cross-check.
What the council does not hold or publish
Penalties broken down by camera. The council named its four camera sites but said the penalty counts are "not available in the format requested" at that level, so every figure here is a Bury-wide total.
Anything before 2023/24. The council gave the same "not available in the format requested" answer for 2021/22 and 2022/23.
Penalties paid at the discounted rate, and challenges and appeals. Both refused on the same availability grounds rather than under an exemption, for every year requested. A follow-up asking whether the data is genuinely not held or simply not in the shape asked for went out on 12 August 2026; the council's reply of 24 August answered only the questions about income and left these two unaddressed, so we still cannot say which it is.