Predictions for bus travel in west yorkshire?

[mattb7tl]

Title, would love to hear your thoughts!

I think my main prediction is team pennine creating a premium route between Huddersfield and Leeds, not the craziest thing they've done. 

[stephen01]

Mar 8, 2022 19:03:41 GMT 1 mattb7tl said:

Title, would love to hear your thoughts!

I think my main prediction is team pennine creating a premium route between Huddersfield and Leeds, not the craziest thing they've done. 

Doubt it as there's been calls to bring the Manchester-Leeds Cityzap but with it been run from Waterloo & Elland and the idea keeps getting quashed.

[Deleted]

In an ideal world:

Buses working better with the railway,rather than looking to compete (although that would probably require improvements to the railway also).
Localised M-Card tickets (Calderdale/Kirklees/Leeds/Bradford/Wakefield 'Zones') - I Think this one has been mentioned as a possibility by the WY Mayor.
Restoring pre-covid frequency on key routes,with possible improvements to some routes.
Better coordinated timetables between routes on common sections (both when operated by the same or multiple operators).

More realistically:

Transdev starting up more competing routes,a batch or 2 of refurbished vehicles & maybe a couple of more brands,if the Shuttle gets it's electric buses then i could see the Eclipses moving to Blackburn/Burnley to replace the Renowns.
A Few tendered routes changing operators,depending on whats for renewal this year.
Arriva/First continue to do minor cuts to some services (possibly more major across all operators depending on how things look when funding is stopped in the Autumn) & some of the current 'temporary' cuts become more permanent.
If West Yorks gets one or both of its funding (ZEBRA & BIP) then we could start to see the first roll outs of them happening this year.
First will continue its roll out of HD/HX brands with the odd newer vehicle moved to Halifax & Huddersfield - possibly some of the buses replaced from Bradford.I Wouldn't be too surprised if the current X63 B7s get the HD Connect livery & move onto the Holme Valley routes with the guidewheels swapping onto the standard livery B9s (with them gaining E6 conversions) for the X63. I'd expect some of the Bradford fleet to be repainted into the new Bradford City livery as well.
Arriva introducing a daytime service to the Wakefield Eastern Relief Road,as more people move into Cityfields with either a new route or maybe a revised service 100. Depending on the survey results then there could be some changes to the 110 or see an X41 style route return (as one option was more buses going via the motorway)
Leeds DRT expanded to cover more areas.

[deerfold]

Mar 8, 2022 19:03:41 GMT 1 mattb7tl said:

Title, would love to hear your thoughts!

I think my main prediction is team pennine creating a premium route between Huddersfield and Leeds, not the craziest thing they've done. 

Fingers crossed for not having major cuts everywhere.

[mattb7tl]

Mar 8, 2022 19:27:52 GMT 1 stephen01 said:

Mar 8, 2022 19:03:41 GMT 1 mattb7tl said:

Title, would love to hear your thoughts!

I think my main prediction is team pennine creating a premium route between Huddersfield and Leeds, not the craziest thing they've done. 

Doubt it as there's been calls to bring the Manchester-Leeds Cityzap but with it been run from Waterloo & Elland and the idea keeps getting quashed.

What was the reason for that cityzap being cancelled in the first place? I would guess low passenger usage but from images I've seen the bus always seemed to be reasonably packed.  

[stephen01]

Mar 8, 2022 22:40:26 GMT 1 mattb7tl said:

Mar 8, 2022 19:27:52 GMT 1 stephen01 said:

Doubt it as there's been calls to bring the Manchester-Leeds Cityzap but with it been run from Waterloo & Elland and the idea keeps getting quashed.

What was the reason for that cityzap being cancelled in the first place? I would guess low passenger usage but from images I've seen the bus always seemed to be reasonably packed.  

exactly that poor numbers. Leeds to Huddersfield the 229 is the fastest route at 1hr30 as the 202/203 take 1hr30-2hrs

[mattb7tl]

Mar 8, 2022 22:45:12 GMT 1 stephen01 said:

Mar 8, 2022 22:40:26 GMT 1 mattb7tl said:

What was the reason for that cityzap being cancelled in the first place? I would guess low passenger usage but from images I've seen the bus always seemed to be reasonably packed.  

exactly that poor numbers. Leeds to Huddersfield the 229 is the fastest route at 1hr30 as the 202/203 take 1hr30-2hrs

I don't rate those links, I feel like they they're meant for the places in-between those locations more than the actual starting and final destinations. I genuinely believe that a fairly quick, cheaper and premium route between those locations would be a successful route. Transdev seems to take a lot of risks creating long and risky routes, and I believe they would attempt to do something similar. For example, X43 from Burnley to Manchester. They're absolutely ages away from each other, there's not much of a population between the two and it seems to be a very successful route. 

[twy7]

Mar 8, 2022 23:07:00 GMT 1 mattb7tl said:

Mar 8, 2022 22:45:12 GMT 1 stephen01 said:

exactly that poor numbers. Leeds to Huddersfield the 229 is the fastest route at 1hr30 as the 202/203 take 1hr30-2hrs

I don't rate those links, I feel like they they're meant for the places in-between those locations more than the actual starting and final destinations. I genuinely believe that a fairly quick, cheaper and premium route between those locations would be a successful route. Transdev seems to take a lot of risks creating long and risky routes, and I believe they would attempt to do something similar. For example, X43 from Burnley to Manchester. They're absolutely ages away from each other, there's not much of a population between the two and it seems to be a very successful route. 

The difference is burnley has a slow and big cost train service that is not direct or that often but huddersfield to leeds is cheap quick and runs often with load of passengers

[WYBS]

Let's face it, people who travel between Leeds and Huddersfield regularly are going to use the train. 25 mins on a TPE 185/ Nova vs 90+ mins on a smelly Arriva vehicle...

[stevieinselby]

Mar 8, 2022 22:40:26 GMT 1 mattb7tl said:

What was the reason for that cityzap being cancelled in the first place? I would guess low passenger usage but from images I've seen the bus always seemed to be reasonably packed.

The problem is that even a full bus isn't necessarily a profitable bus. If everyone using it is on an ENCTS pass then that reduces their income, and if there's no churn then that also reduces their income – if passengers are travelling the whole length of the route, they can only sell each seat once, whereas if a lot of passengers are only travelling part-way then they can sell that seat multiple times on each journey, and as part-way journeys are not proportional to the distance travelled (travelling only half-way, you'll might pay 80% of what someone travelling the full route pays), that is a lot more profitable.

[mattb7tl]

Defiantly slowly changing my opinion on my prediction 😂 Must ask one last question, what would makes the cityzap between York and Leeds different? Trains are similar in price and train usually takes the same amount of time as the ones between Leeds and Huddersfield. Is the route heavily subsidized or?

[Deleted]

Mar 8, 2022 23:58:17 GMT 1 mattb7tl said:

Defiantly slowly changing my opinion on my prediction 😂 Must ask one last question, what would makes the cityzap between York and Leeds different? Trains are similar in price and train usually takes the same amount of time as the ones between Leeds and Huddersfield. Is the route heavily subsidized or?

Theres probably a mix of reasons why Leeds to York works - York is a tourist spot & is able to serve the college on route,both being cities allow 2 way traffic at peak times (compared to Huddersfield where it mostly likely be all towards Leeds in morning & return in the evening) Transdev already had a share of the Leeds > York market via Coastliner plus when Cityzap was introduced they dropped Coastliner from every 20 to 30 mins.They are also able to make it more of an attractive option with tickets valid on both them & the local buses what the trains don't have,whilst in Huddersfield the trains have both the M-Card & Firsts 'Connection' tickets.

One other issue is that both the main routes from Huddersfield to the motorway (Halifax Rd & Leeds Rd) both have long term roadworks planned,so if they was to launch a new route anytime soon they would either have to deal with unpredictable traffic delays or taking a detour via Brighouse to join the M62.

[joseph]

By eck there are some on here who must be earning way over a tenner an hour going by some of the comments about the train to Huddersfield being cheap, if you get a Metro or Arriva period product, say weekly, monthly or more, the bus works out a lot cheaper. Even the day ticket offers a saving that I'd personally find better spent on something else than fares. Same applies to York, the unrestricted walk up return works out quite a bit cheaper than the walk up return on the train, and that's money in my pocket I can spend on better things. The only way you get the train cheaper is to restrict yourself to specific journeys in advance making your day a hassle, or take a gamble and hope 2 cheap walk up fares become available on the ticket machine. Did the latter in error just the once with a train that was almost ready to depart, didn't notice the time to be honest so won't be making that error again.

[deerfold]

Mar 8, 2022 23:07:00 GMT 1 mattb7tl said:

Mar 8, 2022 22:45:12 GMT 1 stephen01 said:

exactly that poor numbers. Leeds to Huddersfield the 229 is the fastest route at 1hr30 as the 202/203 take 1hr30-2hrs

I don't rate those links, I feel like they they're meant for the places in-between those locations more than the actual starting and final destinations. I genuinely believe that a fairly quick, cheaper and premium route between those locations would be a successful route. Transdev seems to take a lot of risks creating long and risky routes, and I believe they would attempt to do something similar. For example, X43 from Burnley to Manchester. They're absolutely ages away from each other, there's not much of a population between the two and it seems to be a very successful route. 

The X43 has existed since the 1930s at least - with various extensions from Burnley. It's not something Transdev introduced as a new risky route.

[deerfold]

Even with the cutbacks the train between Leeds and Huddersfield runs 3-4 times an hour taking 22-25 minutes for £10 peak, £8.30 off-peak.

An express bus is going to be doing well to do the journey in under an hour and is unlikely to be be less than £5 return.

I can see it being popular with people with ENTCS passes and those with a period bus pass already who fancy a trip to Leeds at the weekend or on a day off - but that's not going to bring in more money for the bus company.

What frequency do you think it can sustain?

Between Leeds and Manchester the cheapest open return valid on TPE was at least £15 more than the return fare on CityZap Manchester - an amount more likely to tempt people to change.

[rwilkes]

The M62 is far to unreliable to be used as a bus route which is a shame
Scrapping the hard shoulder seems to have made M ways more dangerous, but I have wondered if hard shoulder working for bus and coach only would be safe.
That would bring some express opportunities - but only if safe

[lucyp]

Fare increases and the axing of poorly used services, are my predictions, because of the recent rapid rise in the cost of fuel.

[rwilkes]

Bus fares need to go up to pay for fuel and staff pay rises but then politicians will go deranged!
Fare increases could be avoided with a big increase in bus priority which would cut costs and increase usage

[rossbailey]

Love to see Transdev go in competition with First and take on the Leeds to Bradford 72 route.

Feel like now would be right time to do it, as the current 15 min daytime and half hourly off peak services are inadequate and most buses are running to near full loads, even having to leave passengers behind.

[westyorkshirebus]

In reality there won’t be all these expensive sounding new links, I think we’ll be best crossing our fingers that what we have now remains rather than anything new, and in this new post Covid world there certainly won’t be new bits of competition, operators work with each other now, not against each other.

What we may have is service cuts by all the big operators. Transdev will apply a large layer of PR over the top of it to make it sound like they aren’t making cuts but it will basically amount to the same outcome,

[576 Gemini 2]

The Manchester Road guide way to go replaced by a bus lane, must be a nightmare for vehicle allocaters at Bradford & Huddersfield to make there are enough guide wheeled fitted buses to operate the services that use it everyday

[mattb7tl]

Mar 9, 2022 19:45:06 GMT 1 576 Gemini 2 said:

The Manchester Road guide way to go replaced by a bus lane, must be a nightmare for vehicle allocaters at Bradford & Huddersfield to make there are enough guide wheeled fitted buses to operate the services that use it everyday

I can't lie guide ways feel much more inefficient than a bus lane, I genuinely hope they end up doing this sometime in the future. 

[adam]

I think we're gonna continue with the amalgamating routes and sending previously main road buses through estates to get rid of other services. But then will realise that they're losing passengers because of it and totally change the routes again and bring back faster services and estate services again but will be too late

[kendall17]

Mar 9, 2022 21:28:42 GMT 1 mattb7tl said:

Mar 9, 2022 19:45:06 GMT 1 576 Gemini 2 said:

The Manchester Road guide way to go replaced by a bus lane, must be a nightmare for vehicle allocaters at Bradford & Huddersfield to make there are enough guide wheeled fitted buses to operate the services that use it everyday

I can't lie guide ways feel much more inefficient than a bus lane, I genuinely hope they end up doing this sometime in the future. 

It's already planned for Leeds.

[deerfold]

Mar 9, 2022 18:41:13 GMT 1 rossbailey said:

Love to see Transdev go in competition with First and take on the Leeds to Bradford 72 route.

Feel like now would be right time to do it, as the current 15 min daytime and half hourly off peak services are inadequate and most buses are running to near full loads, even having to leave passengers behind.

Transdev are still running reduced timetables of their own on several routes including Bradford's 662 and Leeds's 36. They don't have much of a network in either Bradford or Leeds (compared with First).