Helen Deborah Vecht wrote:

Joe Patrick ty ped


I seem to remember reading that during certain times, all stops operate
by request, but I can't find such information on TfL's Buses site.

But on my recent visit to London, I was observing buses at a compulsory
stop in Holborn - all Arriva buses simply sailed past the stop (yes,
those buses *Do* stop there), and all (former) Stagecoach buses did stop.

Are all stops now request stops 24Hr/day, or are some companies
enforcing the rules more strictly than others?

IME if you do not treat all bus stops as request stops all the time, you
will either miss your bus or your stop.

My partner was on a bus that did not stop as it passed the bus station
at Harrow on the Hill. He had intended to change buses there, assumed
the bus would stop and had a nasty shock & long walk.

Night Buses treat all stops as request stops anyway.


Joe - as Helen says officially speaking it's only night buses that
don't stop unrequested at compulsory stops. As Helen also says it's
always worthwhile to hail the bus/ ring the bell during the day anyway
- it's not much effort anyway! Some bus drivers do slow down for
compulsory stops but if there's no-one at said stop - or no-one looking
keen to get on, and no-one at the exit door of the bus they just carry
on.

I don't quite know how things work now that many of the night buses
that exactly follow the routes of their daytime equivalents have lost
their 'N' prefix and have instead been subsumed into 24-hour a day
routes - perhaps there's some official timescale that defines when they
should & shouldn't adhere to compulsory stops. But forget the theory -
stick out your hand/ ding the bell whatever!

The practice in some other parts of the country seems to be the
complete opposite - at least when it comes to hailing the bus at a bus
stop. In Newcastle for example no-one seemed interested in sticking
their hand out, and lo and behold the bus would stop nontheless - there
was a visual clue to the driver of people shuffling towards the kerb.
Despite a few posters up in buses trying to encourage people to stick
their hand out, on subsequent journeys I fell into line with the local
practice rather than stick out like a sore thumb! I think I've observed
a similar lack of enthusiam for hailing in other parts of the country,
though perhaps not quite as pronounced.

Who would've thought there could be so much to say about hailing a bus
- well, at least I'm getting it out of my system here rather than using
it as a sparkling (ahem) conversation topic when out with friends - I
think they'd be giving doing the real world equivalent of killfiling
me! ;-)