Arriva North West - Winsford Depot

[Brickmill]

RE: Arriva North West - Winsford Depot

(13/12/2017 09:20)dca529x Wrote:  The GM reference was tongue in cheek. The ego needs puncturing occasionally as the desperation to be like London (odd) is amusing. As for council/LA input, obviously such restrictions work against reliability measures and demonstrate a singular disinterest or ignorance in the reality of bus operation. As for TC 'policy' that would be rater nice if they bothered to enforce it. When it comes to running time, that should indeed reflect the time of day, this just doesn't, with Mon - Fri off peak and all day Saturday constant at 110 mins. So, with that little lot, its no wonder the route is in such a downward spiral

Sorry, I don't understand what you mean by "ego" but I can assure you very few non-motorists in GM (apart from maybe Swinton or Fallowfield) think there is anything vaguely amusing about the fact they can't travel 3 stops for the same price a Londoner can travel from one end of a route to the other, nor that service levels are regularly being cut.

As for the "reality of bus operation", the reality is that without these restrictions, bus stations would be gridlocked (along with Portland Street in the case of Parker Street where the 130 terminates) and passengers of all physical abilities would have to walk into the roadway or run one or two stops down the stand to catch a bus. It would also encourage the 1980/90s attitude of competitors scheduling buses at exactly the same time, and then leaving a 30 minute gap - except of course, intra-bus competition only exists where the route is already well served. The point about Parker Street is that without LA "input", Parking Wardens could ticket any bus parking for more than two minutes (Highway Code 24x something, I think)

Don't bus stations have slot times to prevent chaos in Cheshire, Merseyside or wherever you travel?

[knutstransport]

RE: Arriva North West - Winsford Depot
Slot times seemed to have been relaxed at Cheshire East bus stations in recent years. In the former borough of Macclesfield buses were only allowed to be on bus station premises for a maximum of 10 minutes - quite often buses with a longer layover left the bus station, parked somewhere nearby and came back. Now we have the 27 vehicle spending over half an hour at Macclesfield bus station and 88 vehicles spending 15 minutes at Knutsford, not to mention both D&G and Howards have been known to leave out-of-use vehicles at Knutsford for an hour or more.

[dca529x]

RE: Arriva North West - Winsford Depot

(13/12/2017 21:09)Brickmill Wrote:  Sorry, I don't understand what you mean by "ego" but I can assure you very few non-motorists in GM (apart from maybe Swinton or Fallowfield) think there is anything vaguely amusing about the fact they can't travel 3 stops for the same price a Londoner can travel from one end of a route to the other, nor that service levels are regularly being cut.

As for the "reality of bus operation", the reality is that without these restrictions, bus stations would be gridlocked (along with Portland Street in the case of Parker Street where the 130 terminates) and passengers of all physical abilities would have to walk into the roadway or run one or two stops down the stand to catch a bus. It would also encourage the 1980/90s attitude of competitors scheduling buses at exactly the same time, and then leaving a 30 minute gap - except of course, intra-bus competition only exists where the route is already well served. The point about Parker Street is that without LA "input", Parking Wardens could ticket any bus parking for more than two minutes (Highway Code 24x something, I think)

Don't bus stations have slot times to prevent chaos in Cheshire, Merseyside or wherever you travel?

The days of 'chaos' are long gone. Things have moved on since 1986. Whether 'slot' times have any value nowadays is debatable. Instead of creating restrictions authorities need to work on more efficient traffic management to mitigate delays, then there wouldn't be the need for layover times to be more than necessary. Unfortunately, with the obsession for poor traffic light phases and under utilised bike lanes taking up road space, bus use decline and poor service reliabiity will continue and that brings to topic back very neatly to the decline of the 130.

[Brickmill]

RE: Arriva North West - Winsford Depot

(15/12/2017 21:17)dca529x Wrote:  The days of 'chaos' are long gone. Things have moved on since 1986. Whether 'slot' times have any value nowadays is debatable. Instead of creating restrictions authorities need to work on more efficient traffic management to mitigate delays, then there wouldn't be the need for layover times to be more than necessary. Unfortunately, with the obsession for poor traffic light phases and under utilised bike lanes taking up road space, bus use decline and poor service reliabiity will continue and that brings to topic back very neatly to the decline of the 130.

Totally agree with you regarding poor traffic light phasing and unused cycle lanes, but that doesn't alter the fact that (TFGM) bus stations are still working to full capacity; Piccadilly more so because it hasn't seen any decline in services. "Efficient traffic management" is like "integrated transport", its a generalised phrase, but often people need to be more specific...........

[mr t]

RE: Arriva North West - Winsford Depot

(15/12/2017 21:17)dca529x Wrote:  The days of 'chaos' are long gone. Things have moved on since 1986. Whether 'slot' times have any value nowadays is debatable. Instead of creating restrictions authorities need to work on more efficient traffic management to mitigate delays, then there wouldn't be the need for layover times to be more than necessary. Unfortunately, with the obsession for poor traffic light phases and under utilised bike lanes taking up road space, bus use decline and poor service reliabiity will continue and that brings to topic back very neatly to the decline of the 130.

Spot on, absolutely every journey is different every day and every week, this is what passengers and PTEs do not understand, It is impossible to predict 100% accurate. Yes there is the "average journey" during lunchtimes, evenings and early mornings, but each week could be affected by bank holiday, football match, bingo nights on, school parents evenings, school shows/meetings, sponataneous roadworks that always spring up unannounced, something in town on, something at the arena, something on in the park, which then obviously affects journeys either through extra passengers or extra other traffic which all affects journey times, then we have emergency incidents breakdowns, mr white van man who will stop in a lane meaning a bus has to wait 30secs-60secs to get past, or taxi driver, or parkings at schools. It is unfair of TGM to expect an operator to have accuracy so well for every single journey and then give them 5 minute layover, then moan when they are late! Especially on long journeys like 130 which is 2 hours long nearly. The only way around it would be to vastly over estimate journeys and give each one 2.5 hours instead which then results in stopping at timing points...but then what if something happens in the city centre and its been on time all the way there, then gets held up for 5 minutes but has no recovery time then. Absolute joke that TFGM

[dca529x]

RE: Arriva North West - Winsford Depot

(16/12/2017 04:30)mr t Wrote:  Spot on, absolutely every journey is different every day and every week, this is what passengers and PTEs do not understand, It is impossible to predict 100% accurate. Yes there is the "average journey" during lunchtimes, evenings and early mornings, but each week could be affected by bank holiday, football match, bingo nights on, school parents evenings, school shows/meetings, sponataneous roadworks that always spring up unannounced, something in town on, something at the arena, something on in the park, which then obviously affects journeys either through extra passengers or extra other traffic which all affects journey times, then we have emergency incidents breakdowns, mr white van man who will stop in a lane meaning a bus has to wait 30secs-60secs to get past, or taxi driver, or parkings at schools. It is unfair of TGM to expect an operator to have accuracy so well for every single journey and then give them 5 minute layover, then moan when they are late! Especially on long journeys like 130 which is 2 hours long nearly. The only way around it would be to vastly over estimate journeys and give each one 2.5 hours instead which then results in stopping at timing points...but then what if something happens in the city centre and its been on time all the way there, then gets held up for 5 minutes but has no recovery time then. Absolute joke that TFGM

Or of course allocate 'slot' time according to frequency. I would suggest protecting the reliability of a low frequency service, is more important than a high frequency one, or does that fall in (for TfGM anyway) the too difficult box.

[Brickmill]

RE: Arriva North West - Winsford Depot

(16/12/2017 09:28)dca529x Wrote:  Or of course allocate 'slot' time according to frequency. I would suggest protecting the reliability of a low frequency service, is more important than a high frequency one, or does that fall in (for TfGM anyway) the too difficult box.

It falls in the "too difficult" box for three reasons in this instance:

1. As I've said, the 130 runs to/from Parker Street - which is subject to TROs laid down by the City Council, same as services terminating elsewhere round Piccadilly Gardens, Major Street (eg Transdev services) and Albert Square. Albeit, Parker Street is managed on a day to day basis by TFGM and Operators' Supervisors. Mind you, by "Operators" I do, of course mean Stagecoach, as First no longer employ Supervisors (except via Twitter). I assume its impractical for Arriva to provide Supervision.

2. You would have to change policy of many years (31?) standing.

3. It would effectively mean another Operator reducing departures, which obviously they are not going to agree to do.

That said, you make a reasonable point and Bus Reform *might* give the oppurtunity to overhaul the whole system in this regard.

[Brickmill]

RE: Arriva North West - Winsford Depot

(16/12/2017 04:30)mr t Wrote:  Spot on, absolutely every journey is different every day and every week, this is what passengers and PTEs do not understand, It is impossible to predict 100% accurate. Yes there is the "average journey" during lunchtimes, evenings and early mornings, but each week could be affected by bank holiday, football match, bingo nights on, school parents evenings, school shows/meetings, sponataneous roadworks that always spring up unannounced, something in town on, something at the arena, something on in the park, which then obviously affects journeys either through extra passengers or extra other traffic which all affects journey times, then we have emergency incidents breakdowns, mr white van man who will stop in a lane meaning a bus has to wait 30secs-60secs to get past, or taxi driver, or parkings at schools. It is unfair of TGM to expect an operator to have accuracy so well for every single journey and then give them 5 minute layover, then moan when they are late! Especially on long journeys like 130 which is 2 hours long nearly. The only way around it would be to vastly over estimate journeys and give each one 2.5 hours instead which then results in stopping at timing points...but then what if something happens in the city centre and its been on time all the way there, then gets held up for 5 minutes but has no recovery time then. Absolute joke that TFGM

As I've said elsewhere, in the case of the 130, Parker Street is controlled by Manchester City Council TROs not TFGM slot restrictions - albeit TFGM would do something similar. It might also be worth remembering that 130 is one of the longest surviving services wholly or partly in GM. Rightly or wrongly, Stagecoach and Arriva have "bitten the bullet" and truncated or even withdrawn such services eg. the 22 and 32, because they now its impractical with all the imponderables you mention above (though I'm not sure what bank holidays have to do with it, as they have a seperate schedule).
Trouble is, amongst your hyperbolic criticism of the system, you don't suggest a practical solution, other than inferring 130s should be allowed to park on the stop for considerably more than 8 minutes every hour.

[dca529x]

RE: Arriva North West - Winsford Depot

(16/12/2017 16:56)Brickmill Wrote:  As I've said elsewhere, in the case of the 130, Parker Street is controlled by Manchester City Council TROs not TFGM slot restrictions - albeit TFGM would do something similar. It might also be worth remembering that 130 is one of the longest surviving services wholly or partly in GM. Rightly or wrongly, Stagecoach and Arriva have "bitten the bullet" and truncated or even withdrawn such services eg. the 22 and 32, because they now its impractical with all the imponderables you mention above (though I'm not sure what bank holidays have to do with it, as they have a seperate schedule).
Trouble is, amongst your hyperbolic criticism of the system, you don't suggest a practical solution, other than inferring 130s should be allowed to park on the stop for considerably more than 8 minutes every hour.

There is a solution, cut it back to Parrs Wood. Is there really a need for it to go into the City Centre ?. Is cross East Didsbury traffic that high ?. From my obs, no its not. Onward services are plentiful Northern Rail, Metrolink, Magic Bus, First or along Kingsway the not infrequent 50. Having said that though, why should it ?. Just because restrictions are in force by whoever, because they are long standing, it doesn't make them right or fit for todays operation conditions. The failure still remains with those who seem to think they are appropriate. The one size fits all approach, doesn't work and its not helped by the operator who seems content with it.

[Brickmill]

RE: Arriva North West - Winsford Depot

(16/12/2017 19:44)dca529x Wrote:  There is a solution, cut it back to Parrs Wood. Is there really a need for it to go into the City Centre ?. Is cross East Didsbury traffic that high ?. From my obs, no its not. Onward services are plentiful Northern Rail, Metrolink, Magic Bus, First or along Kingsway the not infrequent 50. Having said that though, why should it ?. Just because restrictions are in force by whoever, because they are long standing, it doesn't make them right or fit for todays operation conditions. The failure still remains with those who seem to think they are appropriate. The one size fits all approach, doesn't work and its not helped by the operator who seems content with it.

But you've still not said who (as in which service) should make way for the extra stand time of the 130.

I didn't want to make the "obvious" suggestion of running to Parrs Wood only, as I have no knowledge of cross Didsbury patronage, nor where north of Parrs Wood people are travelling to/from. The only slight thing I would say is that the 50 does not serve Piccadilly, so that would leave Kingsway/UBS (and specifically the back of MRI) without a link to Piccadilly Gardens.