77syk7
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Posts: 641
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Post by 77syk7 on Feb 21, 2018 17:29:07 GMT 1
I have just had a careful look at the latest timetables from the February changes to check out what 'a revised timetable has been introduced to improve punctuality' actually means when it appears at the front of the timetable.
My local route,the 508 from Halifax to Leeds has been continually subject to ever increasing journey times over the last few years. However, I was indeed surprised to note that the 0720 from Halifax (Monday-Friday is now scheduled to arrive in Leeds at 0915 - therefore taking 1 hour and 55 minutes! This is almost double the time it used to take 30-40 years ago and compare this with the current last journey from Leeds to Halifax (2300-0002)which takes 1 hour 2 minutes. Traffic congestion therefore doubles the journey time. As I have commented before, First do need to do something with this route, which I am sure is becoming more of a problem to them.
I then started to look at the similar changes to the Leeds routes and Route 1 Beeston-Holt Park must surely win the prize of having the slowest scheduled journey time within the county. Look at the Mon-Fri pm pk journey from Beeston departs at 1643 arriving Holt Park at 1816 - this takes 93 minutes for 9 miles, giving an average speed of less than 6 mph. To put this into perspective, the 1st journey of the day (0525 - 0606) takes just 41 minutes. It is great we are having brand new 'state of the art' buses on this route, but it seems they do not need to be able to be capable of any high speed running.
Comments please, I am sure somebody on the forum will be able to find a slower journey somewhere!
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Post by Dom on Feb 21, 2018 18:04:52 GMT 1
When we had the full 9 route at Bramley, the 1615 from Horsforth used to get to Seacroft at 1842...
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Post by westyorkshirebus on Feb 21, 2018 18:21:30 GMT 1
I wonder how many passengers have abandoned the 508 since it was changed to run via Farsley. There can’t be many passengers using it as a bus to work in Leeds from Northowram, Shelf, Woodside, Odsal, Dudley Hill etc with journey times like that.
Ideally if one change was to be made with the extra money available in Leeds, they would create a new service Farsley to Leeds, maybe numbered 671, and send the 508 via Stanningley Bypass instead.
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Post by steve440 on Feb 21, 2018 19:23:29 GMT 1
It is quite tragic the impact that congestion is having on our bus services.
I used to use the 508 service from my home in Stump Cross to Leeds every day for work in the early 1980s. I caught the 06:40 departure from Halifax and arrived in Leeds without fail for 07:45! Similarly on my way home I would catch the 16:05 from Leeds (worked then by Bramley) arriving home just after 17:00.
If only that were possible now.
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Post by Craig on Feb 22, 2018 0:15:32 GMT 1
Surely an X8 peak service, even just 1 bus each way per day, taking the 508 route to Dawsons Corner and then non-stop to Leeds would be used. But I know there was an X8 at one point which died, but can't remember how that worked, was it via the M62?
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Post by Craig on Feb 22, 2018 0:30:24 GMT 1
I then started to look at the similar changes to the Leeds routes and Route 1 Beeston-Holt Park must surely win the prize of having the slowest scheduled journey time within the county. Look at the Mon-Fri pm pk journey from Beeston departs at 1643 arriving Holt Park at 1816 - this takes 93 minutes for 9 miles, giving an average speed of less than 6 mph. To put this into perspective, the 1st journey of the day (0525 - 0606) takes just 41 minutes. It is great we are having brand new 'state of the art' buses on this route, but it seems they do not need to be able to be capable of any high speed running. Comments please, I am sure somebody on the forum will be able to find a slower journey somewhere! I think you have already won the prize with the journey on service 1 being the slowest. I had also noticed the significant increase in running times for Leeds peak journeys from this weekend's changes. I've listed what I think are the 10 slowest journeys, times quoted for each service but some services have more than one journey with the same high running time. All are well below 10mph average speed. 1 ex Beeston 16:43, arr Holt Park 18:16 (93 mins), av. speed 5.8mph 42 ex Oakwood 16:05, arr Farnley 17:32 (87 mins), av. speed 6.2mph 49 ex Monkswood Gate 16:37, arr Bramley Centre 18:13 (96 mins), av. speed 6.8mph 6 ex Leeds 17:15, arr Holt Park 18:30 (75 mins), av. speed 7mph 7 ex Leeds 16:20 arr Primley Park 17:11 (51 mins), av. speed 7.6mph 97 ex Leeds 16:38 arr Guiseley 18:11 (93 mins), av. speed 7.6mph 9 ex Horsforth 07:15 arr White Rose 08:42 (87 mins), av. speed 7.7mph 33 ex Leeds 17:20 arr White Cross 18:40 (80 mins), av. speed 8.1mph 4 ex Seacroft 08:18 arr Pudsey Highfield Green 09:42 (84 mins), av. speed 8.8mph 16 ex Whinmoor 15:09 arr Pudsey 16:52 (103 mins), av. speed 9.2mph These are all end-to-end journey times, if you broke it down into separate sections of routes you would find even more examples. Obvious examples here are along Headingley and Kirkstall Road, but some perhaps more surprising ones including the 42 being so high. Just to add, I don't blame First for this. They get an awful lot of criticism for reliability in Leeds, so they are damned whatever they do. I've noticed that as well as the peak running time increase, a lot of buses are given a more generous recovery time at termini. The downside to all this extra running time is that a lot of core frequent services now have gaps of 15+ mins at peak times, which only leads to more bus bunching and unreliability. But First don't have an infinite resource of buses and drivers. |
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Post by ajw11239 on Feb 22, 2018 14:29:50 GMT 1
Sadly it's happening to loads of services now - bad traffic, leading to poor punctuality, leading to the service needing more time and therefore the frequency goes down.
It's happened to several services in Leeds (1, 16, 33 at peak), Huddersfield has had the 503 cut from every 7/8 mins to every 10, York's 66 was every 6/7 mins when it was launched and is now every 8 mins or so. It shows with longer wait times between buses, and they're busier too.
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Post by kommie123 on Feb 22, 2018 14:58:00 GMT 1
Its a really difficult one. It means more complaints too from people complaining about their bus not turning up but its usually down to traffic. Thankfully NEARLY ALL bus operators have real time tracking.
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Post by westyorkshirebus on Feb 22, 2018 18:40:59 GMT 1
Its a really difficult one. It means more complaints too from people complaining about their bus not turning up but its usually down to traffic. Thankfully NEARLY ALL bus operators have real time tracking. Almost every tweet directed at First is people complaining that their bus is late, with a tone of voice suggesting that the reason it is late is entirely First’s fault. The longer gaps at peak times aren’t great. Ideally First would run some school routes that could then drop into service in the PM peak ensuring that the main routes are still every 10 minutes. |
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Post by deerfold on Feb 22, 2018 19:00:41 GMT 1
Sadly it's happening to loads of services now - bad traffic, leading to poor punctuality, leading to the service needing more time and therefore the frequency goes down. It's happened to several services in Leeds (1, 16, 33 at peak), Huddersfield has had the 503 cut from every 7/8 mins to every 10, York's 66 was every 6/7 mins when it was launched and is now every 8 mins or so. It shows with longer wait times between buses, and they're busier too. The 503 is supposed to be a temporary measure until the Salterhebble roadworks are complete. |
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Post by northerner on Feb 22, 2018 22:18:40 GMT 1
Almost every tweet directed at First is people complaining that their bus is late, with a tone of voice suggesting that the reason it is late is entirely First’s fault. Operators can control late running to some degree though. The bus I regularly use home from work is late at least 3 nights a week. Some days it may just be 5 minutes, other days it can be 20 or more late - it was around 12 minutes late today. The journey in question clearly doesn't have enough running time allocated to cope with a standard afternoon peak. First have to accept some responsibility for this as they should be using data from the RTI system to realise more time is needed. Buses can be delayed for many reasons, but if the same journeys are routinely being delayed the timetable should be amended at the earliest opportunity |
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Post by ajw11239 on Feb 22, 2018 22:26:48 GMT 1
Its a really difficult one. It means more complaints too from people complaining about their bus not turning up but its usually down to traffic. Thankfully NEARLY ALL bus operators have real time tracking. Almost every tweet directed at First is people complaining that their bus is late, with a tone of voice suggesting that the reason it is late is entirely First’s fault. The longer gaps at peak times aren’t great. Ideally First would run some school routes that could then drop into service in the PM peak ensuring that the main routes are still every 10 minutes. I guess it's a complex problem really, because it depends who's to blame with the delay. Like for example, in the evening peak you're 95% likely to be delayed thanks to the traffic or something outside the operating company's control. However there are times it's been late or cancelled thanks to the operator. Staff shortages, driver latenesses etc. For example, the bus I usually use to get to work has no previous journeys; it comes dead from the depot 100m away. So when that's late, I do get slightly irritated. But Leeds in the evening peak can be a complete car park. Ideally, to keep frequencies decent at peak time (or increased), additional buses will be provided at peak. But that would involve having a load of buses which just sit in the depot for most of the day. A solution I'd like to see is what Lothian do in Edinburgh - the main commuter routes get extra Limited Stop express services to add to capacity, and provide passengers with a speedier journey. But as above, it requires a decent amount of extra buses (and drivers, which First are short of). For example, in the evening, a good handful of Lothian's express services come dead from the depot, run that single journey, then go straight back and that is it. |
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Post by westyorkshirebus on Feb 22, 2018 23:15:55 GMT 1
Everyone who travels by road either by bus or by car knows that rush hour traffic can vary greatly.
On my journey it can either be busy at the start, or in the middle, or at the end, or in all three, or it can be extremely busy across all three, or in the holidays it can be quiet across the whole route. The journey time varies from day to day, some Fridays are quieter, some are no different than any other day. It’s generally busiest in the winter. You get the shoulder holiday periods like June and September where schools are still in, but universities aren’t, and many are starting to go on holiday.
That’s all in a car where I don’t have to wait for time if I pass a point early, and that’s before you start factoring in passenger actions.
They need to be looking at all journeys starting on time, with sufficient layover before hand, and also ensuring the real time works better, stop having tracked buses mixing with untracked buses at times of extreme disruption. Ideally they need someone to manually control the system adding cancellations, linking journeys together as per the running boards, and ability to input better and more localised scrolling messages.
One thing they need to do is ensure the every 10 mins routes still run every 10 mins at peak times. It doesn’t help when a bus is advertised as every 10 mins but in actual fact there are 12-15 min gaps at peak times, and with traffic it’s more like 15-20. This means additional buses required and additional drivers, but there is no way around it.
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Post by jdodger08 on Feb 23, 2018 12:41:49 GMT 1
Yes, the traffic is bad in Leeds. It only takes 1 accident on the primary gateways to gridlock the whole city. Sometimes it can take half an hour to get from Park Row to St Peters Street...
Realistically there is nothing more they can do with busses in this city. The road capacity is at a tipping point and placing more vehicles on the road is not going to solve anything.
Thanks to NIMBYs the trolleybus was scrapped. The supertram before that was scrapped. Yet we see the likes of Sheffield and Nottingham with tram systems!!!? Money needs to be ploughed into Leeds to unlock the economical benefits, to make the economy more efficient, think of it, our bus operators waste money sat in traffic, business loose money because there trucks are sat in traffic, or their employees are sat in traffic.
The government shakes that nice money tree when it comes to crossrail in London so where is crossrail for Yorkshire and Leeds? The only way forward now is investment in underground or above ground transit systems, and there is plenty of innovation they just need the vision.
Rant over!
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Post by davopazza on Feb 23, 2018 21:25:55 GMT 1
Yes, the traffic is bad in Leeds. It only takes 1 accident on the primary gateways to gridlock the whole city. Sometimes it can take half an hour to get from Park Row to St Peters Street... Realistically there is nothing more they can do with busses in this city. The road capacity is at a tipping point and placing more vehicles on the road is not going to solve anything. Thanks to NIMBYs the trolleybus was scrapped. The supertram before that was scrapped. Yet we see the likes of Sheffield and Nottingham with tram systems!!!? Money needs to be ploughed into Leeds to unlock the economical benefits, to make the economy more efficient, think of it, our bus operators waste money sat in traffic, business loose money because there trucks are sat in traffic, or their employees are sat in traffic. The government shakes that nice money tree when it comes to crossrail in London so where is crossrail for Yorkshire and Leeds? The only way forward now is investment in underground or above ground transit systems, and there is plenty of innovation they just need the vision. Rant over! A Leeds Underground will be good. |
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Post by nic on Feb 23, 2018 23:41:38 GMT 1
richd.me/2013/01/leeds-tube-map/ Credit where credit is due for this creation. Split the red line though and have one section go through the centre would be my only suggestion. Now they need the investment. Anyway back on track. One idea, especially for the cross city journeys, could be to split them on the timetable and the running boards thus reducing the risk. Let's take the 1 service. Split it at Leeds and have either: Option A) - The bus layover in Leeds having completed the Beeston-Leeds journey. Then continue to Holt Park from Leeds. Likewise for return journeys. So Beeston-Leeds, Leeds-Holt Park, Holt Park-Leeds, Leeds-Beeston. Option B) - Or have separate boards completely, split the timetable as above, but buses either go on the Beston trips or Holt Park trips when it comes evening and morning peaks.
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kendall17
Forum Member
Justice for the 96!
Posts: 4,515
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Post by kendall17 on Feb 24, 2018 9:08:38 GMT 1
I can appreciate the slower journey times buy I'm grateful that the timetables reflect the road conditions now. Something that we've been crying out for for some time.
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Post by wandle on Feb 24, 2018 20:55:38 GMT 1
As nic suggests splitting routes is a good idea,whilst some people are put out, it seems to have helped in Bradford especially with the X6. The problem with adding extra time to routes, it seems to me, once the registration has gone through and the service change windows happen, is that congestion has gone up so it is a constant catch up situation.
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Post by westyorkshirebus on Feb 24, 2018 21:52:47 GMT 1
The problem with splitting the cross city routes in Leeds, is that you’ll get complaints from passengers if their bus no longer serves as much of the city centre.
If you do try to serve as much of the city centre you’ll double the number of buses in the city and add many buses to the PVR.
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Post by Arriva Wakefield on Feb 24, 2018 22:25:35 GMT 1
As nic suggests splitting routes is a good idea,whilst some people are put out, it seems to have helped in Bradford especially with the X6. The problem with adding extra time to routes, it seems to me, once the registration has gone through and the service change windows happen, is that congestion has gone up so it is a constant catch up situation. The other part was the fact that it was a ‘combined’ service beyween the X6 & X63, but both had different stopping patterns. Now theres a standardised stopping pattern, and a higher frequency from the stops. |
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Post by Arriva Wakefield on Feb 24, 2018 22:26:58 GMT 1
The problem with splitting the cross city routes in Leeds, is that you’ll get complaints from passengers if their bus no longer serves as much of the city centre. If you do try to serve as much of the city centre you’ll double the number of buses in the city and add many buses to the PVR. Unless they did something like Nottingham did, and run the routes round a City Loop, so easy to interchange between the various routes. |
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kendall17
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Justice for the 96!
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Post by kendall17 on Feb 25, 2018 0:09:54 GMT 1
The problem with splitting the cross city routes in Leeds, is that you’ll get complaints from passengers if their bus no longer serves as much of the city centre. If you do try to serve as much of the city centre you’ll double the number of buses in the city and add many buses to the PVR. Unless they did something like Nottingham did, and run the routes round a City Loop, so easy to interchange between the various routes. City centre is already screwed and this will add how long to journey times? I believe Cross city routes reduce PVR & wont be going anywhere anytime soon. |
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Post by deerfold on Feb 25, 2018 10:44:10 GMT 1
Unless they did something like Nottingham did, and run the routes round a City Loop, so easy to interchange between the various routes. City centre is already screwed and this will add how long to journey times? I believe Cross city routes reduce PVR & wont be going anywhere anytime soon. In Nottingham, much of the loop is restricted to buses and a small amount of other traffic. Without that, I don't think it would work. |
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Post by westyorkshirebus on Feb 25, 2018 10:57:10 GMT 1
Also only two colours run via the loop, most just serve a little bit of the city and turn around.
It works now, but I bet it was controversial at the time. Getting off a train and wanting a bus which goes from the Victoria Centre, which the vast majority of buses do, is quite a trek
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Post by SCH117X on Feb 25, 2018 14:01:17 GMT 1
Also only two colours run via the loop, most just serve a little bit of the city and turn around. It works now, but I bet it was controversial at the time. Getting off a train and wanting a bus which goes from the Victoria Centre, which the vast majority of buses do, is quite a trek All of the Green Line 5-11 buses link Victoria Centre and the train station. Most of the road restrictions were in place for many years before the "City Loop" was so named. The biggest change for the City Loop as it exists today was the reversing of the one way direction along Angel Row and Mount Street. |
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