The Arriva Decker Influx

[H101GEV (Administrator)]

RE: The Arriva Decker Influx
I'm not sure it is down to significantly increased demand. Certainly, the general impression seems to be that bus travel in the North West is steadily declining. That was the view of Merseytravel in one of their recent website articles. Of course, it could be that Liverpool is bucking the trend, but given the way bus services have stagnated and been cut back in some cases, I doubt it. It's more the case that the routes set to be upgraded this year have suffered with high levels of overcrowding for years.

I still think Arriva North West is living in the shadow of the dark B. Hind days, where actual quality of service was seemingly not important. For Capital of Culture, you had buses receiving 'Lebus' branding and drivers were being taught French and Spanish, yet core routes still had old and cramped buses for the most part. There has been a slow but marked transformation in Arriva Merseyside since his departure.

As for bus lanes, the effect of their suspension on any of the services I've used in the last few months has been pretty negligible. I can't see it affecting frequencies - Anderson hasn't made quite the mistake I thought he had to be fair.