At Winchester Vineyard Church we feel very strongly that coming out of covid, one of our key priorities should be the needs of young people, both in the church and further afield.  Almost immediately after we said this publicly, we were forwarded an email completely out of the blue offering to give us a fully equipped youth bus - literally free of charge.  It’s already fitted out with a cafe bar and consoles - a brilliant mobile hang out space for young people. 

The bus had been off the road for over a year, but the amazing team from Eden project didn’t need it any more and were more than happy to give it to us, so we decided that even if all we could do was tow it to our car park, it would be a brilliant space, but we had a much bigger vision to see it used right across our city to help provide a space where we can support young people in all kinds of ways. 

So we decided to talk to our neighbours and see if they could help.  Winchester Vineyard church building just happens to be situated right next door to a bus garage.  There are people servicing & fixing buses literally over the fence from us - and Stagecoach were more than happy to get involved and support the project.  Honestly - they’ve been amazing.  They diagnosed the problem & quickly got the engine going again. They are sourcing and providing the replacement parts it needs right now, and their mechanics are fitting them in their spare time.  We are so grateful to Simon and the team at Stagecoach and wouldn’t even be able to contemplate this project without them.  

So from almost nowhere, we are going to have a fully equipped youth bus up and running and ready to hit the road.  We’re in conversation with local schools and youth organisations, who are really keen to work with us with groups & projects to to support young people’s mental health - which is especially challenging post covid. (By the way if you work with young people, and you’d be interested in partnering with us, we’d love to talk, please get in touch).

Once the Stagecoach team have replaced the batteries etc, we only need to do two things to get the bus up and running.  One is give it a good clean (which we can do), but the main thing is that we need to repaint it, which is going to cost about £3K.  So we have launched a crowdfunder, and we would love you to get involved.  You can give directly by going to crowdfunder.co.uk/youthbus  

The brilliant thing about a crowdfunder is that a whole crowd of people can each give a relatively small amount to fund the project.  So this is an invitation to anyone who is excited by the idea of having a mobile space where we can invest in the welfare and future of young people across Winchester and beyond

So whether you are a parent or grandparent, a teacher or a youth worker, a mental health practitioner or just someone who cares about young people, we invite you to partner with us… You might even be a teenager who wants to get involved, or invest in your own future or that of your peers.