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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 19, 2023 20:28:30 GMT 1
www.dalesbus.org/uploads/1/1/3/9/113919127/875.pdfSpot the new service and operator, who aren't that new to Leeds itself, however for the first time ever (apart from excursions) they'll be seen running through North Leeds and Otley, and you'd never think back in the days of other red buses you'd be seeing them do so up that way. It's an interesting one. At the start of the season, they are running a bus from York via Leeds to Grassington, which then continues to Hawes. Then at some as yet unspecified time, that bus will terminate at Grassington, and a connection will be available to Hawes at the same time on the York via Ripon to Grassington and Hawes service. The timetable for that isn't available yet, so I'm not sure if that bus will then just sit at Grassington for 4 hours until it's time to return, or if it do something else in the meantime. Last year, the York to Hawes via Ripon service started at the start of the season although finished a few weeks earlier than the Leeds to Hawes service. I'm puzzled as to whether Leeds really needs three buses in quick succession to Wharfedale (two of them running at the same time), but with only one of the three calling at Bolton Abbey and Burnsall – at least on the way back, they are a bit more spread out, but still doesn't address the fact that two of the three miss out a couple of key destinations. If for most of the season the EY bus isn't going to Hawes then I would have thought it would make more sense to use a single decker and run it through Bolton Abbey.
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 14, 2023 18:42:56 GMT 1
Doubt Transdev would get it passed the competition authorities due to the Team Pennine ops I can't imagine that they would give two hoots. There are numerous examples up and down the country of areas where one bus company has an effective monopoly in a particular town, city or area. Unless there's any evidence of them being involved in harmful anti-competitive practices, it won't even be on their radar.
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 12, 2023 18:57:03 GMT 1
I want to friendly challenge no serious attempt at investment to grow their market Friendly challenge accepted. Based in Selby and looking towards North Yorkshire rather than West Yorkshire, a lot of the changes that you've mentioned were not on my radar so there may have been some genuine improvements there that I wasn't aware of. As a general passenger, I couldn't give two hoots about a college bus. That's all it is, a college bus. Sure, members of the public can use it, but when it only runs during term time it isn't a public transport service. What I see are cuts. The 42 used to run every hour, then it was every 1½ hours, now it's every 2 hours. When the weight limit came in on Cawood Bridge, Arriva were not interested in acquiring any light-weight vehicles to run it and just abandoned their passengers. The Selby to Leeds corridor used to be every half-hour, then it was reduced to every half-hour to Sherburn only and every hour to Leeds, then it was every hour right through to Leeds, now it is every hour to Sherburn only and every 2 hours to Leeds. Doncaster and its northern satellites have lost their direct services to Selby and Pontefract. Local services around Selby to Brayton and Thorpe Willoughby have been reduced with some areas no longer being served at all. The inconsistent branding and a general feeling of a fleet that – while more modern than it has been – is uncared for. Little or no attempt to post current timetables in any kind of proper format at bus stops. A website that has been unfit for purpose since it was unveiled 3 years ago and which they have done nothing to resolve, with timetables that (if you can even find the bloody things) are riddled with inaccuracies and are utter gibberish (which is a much more longstanding problem than the current website but which again they have shown no interest in addressing). Constant fiddling with timetables by a few minutes here, a few minutes there, which makes no difference to overall punctuality or reliability but means passengers have to stay on their toes all the time. Social media feed that often doesn't mention changes to routes and timetables that are coming up or any information about roadworks and planned diversions. Yes, there may have been some new routes or improved frequencies but these are often not given time to bed in before they are abandoned, and there doesn't seem to be much of a marketing drive to encourage people to use them. I'm not saying they are a terrible company, I've seen far worse over the years, but there's nothing there that makes me think that there is any drive to make things better.
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 10, 2023 0:18:17 GMT 1
If Transdev do have a tendency to "get away with more" where other operators would get called out for it, that may be because they usually operate a high quality service and so people may be more inclined to cut them some slack. That may also be because they are a more local operation – OK, they are owned by a multinational parent company now, but their UK base started as a Yorkshire company and has now spread to Lancashire but remains a northern operation – whereas big players like First and Arriva come across as faceless corporate monoliths who have no "real" interest in Yorkshire, it's just one of many places where they try to make money. That is probably especially true for Arriva, with their nation-wide branding (not that I'm necessarily against that, although I don't like the latest incarnation).
What grates for me about Transdev is the constant hype, how everything has to be hashtag-amazing even when it demonstrably isn't, and trying to sell every change as an improvement even when it's demonstrably a degradation – but at least they are trying, whereas the social media feeds of other companies are dismal. We also see a lot of cancellations posted by Transdev (although incomplete), far more than for any other operator, but I don't know whether that is because they genuinely have more cancellations or if it's that they are more proactive in trying to tell people about them whereas other operators just leave you wondering if and when your bus will ever turn up. But on the plus side, they do try to be innovative and to make improvements, in contrast to First and Arriva who often appear to be in a permanent state of managed decline with little or no serious attempt at investment to grow their market.
I try to be fair and even-handed, but I'm sure I do have biases and prejudices that I'm not aware of. I have had serious gripes with most operators in the region at some time or another, but as the wheel turns in most cases the particular thing that provoked my ire gets sorted out and is no longer an issue or at least no longer a priority.
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 9, 2023 22:49:14 GMT 1
At the far end of North Yorkshire - the 80/89 between Northallerton and Stokesley is moving from Abbotts to Coatham Connect next month, with the promise of a better timetable. Abbotts have run the service since at least 2004, and for much of that time it has been their only stage-carriage service.
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 7, 2023 23:53:02 GMT 1
The M6 will be exactly the same as the Pendle Wizz to Colne and then just via the normal Mainline route onward to Burnley. Is that definite? Because at the moment, the M5 serves Earby every 30 minutes – and it looks like with the changes the M5 is going to be reduced to hourly alongside an hourly M6 – so that will either mean that Earby drops from half-hourly to hourly, or that the Skipton service will take ~10 minutes longer to get to Colne as it will divert to Earby (and ~30 minutes longer to reach Burnley). I hope I'm wrong and that the M5 will be retained every 30 minutes alongside the M6, but I think that's unlikely.
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 7, 2023 19:52:32 GMT 1
Is the new M6 the same as Pennines old 215 route? It looks like it, although the map only shows the environs of Burnley and not the full Mainline network so it's hard to be sure.
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 7, 2023 0:34:46 GMT 1
Looks like the Skipton > Burnley corridor is now permanently hourly (Wasn't the original plan for Wizz to increase to half hourly?) The original plan for the Wizz, which was published pre-Covid and due to start in April 2020, was a half-hourly service – but then the world stopped and the service has never run more than hourly. With only 3 buses painted into the Wizz livery, it doesn't feel like they have at any point anticipated it picking up. Disappointing when you think that in 2010, they went into competition with Pennine on that corridor running a half-hourly service alongside Pennine's hourly, and after Pennine pulled out of the business they were running 4 buses an hour from Skipton to Barlick, Colne and Burnley on weekdays. And it looks like Skipton to Burnley will be back on the slow route through Nelson rather than wizzing down the M65, so Skipton to Burnley is seeing the worst service it has had in 12 years, by quite some margin. And if it is becoming part of Mainline, does that mean it will be stepping down from double-deckers to Versas? Could get very cosy 😬 But they are still trying to sell it as an improvement!
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 6, 2023 11:38:36 GMT 1
The latest innovations from a couple of scheduling software suppliers include plugging all the tracking data that is now available into automated scheduling packages to produce timetables reflecting accurate real running times - I think I did see First signing a deal with one of these suppliers a few months ago so they may be actually using this. On paper this seems a good thing as it would appear to offer a more accurate and so reliable timetable that can be prepared in much less time than manual intervention but as is being pointed out if it is relied on without any intervention you get these anomalies with irregular frequencies though if it is cycling at just over 30-mins like this it sounds like you need an extra frequency or a lower frequency to get consistency (or interworking with another route with some slack). Timetable design is a complicated process and whilst these systems do seem to offer advantages in speed of turning round initial proposals clearly they could do with some manual reviewing to ensure what comes out is passenger friendly. This is the current timetable for the First York 5/5A. Does anyone really think that the traffic in York is so predictable that one journey will be 51 minutes and half an hour later it will be 53 minutes? It's absolute garbage!
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 5, 2023 21:34:30 GMT 1
Thanks for letting me know. I'm still learning about this kind of stuff. I believe that would still be enough time to make their money back? Transdev and some other operators evidently thought so – the lower purchase cost and lower running costs are supposed to offset the shorter lifespan. Whether that actually works out is another question – but and whether there is any benefit or loss from running breadvans rather than buses in terms of attracting ridership or possibly operational efficiency from being small and agile on the road.
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 5, 2023 18:59:34 GMT 1
x11 is a non clockface timetable Is this another one where First are using a random number generator to create the timetable? I don't know how they can think that a timetable with irregular and inconsistent headways, and irregular and inconsistent running times, is remotely customer-friendly or makes them look remotely competent, but every single route they run in York is like that now 🤷🏻♂️
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 5, 2023 18:56:22 GMT 1
The money spent on those liveries is pocket change when considering just how many liveries have been created over the past two years. I can't help but think that creating one corporate livery and sticking to it would have saved them quite a bit of money, rather than the constant rebranding, not to mention the repainting every time they move a bus from one division to another. It could still have been something high quality, but at less total expense.
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 2, 2023 12:15:29 GMT 1
What about the two Solos for Wharfedale? they aren't brand new. Nor were the double-decker for the 64 and the two buses for the 13, which you said were "the last 3 purchases".
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 2, 2023 8:58:50 GMT 1
Must be some time since they added three buses in succession to the fleet actually in fleet livery. think the Vehicles still in White are Vehicles that can be sold on. The last 3 purchases have resulted in a Decker for 64 in it's own branding and 2 buses for the 13. The last brand new bus though was the current L50LOW What about the two Solos for Wharfedale?
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 2, 2023 8:57:03 GMT 1
New route for 508 , cant disclose yet but commences April 2nd , and yes it is reduced to an hourly service. An hourly service between a major town and major city… Gonna have no buses left at this rate How many people use the 508 to get from Halifax to Leeds? I reckon you could count them on the fingers of one foot. If they are that desperate for a direct bus service, despite it taking 3 times as long as the train, they can still use the 255. It won't take them a lot longer to use the 576 to Bradford and then the X6 to Leeds, although the latter does suffer from First's recent policy of using a random number generator to create the timetables meaning that there are no two journeys through the day that have consistent clockface intervals between them. Routes like the 508 aren't used for end-to-end journeys, they are used for people travelling to/from intermediate points and it just happens to be more operationally convenient to link them to major destinations at either end of the route than have separate overlapping routes, one to Halifax and one to Leeds.
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Post by stevieinselby on Mar 1, 2023 16:58:26 GMT 1
They have only had those routes for 2 years, so I doubt that's the full term of the contract, I guess they are relinquishing them early? I mean, that's not necessarily a surprise, if they don't think it's viable on the current contract terms, back in 2020 when the contracts were agreed no-one was expecting that we'd be in this situation today.
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Post by stevieinselby on Feb 25, 2023 12:27:25 GMT 1
To start off getting things back on track, the Summer Dales network has started to be announced, details attached in the link which includes a re-numbering of the 884 to 864 to tie in with the 64. www.dalesbus.org/summer.htmlbelieve that could be a typo when the page has been set up as the map still shows 884. It says "A summer season network map for 2022 is available here (PDF file) - a 2023 version will be available in Spring 2023."
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Post by stevieinselby on Feb 22, 2023 23:46:07 GMT 1
Currently in York and North Yorkshire (plus Wetherby) the only services with tender bids being sought are the 12, 13 and 412 for five years Notable that those are services where the commercial service has been withdrawn (wholly or partially) and so they are outside the normal tendering cycle. Contracts for Selby were awarded recently, wef April 2023. Not sure what the length of the contracts is. No change to the 5, 8, 37, 42, 408/409, 476, 486, 488, 492, 493, 495 and 496. The 1 will now be run by East Yorkshire, not Thornes, and will only run one journey in each direction with the 1020 from Selby being dropped.
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Post by stevieinselby on Feb 22, 2023 13:01:06 GMT 1
Deerfold asked: "Why wouldn't you catch the 17.35 or the 1745? If you work so far from the route that you miss the 1745 then you'll have less than 15 minutes to wait for the 1800." Because they don't exist! Pick up a copy of the latest composite timetable for all the services available on the bus, called "The Harrogate Bus Guide" from a "The Harrogate Bus Company". Look at the 36 timetable, which states "every 10 mins until 15:30". From Leeds bus station, Monday to Fridays, you will see a 17:10, a 17:30, an 18:00 and an 18:20. I can't help you with that, but this is the timetable on their website, and these buses have been running.
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Post by stevieinselby on Feb 21, 2023 23:42:08 GMT 1
Coastliner used to be the UKs most profitable company. New buses every year, one year old buses passed onto the other Blazefield companies. Always expanding and improving. The came free OAP travel. Completely underfunded. Company now reducing services, not the companies fault I am an OAP and the free travel was stupid idea which has destroyed rural buses and harmed all the others Pretty sure that Coastliner never made a point of passing on 1-year-old buses, at least not in the last 25 years, they usually stayed at Coastliner for 4 or 5 years at least before being moved to lighter work. Also not sure of the evidence that it was "expanding and improving", when the service had been static for years – it was only in 2009 that they started trying to expand it with more frequent services between Leeds and York, after the introduction of ENCTS. Free travel was not a stupid idea per se, but the implementation of it on the cheap means that bus companies don't get enough remuneration for the free passengers they carry.
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Post by stevieinselby on Feb 19, 2023 14:29:01 GMT 1
I would agree with that. Do they use full sized buses on some of the K local services for capacity reasons or because there aren’t enough Solos to go around? If it’s the latter then I’d expect them to move to Keighley. If it’s the former then Team Pennine at Elland looks like the obvious location My guess would be that they use them because they are available. When they were renewing the fleet in 2016/17, they bought Versas for the K7, 60 and 66, and Solos for the rest of the local work – at the time, they thought the K7 needed more capacity, but the subsequent reduction in frequency suggests that they may have overestimated that. With the 60 and 66 being upgraded to double-deckers to provide capacity, and the Versas being rounded up for Flyer, they still only had enough Solos for the rest of the local work but not all of it, while they still had enough Volvos to cover the gaps.
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Post by stevieinselby on Feb 19, 2023 12:51:13 GMT 1
As for through ticketing - it's a non-issue in 2023. No one has to go to the right kind of tobacconist like you do in some European cities to buy a bus or tram ticket in advance. You just pay with your phone. There is the M Card app. Ticketing is not an issue now. Ticketing remains an issue in many areas. Yes, West Yorkshire has MCard, but large swathes of the country have no multi-operator or multi-modal ticket available. Paying with your phone might be "easy" but if you have to buy separate tickets for each leg of your journey then it can get very expensive very quickly.
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Post by stevieinselby on Feb 19, 2023 0:07:00 GMT 1
Your comments are based on that sver reliable source, BusTimes. It's like quoting Wikipedia Wikipedia is right at least 90% of the time. As is Bustimes. I would never use it as a definite source to say that an individual journey didn't run, or that a particular vehicle did/didn't run on a particular route. But when it does track a journey, the timestamps and locations it records are almost certainly correct (if you look at the actual data points and not the interpolated straight lines between them). From the evidence, it is safe to say that the 963 often does not run to Menston station, and when it does it is usually too late to allow the train connection. Although unusually on Friday, it did run to the station and did arrive on time 👍🏻
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Post by stevieinselby on Feb 18, 2023 23:54:18 GMT 1
This will only work and get people back onto buses if reliability improves. Last week a family member got buses home from St Luke’s Hospital to Thornton and it took 3 hours due to buses not turning up. Absolutely ridiculous! It's a real chicken-and-egg situation. People don't use buses because they aren't reliable, so instead they jump into their cars, creating more congestion that delays the buses and reducing income for the operators, which leads to reliability getting worse. That's why we need heavy up-front investment from councils and government, to ensure that the infrastructure and funding is in place to run the service reliably before it gets people out of their cars, in order that it can do so.
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Post by stevieinselby on Feb 18, 2023 13:12:07 GMT 1
It will be interesting to see whether all operators continue taking part in the scheme – anecdotal evidence from some drivers is that it doesn't seem to have done a lot to boost passenger numbers (although that may depend how much advertising their company has done, and what its fares normally are!), so there will be some serious maths to do as to if the money they are getting from DfT makes up for the shortfall in fares, now that they've had a good few weeks to see the impact of the scheme. It depends what they are comparing to when they say it hasn’t boosted numbers. January and early February are usually quieter than November and the first three weeks in December, so an increase v a typical January might seem to be no increase v the previous months. It would be highly unlikely not to have generated some extra trips. The driver on the NYCC 74A yesterday was saying this has been the quietest February half-term he can remember, and even on the 72 they aren't seeing the numbers he would expect despite Transdev's advertising – so he was comparing like with like. And that's despite the weather having been reasonably kind this week, which you might think would encourage more people to go out for the day in that neck of the woods. It's worth remembering how the national scheme is funded – operators get a lump sum for taking part in the scheme. This was not calculated on the basis of the predicted shortfall, but was arrived at by divvying up the allocated budget between operators by some opaque and unknown formula that (theoretically at least) is in proportion to the predicted shortfall, but no determination was made as to whether it would hit that shortfall. The budget was set before operators applied so DfT didn't know how many or which ones they would be divvying it up between. I don't know how much of a grant each company got, or how that compares with the income that they would lose from their existing passengers, but my guess would be that it would be predicated on a substantial number of additional passenger journeys in order to break even. If some operators pull out for phase 2 then that leaves a slightly bigger share of the pot for those remaining in, which may be enough to swing the balance – their could be some games of chicken going on, if some operators felt it was borderline then they may wait til the last minute before making a decision.
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