Impera Bus & Coach

[Route102]

RE: Impera Bus & Coach - FLEET NEWS ONLY

(26/11/2012 01:03)First Class Wrote:  

(26/11/2012 00:55)Route102 Wrote:  Merseytravel were often informed of the timings of the route where the problems where, but as this would mean scheduling another bus into the service, nothing happened. We would fill lost mileage forms out and service delay forms (when more tan 10mins late) to feed back to Merseytravel, again nothing happened!

Hopefully the response to my FOI request may help to explain why Merseytravel neglect to do anything about timekeeping on these routes, if that is the case.

Something is still odd about Impera withdrawing though. They would still get paid regardless of their late running, (especially if they could prove it isn't their fault).

I am wondering whether companies are making diagrams tighter then previously, (i.e. reducing the need for a vehicle or two), which is why Merseytravel won't change the timings. For example, say Stagecoach ran 10 buses on these routes, and ran on time, do Impera say run 9 buses and run late because of tight turnarounds/layovers, (numbers purely random)??

In my CMT days we ran 4 buses on the 130 and 3 on the 210/250, adding a 5th bus on the 130 would improve the timekeeping at certain points (but would create almost 20-25mins of deadtime after each run (hence squeeze the route into 4 buses and reduce the price of Merseytravel paying a 5th bus), Timings on a lot of tendered routes are a joke, there are places on some routes that give 10mins travel time that takes 4mins and others given 5mins which take 10 when driven on a Sunday early morning with hardly any passengers to stop for!! And a lot of the timing points are where the checkers time you!! Thats the problem sometimes with Merseytravel they are not taking these instances into account, commercial services like Stagecoach and Arriva tweak the timings of routes so that at particular times of day additional/less running time is given where they know the problems are. Merseytravel could do this, but it would probably mean an extra bus and driver are needed to be injected into the route for the odd journey, can this be practical, can a driver and bus be sourced for what could only be a couple of hours a day.

Or they could just alter the timings completely, the 122 Crosby-Fazakerley for example has a 30min frequency until a point in the afternoon when there is a chang to 45 min to enable the bus to get back on schedule as a result of the many schools and congestion coming out of Crosby!