Leeds Council bus proposals

[sharksmith]

Plans to invest more than £180 million into bus services in Leeds have been announced. The council wants to double the number of people using buses within 10 years. The proposals include increasing the frequency of services and using zero emission vehicles to improve air quality in the city.

Following on from yesterday’s announcement on rail improvements with new stations serving Leeds Bradford Airport and at the White Rose Centre and Thorpe Park, Leeds City Council has today confirmed significant investment is also proposed to transform bus services.
Operator First West Yorkshire has pledged to invest £71m to provide 284 new state-of-the-art buses for its Leeds fleet by the end of 2020. This will offer a better experience as well as the new buses being low or zero-emissions vehicles which will improve air quality in the city.

The new buses would be complemented by infrastructure improvements. The proposed improvements include:

Over 90 per cent of services on the core bus network to run at 10-minute frequency, along with more frequent early evening services

Additional bus priority measures on key corridors including the A61/A639 South, A61 North, A660, A58 north east and A647 to ease congestion and improve bus journey times and reliability

A new park and ride site at Stourton with an express bus serving the city centre, along with a further new site in north Leeds and Temple Green which opens next year – would add more than 2,000 additional spaces in the city

The current Elland Road park and ride service to continue to be expanded and for it to link with other parts of the city

A focus on improving local bus journeys to improve connectivity between communities and neighbourhoods

Use of new smart technologies to improve ticketing, boarding and waiting times using real-time updated displays and information to generate increased network capacity, along with free wi-fi on all new buses

Bus stops across the city to be improved, with 1,000 more offering real-time information on services

Improvements at Leeds Bus Station and enhanced district hubs across the city as part of a more integrated bus network connecting with community services

The need to provide improved bus services with better reliability, faster journey times and a more integrated network connecting communities was one of the priorities identified from a recent transport survey as part of the transport conversation in Leeds.

The proposals and strategy will be considered by senior councillors at next week’s executive board meeting at Civic Hall on Wednesday 14 December and if approved will then go to the Department of Transport for its consideration.

[gooderson1]

It can only be hoped that another park and ride in Leeds will be better than the one operating out of the Leeds FC stadium. Any P&R should operate when shops are open and a bit more at each end of the day(i.e. 7 days a week except the 3 days a year when shops are closed by law) and not close down when a local football team is playing at home. But at the time when the original P&R was brought into service perhaps Leeds council were looking for a cheap option and Leeds FC were looking for a use for land that was not used for the majority of days a year.

[deerfold]

Dec 6, 2016 14:21:04 GMT 1 gooderson1 said:

It can only be hoped that another park and ride in Leeds will be better than the one operating out of the Leeds FC stadium. Any P&R should operate when shops are open and a bit more at each end of the day(i.e. 7 days a week except the 3 days a year when shops are closed by law).

Christmas Day and Easter Sunday I know about. What's the third?

[westyorkshirebus]

Looks good as a press release but I'd wonder what the funding arrangements are for all this, I.e what happens when the funding runs out and buses running every 10 mins that don't already aren't commercially viable.

[gooderson1]

Thanks for spotting my mistake about the bank holidays. It is of course only two days but I still can't understand why the P&R at the football ground is now open during shopping hours on Sunday's(depending on a football match of course). As for the funding arrangements for the new projects by the time money has been spent on 2 railway stations given Network Rail's experience for overspending on projects I doubt there will be much money left for a bottle of wine let alone upgrade work for more buses. As for the new station at the White Rose Centre it will involve a walk or a hike depending on which line the station is built. I would think that someone (Metro or White Rose) would need to support a shuttle bus service.

[www.buseireann.ie]

I'd love to know what routes they'll upgrade, most run at 10 min intervals on key corridors, are they looking at making routes like the X84 every 10 mins up as far as Otley? Are they looking at increasing the frequency of other routes such as the 14, 15, 19, 19A, 63, 64, 65, 74, 75, 86, 97, 167/8, 189, 410, 444 to every 10 mins over main parts of a route with fast journeys? That's what it sounds like, or at least for many of them. I do like the idea of fast journeys by the way, it'll make a more attractive alternative to rip off trains!

[A1YBG]

Dec 6, 2016 18:59:16 GMT 1 gooderson1 said:

Thanks for spotting my mistake about the bank holidays. It is of course only two days but I still can't understand why the P&R at the football ground is now open during shopping hours on Sunday's(depending on a football match of course). As for the funding arrangements for the new projects by the time money has been spent on 2 railway stations given Network Rail's experience for overspending on projects I doubt there will be much money left for a bottle of wine let alone upgrade work for more buses. As for the new station at the White Rose Centre it will involve a walk or a hike depending on which line the station is built. I would think that someone (Metro or White Rose) would need to support a shuttle bus service.

Park and ride at Elland Road usually opens on Sunday shopping hours leading up to Christmas as they did this last year. They've always do some form of park and ride in Leeds in the past. Now officially they have a park and ride with a service. Plus more £££s for them.

[gooderson1]

Thanks I am aware it opens in the run upto Christmas but that still leaves all the other Sunday's throughout the year when it is closed. Not a way to run a P&R.

[112jct41]

Dec 7, 2016 0:11:24 GMT 1 gooderson1 said:

Thanks I am aware it opens in the run upto Christmas but that still leaves all the other Sunday's throughout the year when it is closed. Not a way to run a P&R.

it's possible it MAY run in the new year as First hinted that its a trail run as they're trailing doing the social media updates on a sunday as well.

[rwilkes]

The Elland Road P & R is far from ideal. But it has been much more successful than WYCA expected and so there is now a real determination to do more.
After the wasted decades of Supertram and NGT there is also an determination/desparation now to get good bus services.
Cutting congestion is the key and we must hope they go for it.

[dennisthemenace504]

Dec 6, 2016 18:59:16 GMT 1 gooderson1 said:

As for the new station at the White Rose Centre it will involve a walk or a hike depending on which line the station is built. I would think that someone (Metro or White Rose) would need to support a shuttle bus service.

Surely, the easiest line to put a station to White Rose on, would be the one, directly behind, the landscaping? (Huddersfield Line)

[gooderson1]

Yes I would agree but it would be necessary to take into account line use age. How many fast(non stopping) trains use the line, how many trains an hour will stop at the station, how will effect other services running on the line,etc. An extra two/three minutes added for each train that stops has a knock on effect to other services.

[kendall17]

New buses, increased frequencies and the like are all great.

But the road infrastructure needs to be improved before anything gets better. They talk about bus prioritisation on the roads but that won't be enough. The city centre needs to be improved for a start.

Headrow right turn to Albion Street can take 5mins. Blocked bus stands = blocked roads.

Then you have the other major snarl ups which can't really be improved, like the approach to Armley gyratory & Otley road.

What I also have to question is how realistic are timetables? I appreciate there are a lot of outside factors, but do timetables reflect the extra time to pick up outside a school at 3pm or are they just done to keep the frequencies up?

[Burnside]

Before any station is built at White Rose, they'll have to do something about capacity on the Huddersfield Line. In the next couple of years, TPE want to introduce a 6th train between Leeds and Manchester and the only way this can be done is to axe Northern's stopper services between Manchester and Huddersfield and Huddersfield and Leeds with the intermediate stops added to TPE trains. Unless this is going to be another stop on an already slowed down 'Express', additional capacity is going to be needed.

[deerfold]

70 new buses a year from First is welcome, but hardly a step change.

[angrycommuter]

The council should make bus lanes a priority to get things moving more quickly. There's little incentive to get a bus if it's stuck in the same traffic as cars.

Dewsbury Road should have bus lanes all the way to/from white rose where they will fit with priority traffic lights. Bus lane along elland road, bus lane through Holbeck, get the traffic system sorted round the back of the rail station. I'm sure there are more but I'm most familiar with that side of the city.

Trams and trolleys were rejected so Leeds should go 100% for bus and make them as attractive as possible.

[Steve Macz403]

I think Beckett Street needs a bus lane,from the Hospital, itself.

I've lived 20 years in Burmantofts, and I've seen Beckett Street, carry as much traffic now as a Major A road.

[biroguy]

Behind the headlines here, the LCC vision is rather lame, bearing in mind we have £200 million to spend on public transport in the city. First should be investing in new buses anyway and why aren`t Arriva and Transdev included? Most core routes are 10 minute services already! As for the railway stations, only Thorpe Park makes any sense. White Rose will at best get one train per hour due to capacity constraints on the track, the Airport station with bus transfer won`t attract air passengers.
The whole transport policy lacks vision.

[westyorkshirebus]

I was just thinking of how the bus network could be simplified, and I've two questions.

Do passengers travel across the terminus at Brackenwood, Gledhow and Roundhay Park?

Do passengers travel across the city centre on the 1?

[jonny182]

I do find the 2/12 interworking very useful at Roundhay Park to go up to Street Lane. If there is a long wait in town for one of them, it can often be quicker to take the other route, wait at Roundhay Park terminal on the bus and then continue your journey.

The 1 service going through town is very useful for me as it's the only route from south of the river northwards to Woodhouse Lane and the university.

[kendall17]

Jun 12, 2017 19:04:58 GMT 1 westyorkshirebus said:

Do passengers travel across the terminus at Brackenwood, Gledhow and Roundhay Park?

Yeah they do, it's the reason for buses terminating at Chapel Allerton Hospital & Harehills rather than at Roundhay Park/Gledhow/Brackenwood.

[Steve Macz403]

Jun 12, 2017 21:32:21 GMT 1 kendall17 said:

Jun 12, 2017 19:04:58 GMT 1 westyorkshirebus said:

Do passengers travel across the terminus at Brackenwood, Gledhow and Roundhay Park?

Yeah they do, it's the reason for buses terminating at Chapel Allerton Hospital & Harehills rather than at Roundhay Park/Gledhow/Brackenwood.

I've done this once, as I needed to get from Oakwood to Chapeltown, it was raining heavy. I didn't fancy getting off a 12 down to Roundhay road and walk. So got a 12 / 2 Around Street Lane to Chapeltown.

[WYBS]

Jun 12, 2017 21:32:21 GMT 1 kendall17 said:

Jun 12, 2017 19:04:58 GMT 1 westyorkshirebus said:

Do passengers travel across the terminus at Brackenwood, Gledhow and Roundhay Park?

Yeah they do, it's the reason for buses terminating at Chapel Allerton Hospital & Harehills rather than at Roundhay Park/Gledhow/Brackenwood.

I ride the full circular all the time. In theory you can start at the white rose centre, do 2 laps of Leeds and Middleton and end up back at the White Rose centre without getting off. (Doing all 4 routes 2, 3/A, 12, 13/A,)