Selwyns

[Liamkennedy2231]

RE: Selwyns

(03/11/2020 22:03)Mrboo Wrote:  Funding / bailout / tender it all the same it all bus subsidy to put a bus on a route at a set time that can`t be run as Commercial service. Am sure in many cases if money was not given some routes would still happen as other Commercial company would jump on the route so market leaders would not let this happen. but my point is money is being given to off set most of the passenger numbers lost. also,, some companies are picking up more school services. and PTE has money pots for things like tickets issues kit and they charge for them so not free. each pot would be spent on it planned for. How many Commercial routes been put to tender since covert for PTE / councils has to fund?

'Money pots' isn't the right phrase, as local authorities realistically don't have enough funding to go around. Sure, investments have been made in the past for new ETMs, but this was done in the knowledge that the increased sales made possible by contactless payment would make up for the cost. At the moment because of the current crisis, funding is provided taking into account whether it really needs to be spent, and whether it would have a detrimental impact on customers. All the current temporary PTE takeovers/dupes have been implemented for good reason. School services are provided in a bid to reduce Covid transmission. Commercial routes like the 500 serve communities where this is the only service available to them, so to keep Otterspool/Brunswick connected, Merseytravel has had to step in and is constantly reviewing provisions to see if costs can be lowered, as they don't have the funds to keep running a full timetable for a service where there may only be one passenger for the entire journey. When Merseytravel have all this going on, I think providing new ticket machines for a service that may be axed/severely reduced in a few days is at the bottom of their to-do list.