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Post by jimobasa on Dec 8, 2016 20:25:20 GMT 1
1. Buses are frequently cancelled - seemingly as a routine feature of the operation.
2. Perhaps connected with the above, there seems to be an awful lot of "Sorry. Not In Service" vehicles running around throughout the day between 10:00 and 18:00
3. 18:00 Monday-Friday is the evening rush hour in most other places, but in Leeds, it is the time First Leeds begin changing from daytime service to evening service with longer gaps between buses and short journeys (a route passing through the city centre during the day, turns around in the city centre in the evening). Does Leeds not have a night life?
4. I have experience of a stretch of route - along Belle Isle Road - served by three routes, 12, 13, 13A. I began waiting at 6PM last night for a bus to Corn Exchange. I waited a full 29 minutes during which time THREE "Sorry Not In Service" vehicles had passed by. I suspect that those three were actually the three services that should have served the stop between 6:03PM and 6:27PM. Instead of the expected leisurely stroll from Corn Exchange to Leeds Railway Station, I had to run to make my 7:16 back to London.
5. There are numberous occasions when the "Countdown" feature on the First App can be at 5 mins, then 4 mins, then 3 mins but then a second or two after 2 mins appears, the dreaded CANCELLED comes up.
First Leeds really is a shoddy operation in my opinion.
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Steve Macz403
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Post by Steve Macz403 on Dec 8, 2016 20:43:53 GMT 1
As crummy as it may be. They are tough days, even where unfortunately due to rush hour Traffic and other factors,means it's harder to operate a good bus service on time.
I'm sure every city's main operators struggle at times, some days are better than others.
I drive a car around Leeds, and due to Traffic on the Inner Ring Road on Rush hour, I had all streets clogged up. So buses would have bunched up or end up delayed through no fault of their own.
A 15 min car journey from Hyde Park to Crown Point with no traffic, took 35 minutes.
I've waited, a very long time for buses in Manchester 40/45 minutes for a bus to Didsbury and even waited 40 minutes for (3 different bus routes on Oxford Street in London)
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WYBS
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Post by WYBS on Dec 9, 2016 0:55:01 GMT 1
Luckily I do not often rely on First Leeds buses day to day as I can use Transdev or First Bradford but when I have no choice but to or I am out riding about they are often very late or cancelled and are pretty dirty inside (especially Bramley b7tl Geminis).
People complain about First in general but Leeds are much worse than Bradford, Halifax and Hudds.
Most people including enthusiasts I have spoken to agree.
They lack any sort of care whether it's really simple things like tiny skylines (meant for single deckers) put on a gemini, x84 branding applied without any care or dirty buses etc..., Transdev and arriva set a great example, there is no excuse why First shouldn't.
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Post by Dom on Dec 9, 2016 1:53:42 GMT 1
Welcome to Leeds... Where the city can grid lock when a cyclist gets a puncture.
Remember us drivers have driving hours which by law have to be adhered to, also time keeping as well.
Sometimes a bus will run part way to ensure a driver doesn't become late off for a break and therefore, instead of cancelling a hourly service, they cancel a frequent service. The city centre needs to become 100% bus only, and then everything will be a lot better.
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Post by westyorkshirebus on Dec 9, 2016 8:04:48 GMT 1
Quite simplistic but I find peak hour traffic worst when it is dark, also factor in how nobody is on holiday, schools are in, universities are in, Christmas shopping is on, and this all results in congestion being the worst at this time of year.
Extend journey times and come March you'll just have buses waiting for time during rush hour.
In this social media generation I notice that people have an expectation of all buses running to time with no exceptions and if they don't it is always entirely the bus companies fault. So whether it is the city centre being gridlocked, roadworks, an accident, the motorway being closed miles away, a parade/demonstration or whatever, it is still seen as First's fault.
I disagree that it is a Leeds thing that buses turn into less frequent evening services after 1800, I find that happens in most places.
Also in London you often get kicked off of buses as they change destination mid route, you don't get that here.
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Post by dwarfer1979 on Dec 9, 2016 9:56:34 GMT 1
It's pretty normal for peak services to start running down after 1800, historically by this point all the shoppers, office workers & students had left and it was just the tail end of the shop workers left so demand is lower. This is a bit out dated now I suspect both because flexi time & the demands of the office mean workers staying later is more common & because there is a higher proportion of shop workers in city centres and they rarely get out of work before 1800 meaning that demand holds up a little better but whether it is enough to maintain the extra cost of the extra journeys is a question that will depend on route & area (it's not just the basic extra hours but the extra scheduling issues as often even adding an extra journey may cause issues over absolute or local agreements on duty lengths along with when anti-social payments kick in as long standing pay agreements are difficult to change).
There does appear to be something about Leeds itself that causes an issue, even Metro had noticed that regardless of operator there was a poorer service delivery from a Leeds based operation than sister depots elsewhere in the county. Whether that is really because there are a higher proportion of less customer focused drivers in Leeds than elsewhere or simply that there is a general shortage of drivers in Leeds that means companies can't be as selective is unclear (I'll assume the later as the former just seems too weird). What it does do though is make it harder to encourage the average driver (who is just there for the money, they will work harder if they see that encouraged but will not see the point if others get away with not putting the effort in) to do a better job as there is little incentive to do more if they see the bad drivers getting away with being useless with nothing getting done as the company can't afford to get rid of them as it is difficult to find a better replacement. Whatever the cause it does seem to be true since even at First (& as a major 'faceless' business they will struggle more with keeping quality up) their operations in neighbouring towns have less issues than Leeds.
Congestion, after a period of relative stability in many places, seems to be getting worse but also more unpredictable over recent times - indicating that road capacity is reaching absolute maximum as even fairly small incidents can lead to gridlock over large areas - even London is now suffering badly which is thought to be the reason that it saw passenger numbers drop for the first time in a while and at a rate much higher than the rest of the country. Leeds is a particularly problematic city for this as it has a good network of major roads feeding traffic into the city centre on relatively good, wide roads that drop traffic right into a centre that isn't really equipped to handle it with comparatively little impediment which makes problems more pronounced as there is little to dis-incentivise the car to approach the centre and with limited Park & Ride at the moment it is difficult to do anything artificially with restrictions and higher car park charges as there are limited alternatives, though with a decent bus network from neighbouring towns there is something to start with.
Historically operators have tried to keep their timetables simpler with relatively standard running times (possibly with extra time in the peak but kept consistent across the peak period) accepting a little late running on one or two journeys or at bad times to keep things easy to remember for customers. There is now more of an acceptance from both operators and passengers that a more accurate, but less consistent, timetable is more appropriate to current levels and increasing numbers of operators are adjusting timetables to try and find something that works. What I can say, as someone who actually does it for a job, is that it is not a simple task - just getting sensible data is a challenge then you have to interpret it and produce a timetable that is workable, accurate & efficient trying to handle bad days whilst minimise unnecessary waiting on average, let alone good, days and place any at logical locations where waiting is possible - and there is an element of trial & error as issues in one place can mask issues elsewhere that only become apparent once you fixed the issues elsewhere.
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Post by chrisboy96 on Dec 9, 2016 12:41:16 GMT 1
Luckily I do not often rely on First Leeds buses day to day as I can use Transdev or First Bradford but when I have no choice but to or I am out riding about they are often very late or cancelled and are pretty dirty inside (especially Bramley b7tl Geminis). People complain about First in general but Leeds are much worse than Bradford, Halifax and Hudds. Most people including enthusiasts I have spoken to agree. They lack any sort of care whether it's really simple things like tiny skylines (meant for single deckers) put on a gemini, x84 branding applied without any care or dirty buses etc..., Transdev and arriva set a great example, there is no excuse why First shouldn't. Bus off the road for a vinyl V in service without, I know which option I choose and which option we as a garage choose. Regarding dirty buses, more buses are cleaned than before at Bramley but if the public choose to litter and treat buses like a skip, than there's very little we can do realistically. |
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Post by northerner on Dec 9, 2016 22:01:34 GMT 1
First Leeds really is a shoddy operation in my opinion. Completely agree with you, although I'd say First in general. They have to be amongst the most customer unfocused businesses in existence. Whilst RTC's, roadworks and Christmas shopping congestion are outside First's control there's many things which they can and should be addressing, such as: -Bradford have had a shortfall of drivers since last Spring. In the past 18 months nothing has been done to reduce the PVR to match the number of drivers available so dozens of journeys are being cancelled on a daily basis. This doesn't help that frequently 2 or 3 journeys in a row have been cancelled meaning gaps in excess of 30 minutes on 10 minute corridors. -Driver attitudes are much worse than any other operator in West Yorkshire. I suspect this stems from management not caring thus passing the culture down the chain. -Vehicle presentation is another area which is poor. Some interiors are appalling with the fabric practically worn away, paint on the grab rails chipped and there's a fair number of buses still to receive LED blinds. There's also the musty smell which seems to be compulsory on the older buses -Unrealistic schedules. One of First's many standard responses on Twitter to missing journeys is that the driver has to return to the depot due to approaching their legal driving hours. Are schedules really constructed with little leeway given to take in to account delays which are inevitable across the peak? Do spare drivers not exist to cover in these instances? Again, something First has to take some responsibility for |
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kendall17
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Post by kendall17 on Dec 9, 2016 23:30:32 GMT 1
I have very little issue with First.
I know how hard it is to run to timetable and the knock on effect of just 1 bus being late on the rest of the days shifts. Took me 15mins to navigate boar lane on a peak time 19 today.
I also observed the bunching of the Otley road routes today, but they were all a good 95% full.
All out of the control of the driver & company.
I agree with the question around timetables and how realistic they are. Though spare drivers are a luxury. Can't get enough drivers as it is.
Thing is though, plan ahead and you won't be left waiting forever. Use your next bus to plan well and you'll never get left behind. E.g 8.23 56 from eastgate cancelled, I'd go for the 4.
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SF07
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Post by SF07 on Dec 11, 2016 13:56:43 GMT 1
I don't think it's just Leeds where these kind of things happens. From personal experience, Manchester has got progressively worse over the last year or so. Roadworks on Oxford Road has resulted in some services running over an hour late, with some buses taking 30-45 minutes to complete what should normally take 10-15 minutes. This results in buses bunching up together, long gaps between services and buses running out of service to start at a later point along the route (seen on a few occasions of buses that run up Oldham Road starting from Newton Heath or Hollinwood rather than Manchester). In Sheffield, First have re-timed the X78 service at peak times on a couple of occasions due to traffic problems between Sheffield and Rotherham, which results in some buses possibly waiting up to 15 minutes before continuing to Doncaster. www.firstgroup.com/south-yorkshire/news-and-service-updates/news/travel-information-x78-customers |
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stevo
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Post by stevo on Dec 11, 2016 14:53:49 GMT 1
The problem with leeds is leeds city councils failure to police bus lanes,in peak times and indeed any time,the number of unauthorised vehicles driving along the headrow is ridiculous,if this section of road was enforced as it should be the traffic flow around the city centre would be faster and buses would not be impeded and also the councils coffers would be topped up considerably by fines
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kendall17
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Post by kendall17 on Dec 11, 2016 15:12:01 GMT 1
The problem with leeds is leeds city councils failure to police bus lanes,in peak times and indeed any time,the number of unauthorised vehicles driving along the headrow is ridiculous,if this section of road was enforced as it should be the traffic flow around the city centre would be faster and buses would not be impeded and also the councils coffers would be topped up considerably by fines Thing is, a lot of the roads are access only that cannot be without somebody sitting there all day & night. It is frustrating though |
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Post by chrisboy96 on Dec 11, 2016 18:10:00 GMT 1
It's pretty normal for peak services to start running down after 1800, historically by this point all the shoppers, office workers & students had left and it was just the tail end of the shop workers left so demand is lower. This is a bit out dated now I suspect both because flexi time & the demands of the office mean workers staying later is more common & because there is a higher proportion of shop workers in city centres and they rarely get out of work before 1800 meaning that demand holds up a little better but whether it is enough to maintain the extra cost of the extra journeys is a question that will depend on route & area (it's not just the basic extra hours but the extra scheduling issues as often even adding an extra journey may cause issues over absolute or local agreements on duty lengths along with when anti-social payments kick in as long standing pay agreements are difficult to change). An issue with scheduling an extra journey at the end of the day is buses due back to the garage around 1900 tend to be those that get their routine inspection first, pushing this back means those on nights in engineering don't get their buses done till later, affecting the early morning run outs. |
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Post by jonny182 on Dec 11, 2016 18:10:41 GMT 1
Alot of problems in Leeds city centre are caused by bad signal timing. Someone has previously mentioned the Albion St/Headrow signal set for right turning buses heading west up the Headrow and north onto Albion Street. Another example of this is the York St/St Peters St signal set. I've reported this several times to urban traffic control and the council that these are not working correctly and they still have not fixed them. The York Street inbound bus lane right turn signal should only turn green if the induction loops detect a vehicle in the lane but it is currently not working and therefore holding outbound York Street buses and traffic for an uneccessarily long time causing almost all the problems as you see on a daily evening peak especially on Fridays as all of Boar Lane, Duncan Street, Call Lane and New York Street being at a standstill. It is evident that as you pass the York Street/St Peters St. signal set outbound traffic is free flowing afterwards and after the Victoria Gate works have since finished, northbound St Peters St traffic is also more free flowing.
Add to this, many bus lanes are badly designed. Someone has mentioned Manchester, take those lanes on Oldham Road or the A59. There are bus lanes which only run for around 80-100yds on some section of road. Leading up to the bus lane there is often a half-mile tailback of traffic in which the buses themselves are stuck in. Better planning and siting of bus lanes and better signal timing will solve most issues as will better enforcement of traffic contraventions if restrictions are properly thought out.
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Post by www.buseireann.ie on Dec 11, 2016 19:07:14 GMT 1
Personally I think we have too many pedestrian lights. The council made a massive error trying to make the city centre pedestrian friendly, it was alright before if you used the existing lights and didn't dart across the road in front of a bus like a blind loonie! How many pedestrian lights together with junction lights that cater for pedestrian signals does Vicar Lane have for example? Does it really need that many? Village idiot flaiming clots are still playing chicken with all those lights!
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stevo
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Post by stevo on Dec 11, 2016 20:32:48 GMT 1
The problem with leeds is leeds city councils failure to police bus lanes,in peak times and indeed any time,the number of unauthorised vehicles driving along the headrow is ridiculous,if this section of road was enforced as it should be the traffic flow around the city centre would be faster and buses would not be impeded and also the councils coffers would be topped up considerably by fines Thing is, a lot of the roads are access only that cannot be without somebody sitting there all day & night. It is frustrating though in this day and age with technology as it is I'm sure they can use a camera and then sort out which are authorised vehicles and which aren't |
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Post by westyorkshirebus on Dec 11, 2016 20:42:23 GMT 1
In terms of the city centre, I wonder how much manual operation of the traffic signals there is, or are they all automatic so go green even if all the traffic is stuck at the previous red set. There should be manual intervention at peak times and on saturdays to stop those endless queues from the Bus Station all the way back to Infirmary Street.
Other issues include taxis picking up in the bus stops on New York Street by the bingo hall causing buses to load/offload in the middle of the road, tight bus stops on The Headrow and the pointless central reservation meaning buses often can't get passed also blocking the road
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kendall17
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Post by kendall17 on Dec 11, 2016 21:34:47 GMT 1
Thing is, a lot of the roads are access only that cannot be without somebody sitting there all day & night. It is frustrating though in this day and age with technology as it is I'm sure they can use a camera and then sort out which are authorised vehicles and which aren't Access only roads cover disabled parking bays, access to businesses such as accountants, solicitors etc. So it's not as simple as authorised or unauthorised. |
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Post by 112jct41 on Dec 11, 2016 21:36:49 GMT 1
Thing is, a lot of the roads are access only that cannot be without somebody sitting there all day & night. It is frustrating though in this day and age with technology as it is I'm sure they can use a camera and then sort out which are authorised vehicles and which aren't that's been partially trialled in York and the council got fined as it was classed as been illegal. |
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Post by stevieinselby on Dec 11, 2016 22:34:52 GMT 1
in this day and age with technology as it is I'm sure they can use a camera and then sort out which are authorised vehicles and which aren't that's been partially trialled in York and the council got fined as it was classed as been illegal. That was because the signage wasn't clear and the legal order was badly-worded. There is no problem in principle with using cameras to enforce restricted access roads. In fact, the cameras on Coppergate are being switched back on this weekend, and hopefully this time round the council has made sure that all the words are absolutely watertight. |
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Post by gooderson1 on Dec 11, 2016 23:28:29 GMT 1
It is the local authority in the form of parking enforcement officers(or what ever they want to call them) that need to enforce parking and bus lane rules. People employed in this role will "ticket" vehicles parked in side streets rather than have a confrontation with a motorist who has parked on a main route or bus lane. There are not many councils(if any apart from London) who employ contractors to remove illegally parked cars and until something is done bus times/congestion will only get worse.
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Post by Bradford Traveller on Dec 15, 2016 18:17:36 GMT 1
First Bradford's frequent 607 route currently showing 39 minutes between buses from Thornton, according to acislive !!
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kendall17
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Post by kendall17 on Dec 15, 2016 21:11:46 GMT 1
It is the local authority in the form of parking enforcement officers(or what ever they want to call them) that need to enforce parking and bus lane rules. People employed in this role will "ticket" vehicles parked in side streets rather than have a confrontation with a motorist who has parked on a main route or bus lane. There are not many councils(if any apart from London) who employ contractors to remove illegally parked cars and until something is done bus times/congestion will only get worse. Quite simple, camera notorious bus stops. Albion Street. Anything other than a bus stopped for longer than 5mins gets a nice letter through the post. |
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Post by jonny182 on Dec 16, 2016 22:16:02 GMT 1
In response to westyorkshirebus' post: It is possible to take manual control of the traffic lights. The City Council installed radio antannae to almost all the signal sets across the entire city. (They previously used the telephone lines to do this). However in the city centre. I don't think they do this at all, most signal sets are the old fixed-timer style controls which don't have induction loops or passive infra-red to "count" the traffic and adapt the signal timings accordingly.
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