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I always thought Rochdale to Airport via Oldham would have been good

I think the 80A could be extended from Liverpool city centre to serve Maghull and Lydiate again as it used to back in Merseybus days thus providing a link between North Liverpool and the airport.

I was just going to suggest a service from Rochdale to Airport via Oldham then maybe Express down M60.

Another service that could work and I'd love to see brought back is 339 Warrington-St Helens via Burtonwood, St Helens Central and St Helens Hospital that Fairway Travel operated, I used to use this service a lot and quite a number of the journies left Warrington with good loads with some people using the service between Warrington and Burtonwood (a daytime link now lost) and even between Warrington and St Helens.

I never did understand why when Fairway went out of business nobody wanted 339 service considering how busy it used to be

(16/09/2015 06:17)M60lad Wrote: [ -> ]Another service that could work and I'd love to see brought back is 339 Warrington-St Helens via Burtonwood, St Helens Central and St Helens Hospital that Fairway Travel operated, I used to use this service a lot and quite a number of the journies left Warrington with good loads with some people using the service between Warrington and Burtonwood

A more frequent than hourly express service Warrington to Gemini, shopping hours only, would be nice.

(15/09/2015 17:37)Raawwwrrr! Wrote: [ -> ]I've always wondered if a crossover would work between the old 89, 212 and 217 would work.

Halewood - Hunts Cross Stn - Woolton Village - Gatacre Cross - Bellevale - Huyton - Pagemoss (via Woolfall) - Stockbridge Village - Knowsley Village - Kirkby Admin Gates - Kirkby Civic Centre.

I could see this route having gret potential. I was quite surprised when Stagecoach decided to curtail the 217 by such a great deal. The replacement, subsidised route 193 between Huyton and Halewood always seems to have decent loads so I'm sure it would be worth a try for at least one operator. I'd even go as far as adding an extension to Fazakerley Hospital.

One other route that I think could work is to add a variant to the 81 to operate via the New Mersey retail park and on to terminate at South Parkway.

(16/09/2015 06:11)MX12CFE Wrote: [ -> ]I think the 80A could be extended from Liverpool city centre to serve Maghull and Lydiate again as it used to back in Merseybus days thus providing a link between North Liverpool and the airport.

I don't think that this route is really viable. Since the opening of LSP, getting to the airport is much easier and quicker by train from north Merseyside than it was in the past. Would you really want to spend as much time travelling to the airport on a bus as you are likely spend travelling on the plane? Also, the cross-city experiment failed because of the difficulty of keeping to a timetable.

(15/09/2015 19:52)Dentonian Wrote: [ -> ]There are many places in Greater Manchester, within 10 miles of the Airport with no bus service there - and more to the point, lousy connections. These are often poorer areas, which are being left out of the Airport's jobs bonanza as a result - not to mention why the M60 is solid between Ashton-under-Lyne and Sharston every weekday!
That said, the 200 could do with either an extension or something to interwork with, if only to improve punctuality. The running time is very tight, so drivers are chasing their tales by mid day somedays.

More generally, though, who is going to pay for these services? LAs are hard pressed, and if they were ever going to be commercially viable - especially ones in urban/suburban areas - it would have been a quarter of a century ago when car ownership was much lower.

The suggestion I made to revise the 88 and 200 services could be done without requiring any additional buses. The snags would be while both are contracted services awarded to GHA they are renewed at different times, as well as their currently being 4 GHA Gold for the 88 route and the 200 bus being any Solo they can find.

One difference between Cheshire towns not having a link to the Airport and Greater Manchester towns is in Greater Manchester there's integrated ticketing and more frequent services so a change of bus is less of a hindrance.

Bus usage on the 27 and 88 routes in the Knutsford area is higher than it was a few years ago despite in the case of the 27 route the number of services being cut back.

There was a 47 route between Knutsford and Warrington which wasn't well timed and it got cut back to a token service as a result of a dispute between Cheshire County Council and Warrington Borough Council and then subsequently withdrawn. If it was run at useful times the dispute about who was going to fund it might not have been necessary as more fares would have been collected.

(16/09/2015 06:17)M60lad Wrote: [ -> ]I was just going to suggest a service from Rochdale to Airport via Oldham then maybe Express down M60.

Another service that could work and I'd love to see brought back is 339 Warrington-St Helens via Burtonwood, St Helens Central and St Helens Hospital that Fairway Travel operated, I used to use this service a lot and quite a number of the journies left Warrington with good loads with some people using the service between Warrington and Burtonwood (a daytime link now lost) and even between Warrington and St Helens.

I never did understand why when Fairway went out of business nobody wanted 339 service considering how busy it used to be

I think the main reason the 339 was never replaced was due to the fact most of its regular users have OAP/Disabled Passes and that sadly does not pay

In this day and age most routes that will be commercially viable are in operation , some commercially viable routes could be joined together , remember the days in Merseybus times when routes where joined together may be an idea.

As noted some of the routes do carry an abundance of concessionary travellers and unless the reimbursement of these passes is made more viable more routes could disappear rather appear. There soon will be a tipping point in this subject but that's for another thread.

(16/09/2015 13:54)wirralbus Wrote: [ -> ]In this day and age most routes that will be commercially viable are in operation , some commercially viable routes could be joined together , remember the days in Merseybus times when routes where joined together may be an idea.

As noted some of the routes do carry an abundance of concessionary travellers and unless the reimbursement of these passes is made more viable more routes could disappear rather appear. There soon will be a tipping point in this subject but that's for another thread.

Couldn't agree with you more.
I think the majority of areas of been explored and exploited over the years and services linking areas that are commercially viable are still operating now.

Looking back over the last 10/15 years it's interesting how many commercial services became subsidised In one way or another around the time the free concessionary travel scheme started, and the years after, and now face the chop completly due to the ongoing cuts, so it begs the question, had the national scheme never been brought in would we be seeing the cuts to subsidised (many once commercial) services that were now seeing?