Arriva put Prices up again

[Mayneway]

RE: Arriva put Prices up again

(24/02/2015 16:44)Dentonian Wrote:  Funnilly enough, my "Timeline" (if you pardon the pun - as an appropriate example), is almost the opposite of yours. In principle, I have always been dead against Deregulation - an attitude hardened by the fact that London (where the market IS strong enough for competition) was spared, and so too was Rail. However, it eased slightly once the cowboy "run where the orange bus goes, but just in front of it" operators began to fall by the way side. In many ways the current bus war is no different to earlier skirmishes, except that First do run something approximating what they have registered. The main point about the cowboys was they constantly ran "on the edge of the law" (at best), but escaped TC sanctions for years. They also showed a distinct lack of innovation, because ALL they did (east of the Rochdale Rd/Stockport Road axis) was copy GMB/GMN/GMS/First/Stagecoach.
Apologies to those in Merseyside or other low car ownership parts of the North West, if your "indies" are/were more innovative and legal.
Trouble is now, whilst First, Stagecoach and possibly Arriva are bending over backwards to score Political own goals, what are the Politicians rubbing their hands at taking control back after 30 years actually planning? I fear it may be a case of "be careful what you wish for?"

I think Merseyside is quite lucky in that there are still a few independants willing to try and run commercial services, in Manchester they have all but died commercially and seem to survive on picking up odd tenders and I find that really sad.
I carnt really comment on regulation as I was all but a glint in my mothers eye but growing up in the 90's de-reg seemed to work ok. Taking the legalities out of the window the fact you had 2 or 3 smaller ops competing with the big company on a particular corridor meant that prices stayed lower, and we have seen just that more recently with UK North, Bullocks and Finglands competing with Stagecoach. Yes UK North were extremely dodgy but the fact you could get from A to B for less than a pound proves compititon can be good.

Would we be in this situation now if GM Buses had been splitt in to 4 instead of 2 I wonder?