The Oxford Bus Company is stepping up bus services between Water Eaton park-and-ride and the city centre to meet increased demand.

From June 2, buses will run every quarter of an hour throughout the day. And meanwhile the No. 500 buses will only stop at: Magdalen Street Banbury Road, Keble Road Banbury Road, St. Margaret's Road Summertown, Oakthorpe and Thorncliffe roads Summertown, South Parade Water Eaton park-and-ride - one of five around the city - initially failed to attract large numbers of users when it first opened in November, 2002, but demand has since increased.

Louisa Weeks, the company's operations director, said: "We've been listening to our passengers and taking note of what our drivers tell us. The overwhelming message is the Water Eaton service is very popular and convenient for people travelling into the city centre, Summertown and North Oxford.

"Water Eaton was slow to capture drivers' imagination at first, but we kept faith with the project when it would have been easier to scale back operations.

"Some of the journeys are run with the help of Oxfordshire County Council, but now we are delighted to be able to introduce the extra services on a commercial basis without any drain on public funds.

"The route between the city centre and North Oxford is well served already by our City2 service, with buses up to every five minutes.

"Passengers who need to use the 500 to go to or from Water Eaton aren't prevented from getting on the bus by passengers who could be on the City2."

Last month, it was reported that Oxford City Council and Oxfordshire County Council had settled their differences and reached an agreement over the transfer of park-and-ride sites in a £2.5m deal.

The county council will take control of all five sites and scrap parking charges.