BS: What are they doing to our bus services?

Subject: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: FreddyHeadey
Date: 05 Dec 18 - 09:50 AM

I get my bus pass next year sometime.
But I wonder how how long it will be useful for.
Amazingly there is an hourly service till midnight between Macclesfield and Crewe but local services seem to stop at tea time.


When retirement was but a dream this wasn't something I expected to see
DalesBus
a weekend bus service sponsored by local firms and fundraising events
http://www.friendsofdalesbus.org.uk/latest-news/4590022137/Fundraising-Music-Evening---Saturday-3rd-February-2018/11241017

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Senoufou
Date: 05 Dec 18 - 01:49 PM

We haven't got one Freddy. Only a small minibus on a Saturday morning which only goes to blooming Dereham (rubbish place) and goes back to our village after two hours, so one's shopping time has a limit. It's free, but seats fill up fast (pre-booked)
So glad we have a car and can still drive.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Mr Red
Date: 05 Dec 18 - 03:50 PM

be prepared for timetable changes every 3 months because some smart arse who never uses the bus, sited in some distant town centre, with a spreadsheet can move things around till he saves one bus or a driver. Spreadsheets don't have a passenger formula.
Our local bus service changed to stop at some early teatime amidst howls from workers unable to get home. That time they relented.

I try and use independent companies, just as a statement.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 05 Dec 18 - 04:59 PM

In Wales the free bus pass is issued at age 60 (or you can apply for it at that age). In England I understand it's from "state pension age" (66?) for a national (England) bus pass.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 05 Dec 18 - 05:13 PM

What bus services?

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: BobL
Date: 06 Dec 18 - 03:43 AM

The bus service through the village switched last Summer from Arriva to a local company, Red Eagle, and has improved immeasurably. Only trouble is that the buses are as likely to leave a few minutes early as late.

I did sympathise with the Arriva drivers and mechanics though, trying to maintain a decent service with the aging and none-too-reliable buses that were used our route. And even with the management, trying (pace Mr. Red) to make the best of what they'd got available and to run their business on the right side of breaking even.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Will Fly
Date: 06 Dec 18 - 04:05 AM

I suppose we're relatively lucky in our West Sussex village, which sits halfway between Horsham and Brighton. The 17 runs every 30 minutes on that route, and the Compass 100 bus runs from Burgess Hill to Horsham via Pulborough, a long, circuitous route. The Community bus, bookable, goes from the village to a shopping centre near Shoreham on a regular basis. So it could be a lot worse, The buses don't run after 7pm, but there's a late night service from Brighton to Horsham for revellers, which saves a taxi fare of around £40.

Brighton city buses are very frequent, as the Green council likes to deter car traffic as much as possible. Every stop in the centre has a digital sign showing the next arrivals - like London Tube train indicators - and there are bus lanes everywhere.

Of course, gigging means using the car...

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Rusty Dobro
Date: 07 Dec 18 - 02:54 AM

Previous postings must be mistaken about the 'bus services, as we were promised at the time of the Beeching Plan that our disappearing rail services would be replaced by convenient 'bus routes.

So that's OK then.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Will Fly
Date: 07 Dec 18 - 03:57 AM

Ah - the Titfield Thunderbolt scenario...

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Dec 18 - 05:01 AM

There are no buses around here (4 miles outside Bude) that are of any use to me for local journeys. We can go to Exeter on the No 6 from Bude, a two-hour rather scenic jag if you go upstairs, but, for a day out in Exeter, there's only one bus that's of any use unless you get up at sparrow's fart and that leaves at 8.50 AM. But because it leaves before 9.30, meaning the bus pass isn't valid for the first 40 minutes, you have to pay a couple of quid. Sheesh. But go to Exeter on a sunny Saturday and go to Lutzy's cafe on Exeter Quays where you can gorge yourself on Lutzy's totally gorgeous Portuguese custard tarts. All bus gripes will be forgotten.

Ps. Lutzy only makes her tarts on Saturdays!

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 Dec 18 - 05:45 AM

The Park And Ride spots around Norwich ('Konect' buses) charge £1-80 per person for concessionary fare (old gimmers' bus passes) That's £3-60 for two. It's never free.
If one drives right into Norwich and parks for a couple of hours in the centre of town multi-storeys, it's about the same cost. And one avoids waiting in the cold and the rain for a bus (no shelters!)
We do use the P&R in the summer, but we resent having to pay. It ought to be free with the Bus Pass.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Dec 18 - 05:56 AM

I'm not a wealthy man, but I'm wealthy enough to not need my bus pass. Discuss.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Jos
Date: 07 Dec 18 - 06:20 AM

If you don't need your bus pass, that's fine - they are not compulsory and it saves you the bother of applying for it (photograph, proof of age ...).

But if bus passes help keep doddery old drivers with failing eyesight off the road, that's a bonus.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 Dec 18 - 06:57 AM

I look like an absolute witch on my Passport, Driving Licence and Bus Pass photos. (I never look good in photos anyway) I always hope that when I show it, the verifier will look at my face carefully as I don't resemble one bit the awful pic. But they accept it straight away. I reckon that means I do look exactly like that, and the camera never lies. :(

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: BobL
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 03:03 AM

It is well known that if you look like your passport pic, you are in sore need of a holiday.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 04:12 AM

Hahaha BobL! That would be very nice indeed. Barbados? Tenerife? I know, a month at the Labadi Beach Hotel in Accra, Ghana!

The problem is, one mustn't smile when having an official photo taken.
I must have an awful 'resting bitch face', like the Queen.
When I'm allowed to smile (which I do most of the time!) I look quite normal. But in these photos I look like Cruella de Vil.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 04:21 AM

Mrs Backwoodsperson says that, on her passport photos, she always looks as though she's a stroke-victim, with the right side of her mouth 'dropped'. It's true - she does - yet her real-life 'straight face' is perfectly normal and symmetrical (as far as anyone's face is symmetrical).

So you see, Sen, the camera can and does sometimes lie, and chances are that you are a radiant beauty! Think positive! :-)

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 04:28 AM

Hee hee BWDSM! I've always suspected I'm irresistibly gorgeous. Slim, perky bust and bottom, long blonde hair...er no, wait, that might have been the case sixty years ago. :( <--resting bitch face

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Jos
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 05:21 AM

It does seem a bit silly not being able to smile in passport photographs. If someone's normal resting face is smiley they are never going to look like the picture that is being used to identify them.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 06:01 AM

I agree Jos. I'm usually smiling (although my pupils used to tell me I'd put on my 'scary face' when displeased, and they found it very effective!)

The prisoners I visited told me they had ways of distorting the 'mug shots' which the Police took of them when in Custody. They'd put their tongue in front of their bottom teeth, hang their chin down and generally gurn for the camera, with the result that their identity photos looked nothing like them at all.

With modern technology though, a single fingerprint on the little device the Police carry and their identity is immediately verified.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Will Fly
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 08:22 AM

I still have a passport photo from my mid-20s - I look just like a PLO terrorist of the period. Very tasty.

The ones they use now - bus pass and passport - are so digitally processed as to be unrecognizable.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 10:46 AM

I'm only just off the main road at the front and there is a bus stop a few 100 yards from me where you can catch the services that run between Norwich and Sheringham. Weekdays between about 7:30am and 5pm, I think it works out as a bus (each way) available roughly every 30 minutes. Looking at getting home from Cromer after that time, I think my choices would be one but around 6pm and one around 9pm.

Someone mentioned Wales above. The (N Wales) village I lived most of time there just had a weekday lunchtime service and the ones that would tie in with getting to/from Llandudno secondary school. It's location was very convenient for those with cars, being in easy reach of the main towns of Conwy, Llandudno and Colwyn bay as well as to get onto the A55 express way but you would be looking at at least a mile walk (up a steep hill coming back, and shortest routes would use footpaths) to get onto a main bus route.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 12:35 PM

A London Freedom Pass is a necessity and I would certainly not refuse it.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: The Sandman
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 03:49 PM

A London Freedom Pass is a necessity and I would certainly not refuse it."
Dogs should not be entitled to them, Bonzo, I hope that they will nopt be offered to dogs, if they are they should be means tested, in accotdance with your conservative capitalist philosophy, however i am a kind man and not DOGmatic so if you would be prepared to sing for your dog pass perhaps you could be an eception

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: JHW
Date: 08 Dec 18 - 04:28 PM

Park and Rides I've used (Durham last week for a funeral) you just pay for the bus so its free with your bus pass. Others I see here vary. P&R is never late enough for a night out though.
When I got my bus pass you didn't go into make-up or anything, they just pointed a camera over the counter.
The bus companies do get paid one average fare per pass ride.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: FreddyHeadey
Date: 15 Dec 18 - 12:24 PM

Thanks - some good comments.
Nice drift into passport photos and witches.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Senoufou
Date: 15 Dec 18 - 12:37 PM

Sorry Freddy, I do rabbit on and make threads drift a bit.

One thing about buses is the blooming germs one picks up when travelling. People cough and sneeze without a hanky, and the germs lurk about in the stuffy air inside the bus.

I feel I should wear one of those surgical masks when up the city on the bus!

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 16 Dec 18 - 07:25 AM

Having moved to Edinburgh in 1986 from very rural Suffolk, we could not understand why people were complaining about the buses here, when in Suffolk we had had a paltry 2 buses per WEEK to our village!
Services here have changed over the years, and there will always be someone complaining, as there was then.
But standard single fare on Lothian Buses is £1.70. - no fare staging, so you could, if you wanted, travel 20 miles from the most westerly terminus near us to the most easterly. A day ticket is only £4 for which you can take as many rides as you like. There are also special deals for evening and night buses. There are a good many "park and ride" facilities around the periphery of the city, where parking is free: they can save you a fortune on trying to park in town, which is expensive.
We have the bus pass anyway, which also permits us to ride on the tram for free, tho the tram does not go anywhere near where we live! (And can't think of trams without remembering the 5 or more years of pain and chaos it caused us residents of Embra while they were being put in!)
The bus pass does not cover night buses, however (after midnight we are supposed to be tucked up with our cocoa or sound asleep!)
So what's not to like? Well, most routes run radially in and out of town: very few circular routes, and most of those don't run at weekends. Therefore you may have to go all the way into town, and back out again to move between different points on the circumference of the city. And our nearest bus stop is half a mile away: a long slog back uphill coming home! But buses every 10 minutes until the eveing when they drop back to every 30 minutes - but still run until midnight.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: KarenH
Date: 16 Dec 18 - 07:47 AM

They are not doing enough to bus services as public transport has to be the way forward environmentally.

Subject: RE: BS: What are they doing to our bus services?
From: KarenH
Date: 16 Dec 18 - 09:17 AM

Ken Livingstone had the right idea, and reduced pollution but look what happened to him. :(