More Boris buses ordered
 

I see Boris has ordered another 195 Boris buses before the end of his
mayoral term:
https://www.london.gov.uk/press-rele...rthern-ireland

The press release gives the strong impression that Boris is campaigning for
votes all over the UK...

More Boris buses ordered
 

On Tue, 01 Mar 2016 22:02:22 +0000, Paul Corfield
wrote:

On Mon, 29 Feb 2016 17:11:18 -0000 (UTC), Recliner
wrote:

I see Boris has ordered another 195 Boris buses before the end of his
mayoral term:
https://www.london.gov.uk/press-rele...rthern-ireland

The press release gives the strong impression that Boris is campaigning for
votes all over the UK...

Monstrous waste of money and a particularly grotesque decision in his
final weeks in office. Let's hope whoever is Mayor next cancels the
order.

Will you get to see bendy buses on the streets of London again?

--
jhk

More Boris buses ordered
 

On Wed, 02 Mar 2016 23:27:16 +0000
Paul Corfield wrote:
On Wed, 02 Mar 2016 22:45:13 +0100, Jarle Hammen Knudsen
Will you get to see bendy buses on the streets of London again?

Doubtful and to be honest it's not important.

That depends on who you are. Bendy buses were a lot friendlier to the disabled
and people with pushchairs than any sort of double decker. Something the
europeans - and Ken Livingstone for all his other faults - seem to have grasped
but completely sailed past Boris. Or he didn't give a **** being too busy
stroking his ego creating his "legacy".

campaign) knows that too. Hence all the focus on attacking that
particular policy and deliberate vagueness about Zac Goldsmith's own
policy on fares.

Goldsmith is the definition of vague. Frankly its a **** poor show from all
the main parties. You'd think they were putting forward candidates for the
major of bognor regis, not western europes largest and richest city.

Unfortunately I think we are going to see the partial destruction of
Central London's bus network off the back of pedestrianising Oxford

Something needs to be done about Oxford street. The river of virtually empty
red buses crawling along in both directions at 10mph no matter what time of
day means something is seriously broken.

St. All the candidates support it and believe Crossrail will be some
sort of cure all. They are wrong. It has also been reported that TfL
have apparently decided that Central London is no longer a priority
for investment so what money there is will go to the suburbs and
capacity will be lost in Zone 1. Oddly I can't recall where the
public were asked if they supported this fundamental change in policy.

Suburbs? They're going beyond that. They want to hoover up some of the
services into rural kent & surrey too. Why politicians think slapping an
Overground roundal on a 375 will suddenly cure all the signal failures and
train issues is anyones guess.

--
Spud

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-02 23:27:16 +0000, Paul Corfield said:

Unfortunately I think we are going to see the partial destruction of
Central London's bus network off the back of pedestrianising Oxford
St. All the candidates support it and believe Crossrail will be some
sort of cure all. They are wrong. It has also been reported that TfL
have apparently decided that Central London is no longer a priority
for investment so what money there is will go to the suburbs and
capacity will be lost in Zone 1. Oddly I can't recall where the
public were asked if they supported this fundamental change in policy.

I'm afraid I agree with the proposal - Oxford St is at times a horrible
place to be, and it would be much nicer if it was pedestrianised. I'd
cope with a tram running up and down every 5-10 minutes, but other than
that it is the epitome of the oppressive feel of much of London caused
by the predominance of large, often aggressively-driven vehicles.
Though I'd admit that builders' lorries are far worse.

Along similar lines, I don't get the Edinburgh hate for the tram
network idea (other than its appalling project mismanagement). Princes
St is oppressive with the number of buses running up and down it at all
times of day. I like Lothian as an operator, but it really isn't
becoming of a European capital city in 2016.

I also, as you're aware, agree with the idea that the primary purpose
of buses should be to run outside central London taking people to/from
railway stations. I do accept that some parallel running is needed,
but that should be limited to where capacity on the rail network is
inadequate.

I also don't like the "first and second class" nature of bus vs Tube.
It should be one fare set for a journey on TfL, regardless of what mode
or combinations thereof are used. If that causes certain groups
economic difficulties, then a concessionary scheme for travel on the
whole network, not just buses, needs to be looked at.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-03 10:22:00 +0000, d said:

Something needs to be done about Oxford street. The river of virtually empty
red buses crawling along in both directions at 10mph no matter what time of
day means something is seriously broken.

If the buses have to stay, banning taxis and pedicabs would be a start.
The black cab is the biggest form of disruption to the bus network of
central London going. They stop where they like and cause significant
delay.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On Thu, 3 Mar 2016 10:24:28 +0000
Neil Williams wrote:
Along similar lines, I don't get the Edinburgh hate for the tram
network idea (other than its appalling project mismanagement). Princes
St is oppressive with the number of buses running up and down it at all
times of day. I like Lothian as an operator, but it really isn't
becoming of a European capital city in 2016.

The scots love to moan. Edinburgh could do with a proper metro, never mind
a tram.

I also don't like the "first and second class" nature of bus vs Tube.
It should be one fare set for a journey on TfL, regardless of what mode
or combinations thereof are used. If that causes certain groups

Which unless you start zoning the buses would mean a flat fare on the tube
which I've advocated for years.

--
Spud

More Boris buses ordered
 

On Thu, 3 Mar 2016 10:31:17 +0000
Neil Williams wrote:
On 2016-03-03 10:22:00 +0000, d said:

Something needs to be done about Oxford street. The river of virtually empty
red buses crawling along in both directions at 10mph no matter what time of
day means something is seriously broken.

If the buses have to stay, banning taxis and pedicabs would be a start.
The black cab is the biggest form of disruption to the bus network of
central London going. They stop where they like and cause significant
delay.

They certainly can be cavalier with the rules of the road. Whether they're have
a big effect on buses on oxford street I don't know. I suspect the main issue
is the sheer number of buses themselves. Far too many routes going down one
street.

--
Spud

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-03 10:53:48 +0000, d said:

They certainly can be cavalier with the rules of the road. Whether they're have
a big effect on buses on oxford street I don't know. I suspect the main issue
is the sheer number of buses themselves. Far too many routes going down one
street.

Agreed there. The other aspect of the German approach is that there
are very rarely duplications of routes.

People happily change trains on the Tube, it's normal practice, even
though they have to walk far further than between two adjacent bus
stops when they do. If we packed in the archaic practice of
deprecating the changing of buses by charging a double fare when you
do, we could design a central London bus network that complemented the
Tube and was comprehensive and simple to understand.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-03 10:52:27 +0000, d said:

Which unless you start zoning the buses would mean a flat fare on the tube
which I've advocated for years.

It'd probably be easier to flatten the Tube fares a bit than to remove
Zones entirely because of the issue of places like Amersham. But you
could go to say 3 or even 2 rather than 6 zones, which is how Hamburg
mostly was before the Verbundtarif area expanded (the new area would be
the equivalent of London fares applying throughout the South East and
thus does need more zoning).

Looking at a map I can see that having zones 1-4 as the "City Zone",
5-6 as "City Plus Zone" and 7-9 as "Country Zone" would probably do it
in terms of the number of graduations of fare actually needed.

The effect of that on buses would be negligible even if the lower of
the fares always applied for a bus-only journey, because who on earth
takes the bus from Amersham to central London?

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On Thu, 3 Mar 2016 11:26:36 +0000
Neil Williams wrote:
On 2016-03-03 10:53:48 +0000, d said:

They certainly can be cavalier with the rules of the road. Whether they're
have
a big effect on buses on oxford street I don't know. I suspect the main issue
is the sheer number of buses themselves. Far too many routes going down one
street.

Agreed there. The other aspect of the German approach is that there
are very rarely duplications of routes.

People happily change trains on the Tube, it's normal practice, even
though they have to walk far further than between two adjacent bus
stops when they do. If we packed in the archaic practice of
deprecating the changing of buses by charging a double fare when you
do, we could design a central London bus network that complemented the
Tube and was comprehensive and simple to understand.

Would be easy - though costly - to implement too. Have a touch out reader on
the bus for people wanting to interchange to a different route then have a
timeout of say 30 mins for them to get the next bus.

--
Spud

More Boris buses ordered
 

In article , d () wrote:

On Thu, 3 Mar 2016 11:26:36 +0000
Neil Williams wrote:
On 2016-03-03 10:53:48 +0000, d said:

They certainly can be cavalier with the rules of the road. Whether
they're have a big effect on buses on oxford street I don't know. I
suspect the main issue is the sheer number of buses themselves. Far too
many routes going down one street.

Agreed there. The other aspect of the German approach is that there
are very rarely duplications of routes.

People happily change trains on the Tube, it's normal practice, even
though they have to walk far further than between two adjacent bus
stops when they do. If we packed in the archaic practice of
deprecating the changing of buses by charging a double fare when you
do, we could design a central London bus network that complemented the
Tube and was comprehensive and simple to understand.

Would be easy - though costly - to implement too. Have a touch out
reader on the bus for people wanting to interchange to a different
route then have a timeout of say 30 mins for them to get the next bus.

Support Caroline Pigeon for Mayor. She's been calling for a 1 hour bus
ticket for at least 4 years. Do any other countries not have tickets which
can be transferred?

--
Colin Rosenstiel

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-03 11:48:29 +0000, d said:

Would be easy - though costly - to implement too. Have a touch out reader on
the bus for people wanting to interchange to a different route then have a
timeout of say 30 mins for them to get the next bus.

Don't even need that complexity. Just allow a second touch-in free
within, say, 1.5-2 hours of a touch in, with any further touch-in
restarting the clock. The odd person would get to do a return-half
journey for nothing, and somebody would no doubt stop a bus, touch in
and alight to restart the clock deliberately, but it would be so few
and such short journeys that the effect would be marginal.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-03 13:04:50 +0000, said:

Support Caroline Pigeon for Mayor. She's been calling for a 1 hour bus
ticket for at least 4 years. Do any other countries not have tickets which
can be transferred?

Paris, notably. But the French are hardly kings of integrated transport.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 03/03/2016 14:32, Neil Williams wrote:

On 2016-03-03 11:48:29 +0000, d said:

Would be easy - though costly - to implement too. Have a touch out
reader on the bus for people wanting to interchange to a different
route then have a timeout of say 30 mins for them to get the next
bus.

Don't even need that complexity. Just allow a second touch-in free
within, say, 1.5-2 hours of a touch in, with any further touch-in
restarting the clock. The odd person would get to do a return-half
journey for nothing, and somebody would no doubt stop a bus, touch in
and alight to restart the clock deliberately, but it would be so few and
such short journeys that the effect would be marginal.


No need for that level of complexity - you already said it, "a second
touch-in free" - i.e. one free transfer - within a time limit. No people
'restarting the clock' like that.

This 'one free transfer' already exists on Croydon Tramlink, within a 70
minute time window. It also exists between the tram and buses and v.v.
in New Addington (at the southern extremity of the tram network) - it
used to be between T-prefixed tram feeder routes (and a few others I
think) but the bus network around there was rejigged very recently so
there aren't any more T-routes, instead the free transfer is on offer
for a number of local routes...

https://tfl.gov.uk/fares-and-payments/fares/bus-and-tram

---quote---
Both pay as you go and paper single tickets cover one transfer made
between trams, or between trams and connecting bus routes 64, 130, 314,
353, 359, 433 and 464 (made within 70 minutes of touching in to pay as
you go at the start of your journey, or within 90 minutes of buying a
paper single ticket).
---/quote---


(The paper single tickets in question are those still available from
tram stop ticket machines... I wonder if the days of said machines might
be numbered though...)

However, as Paul C said earlier, TfL's budget is really tight and it's
going to remain that way for some time to come - free bus transfers
would come at a cost one way or another.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On Thu, 3 Mar 2016 14:45:58 +0000, Mizter T
wrote:


On 03/03/2016 14:32, Neil Williams wrote:

On 2016-03-03 11:48:29 +0000, d said:

Would be easy - though costly - to implement too. Have a touch out
reader on the bus for people wanting to interchange to a different
route then have a timeout of say 30 mins for them to get the next
bus.

Don't even need that complexity. Just allow a second touch-in free
within, say, 1.5-2 hours of a touch in, with any further touch-in
restarting the clock. The odd person would get to do a return-half
journey for nothing, and somebody would no doubt stop a bus, touch in
and alight to restart the clock deliberately, but it would be so few and
such short journeys that the effect would be marginal.


No need for that level of complexity - you already said it, "a second
touch-in free" - i.e. one free transfer - within a time limit. No people
'restarting the clock' like that.

This 'one free transfer' already exists on Croydon Tramlink, within a 70
minute time window. It also exists between the tram and buses and v.v.
in New Addington (at the southern extremity of the tram network) - it
used to be between T-prefixed tram feeder routes (and a few others I
think) but the bus network around there was rejigged very recently so
there aren't any more T-routes, instead the free transfer is on offer
for a number of local routes...

https://tfl.gov.uk/fares-and-payments/fares/bus-and-tram

---quote---
Both pay as you go and paper single tickets cover one transfer made
between trams, or between trams and connecting bus routes 64, 130, 314,
353, 359, 433 and 464 (made within 70 minutes of touching in to pay as
you go at the start of your journey, or within 90 minutes of buying a
paper single ticket).
---/quote---


(The paper single tickets in question are those still available from
tram stop ticket machines... I wonder if the days of said machines might
be numbered though...)

However, as Paul C said earlier, TfL's budget is really tight and it's
going to remain that way for some time to come - free bus transfers
would come at a cost one way or another.

Yup, bus fares would have to rise for everyone to cover the loss of
revenue from those taking two or more buses for their journey.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 03/03/2016 14:33, Neil Williams wrote:

On 2016-03-03 13:04:50 +0000, said:

Support Caroline Pigeon for Mayor. She's been calling for a 1 hour bus
ticket for at least 4 years. Do any other countries not have tickets
which can be transferred?

Paris, notably. But the French are hardly kings of integrated transport.


You're out of date - Paris *does* have tickets which allow bus to bus
transfer (and also bus-tram and tram-tram). It's the standard "ticket t+":
http://www.ratp.fr/fr/ratp/c_21158/ticket-t/

The time window is 1hr 30mins between first and last validation.

If however you buy a ticket on board a bus (€2, a 20 cent premium) then
it offers no transfer validity. Of course in London you can't buy a
ticket on the bus.

Elsewhere in France I've come across bus tickets which offer free
transfers, both city and longer distance Departement buses.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On Thu, 3 Mar 2016 14:45:58 +0000
Mizter T wrote:
On 03/03/2016 14:32, Neil Williams wrote:

On 2016-03-03 11:48:29 +0000, d said:

Would be easy - though costly - to implement too. Have a touch out
reader on the bus for people wanting to interchange to a different
route then have a timeout of say 30 mins for them to get the next
bus.

Don't even need that complexity. Just allow a second touch-in free
within, say, 1.5-2 hours of a touch in, with any further touch-in
restarting the clock. The odd person would get to do a return-half
journey for nothing, and somebody would no doubt stop a bus, touch in
and alight to restart the clock deliberately, but it would be so few and
such short journeys that the effect would be marginal.


No need for that level of complexity - you already said it, "a second
touch-in free" - i.e. one free transfer - within a time limit. No people
'restarting the clock' like that.

Problem with that is that some bus journeys take a long time especially in
rush hour. So if you have a simple time out based on the touch-in time then
it could be exceeded by a long bus journey + wait for next bus. However if you
make it long enough to take account of all realistic scenarios you could have
people getting to their destination, doing their shopping/whatever and then
getting a free trip home again.

--
Spud

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-03 14:45:58 +0000, Mizter T said:

No need for that level of complexity - you already said it, "a second
touch-in free" - i.e. one free transfer - within a time limit. No
people 'restarting the clock' like that.

Why only one? I can change as many times as I wish on a Tube journey.
It is not out of the question that the quickest way to do a particular
journey may be three buses (though four is heading towards the
proverbial goat herding), or Tube-bus-bus or bus-Tube-bus or whatever.

A single journey should be, like it is in Hamburg, a single journey.
No matter what you use to do it, it is one fare for a journey from
point A to point B.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-03 15:11:18 +0000, Recliner said:

Yup, bus fares would have to rise for everyone to cover the loss of
revenue from those taking two or more buses for their journey.

They would, but they would be much fairer, because people would not get
a discount for TfL providing a direct bus for their journey - or rather
people would not be penalised again for TfL not providing a direct bus
for their journey.

The current system is *incredibly* unfair. It near enough works in
small towns where most journeys are to/from the city centre on one
direct bus, and usually if your journey requires crossing the city
centre it's roughly twice as far so charging twice as much is not all
that unreasonable. London is too big for that to work.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-03 15:13:02 +0000, Mizter T said:

You're out of date - Paris *does* have tickets which allow bus to bus
transfer (and also bus-tram and tram-tram). It's the standard "ticket
t+":
http://www.ratp.fr/fr/ratp/c_21158/ticket-t/

What it doesn't do is allow bus-Metro, bus-Metro-bus or any similar options.

The point of an integrated city transport network is that you take a
journey using the modes available to you. The thing you are charged
for is the journey. It doesn't matter what modes you use.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

Neil Williams wrote:
On 2016-03-03 15:11:18 +0000, Recliner said:

Yup, bus fares would have to rise for everyone to cover the loss of
revenue from those taking two or more buses for their journey.

They would, but they would be much fairer, because people would not get
a discount for TfL providing a direct bus for their journey - or rather
people would not be penalised again for TfL not providing a direct bus
for their journey.

The current system is *incredibly* unfair. It near enough works in
small towns where most journeys are to/from the city centre on one
direct bus, and usually if your journey requires crossing the city
centre it's roughly twice as far so charging twice as much is not all
that unreasonable. London is too big for that to work.

I agree it's unfair, but that's partly balanced by lower bus fares. But to
make it fairer for some, it would have to get more expensive for others who
benefit from the current system. And, as always, the losers shout much
louder than the winners cheer (partly because the losers soon discover that
they're losing out, while the potential winners may not even be customers
yet).

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 03/03/2016 15:28, Neil Williams wrote:

On 2016-03-03 14:45:58 +0000, Mizter T said:

No need for that level of complexity - you already said it, "a second
touch-in free" - i.e. one free transfer - within a time limit. No
people 'restarting the clock' like that.

Why only one? I can change as many times as I wish on a Tube journey.
It is not out of the question that the quickest way to do a particular
journey may be three buses (though four is heading towards the
proverbial goat herding), or Tube-bus-bus or bus-Tube-bus or whatever.

No break-of-journey on the Tube though, as is possible in Hamburg.


A single journey should be, like it is in Hamburg, a single journey. No
matter what you use to do it, it is one fare for a journey from point A
to point B.

Hamburg doesn't seem to have a time limit for a single ticket, but
there's certainly a limit in other Germany cities (e.g. Berlin, Munich).

As per HVV (Hamburg):
http://www.hvv.de/en/tickets/single-day-tickets/overview/index.php

---quote---
With the single tickets you get on, change lines, get off - and back on
again! Anything goes as long as it is on the most direct route to your
destination.
Round trips and return journeys are not permitted, however.
---/quote---


Have fun trying to program that for Oyster/contactless! (Presumably it'd
have to be Oyster MkII, i.e. account based... but still, enjoy...)

More Boris buses ordered
 

On Wed, 02 Mar 2016 23:27:16 +0000, Paul Corfield
wrote:

Will you get to see bendy buses on the streets of London again?

Doubtful and to be honest it's not important.
[...]
We need to get away from an obsession with vehicle types or some
aspect of them and concentrate on adding capacity where it is needed,

The environmental aspect is pretty important! Wouldn't running bendies
generate less polution for the same passenger capacity than using
double-deckers?

--
jhk

More Boris buses ordered
 

Jarle Hammen Knudsen wrote:
On Wed, 02 Mar 2016 23:27:16 +0000, Paul Corfield
wrote:

Will you get to see bendy buses on the streets of London again?

Doubtful and to be honest it's not important.
[...]
We need to get away from an obsession with vehicle types or some
aspect of them and concentrate on adding capacity where it is needed,

The environmental aspect is pretty important! Wouldn't running bendies
generate less polution for the same passenger capacity than using
double-deckers?

Why?

More Boris buses ordered
 

"Mizter T" wrote

No break-of-journey on the Tube though, as is possible in Hamburg.

As you know, you can break your tube journey at any OSI and for DLR and
Overground at any station without barriers.

Subject to time limits for OSIs and for the entire journey.


--
Mike D

More Boris buses ordered
 

In article , d () wrote:

On Thu, 3 Mar 2016 14:45:58 +0000
Mizter T wrote:
On 03/03/2016 14:32, Neil Williams wrote:

On 2016-03-03 11:48:29 +0000, d said:

Would be easy - though costly - to implement too. Have a touch out
reader on the bus for people wanting to interchange to a different
route then have a timeout of say 30 mins for them to get the next
bus.

Don't even need that complexity. Just allow a second touch-in free
within, say, 1.5-2 hours of a touch in, with any further touch-in
restarting the clock. The odd person would get to do a return-half
journey for nothing, and somebody would no doubt stop a bus, touch in
and alight to restart the clock deliberately, but it would be so few
and such short journeys that the effect would be marginal.


No need for that level of complexity - you already said it, "a second
touch-in free" - i.e. one free transfer - within a time limit. No people
'restarting the clock' like that.

Problem with that is that some bus journeys take a long time especially in
rush hour. So if you have a simple time out based on the touch-in time
then it could be exceeded by a long bus journey + wait for next bus.
However if you make it long enough to take account of all realistic
scenarios you could have people getting to their destination, doing
their shopping/whatever and then getting a free trip home again.

Since the point is to allow simpler routing by changing buses rather than
allow people to travel further that's hardly a problem. If people want to
travel more than an hour by bus it's not unreasonable to pay more.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

More Boris buses ordered
 

In article ,
(Neil Williams) wrote:

On 2016-03-03 15:11:18 +0000, Recliner said:

Yup, bus fares would have to rise for everyone to cover the loss of
revenue from those taking two or more buses for their journey.

They would, but they would be much fairer, because people would not
get a discount for TfL providing a direct bus for their journey - or
rather people would not be penalised again for TfL not providing a
direct bus for their journey.

The current system is *incredibly* unfair. It near enough works in
small towns where most journeys are to/from the city centre on one
direct bus, and usually if your journey requires crossing the city
centre it's roughly twice as far so charging twice as much is not all
that unreasonable. London is too big for that to work.

It's just hit Cambridge where a route from the north, covering s string of
villages and the city has been cut back and no longer goes to the railway
station and hospital. There are plenty of buses its passengers can change
onto but no transfer fares unless they buy a day ticket.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

More Boris buses ordered
 

In article ,
(Neil Williams) wrote:

On 2016-03-03 14:45:58 +0000, Mizter T said:

No need for that level of complexity - you already said it, "a
second touch-in free" - i.e. one free transfer - within a time
limit. No people 'restarting the clock' like that.

Why only one? I can change as many times as I wish on a Tube
journey. It is not out of the question that the quickest way to do a
particular journey may be three buses (though four is heading towards
the proverbial goat herding), or Tube-bus-bus or bus-Tube-bus or
whatever.

A single journey should be, like it is in Hamburg, a single journey.
No matter what you use to do it, it is one fare for a journey from
point A to point B.

Hence Caroline's proposal for a one hour bus ticket. Routes could be so much
simpler if changing buses wasn't penalised.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

More Boris buses ordered
 

In article ,
(Jarle Hammen Knudsen) wrote:

On Wed, 02 Mar 2016 23:27:16 +0000, Paul Corfield
wrote:

Will you get to see bendy buses on the streets of London again?

Doubtful and to be honest it's not important.
[...]
We need to get away from an obsession with vehicle types or some
aspect of them and concentrate on adding capacity where it is needed,

The environmental aspect is pretty important! Wouldn't running bendies
generate less polution for the same passenger capacity than using
double-deckers?

Arguably any gain on the buses would be balanced against the reduction in
the numbers of cyclists transferring to more energy-consuming modes because
bendies are such a nightmare to share road space with.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-03 22:19:00 +0000, said:

Since the point is to allow simpler routing by changing buses rather than
allow people to travel further that's hardly a problem. If people want to
travel more than an hour by bus it's not unreasonable to pay more.

You've seen London traffic, right?

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

In message , at 16:19:00
on Thu, 3 Mar 2016, remarked:
Yup, bus fares would have to rise for everyone to cover the loss of
revenue from those taking two or more buses for their journey.

They would, but they would be much fairer, because people would not
get a discount for TfL providing a direct bus for their journey - or
rather people would not be penalised again for TfL not providing a
direct bus for their journey.

The current system is *incredibly* unfair. It near enough works in
small towns where most journeys are to/from the city centre on one
direct bus, and usually if your journey requires crossing the city
centre it's roughly twice as far so charging twice as much is not all
that unreasonable. London is too big for that to work.

It's just hit Cambridge where a route from the north, covering s string of
villages and the city has been cut back and no longer goes to the railway
station and hospital. There are plenty of buses its passengers can change
onto but no transfer fares unless they buy a day ticket.

But a day ticket is the same price as a return, isn't it? Are there a
lot of people making one-way trips.
--
Roland Perry

More Boris buses ordered
 

On Thu, 3 Mar 2016 17:37:24 -0000 (UTC)
Recliner wrote:
Jarle Hammen Knudsen wrote:
On Wed, 02 Mar 2016 23:27:16 +0000, Paul Corfield
wrote:

Will you get to see bendy buses on the streets of London again?

Doubtful and to be honest it's not important.
[...]
We need to get away from an obsession with vehicle types or some
aspect of them and concentrate on adding capacity where it is needed,

The environmental aspect is pretty important! Wouldn't running bendies
generate less polution for the same passenger capacity than using
double-deckers?

Why?

When both are full theres a greater number of passengers per unit mass of
the vehicle on a bendy. Hence more efficient.

--
Spud

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-04 00:49:57 +0000, Paul Corfield said:

I appreciate you're going to support her policies but depending on the
scale of discount offered for a one hour ticket you are looking at
something like £70m pa cost.

It's not a "discount", and should not be thought of like that. It is
about charging a fair fare for a journey by TfL bus, which may well
include increases for those travelling by only one bus to make it
revenue neutral.

No different to when zones were abolished for buses.

Depending on where you make that sort of change you may
well get a riot on your hands especially if older people lose through
services where today they have one. The existence of a 1 hour ticket
is irrelevant to those people.

A public transport network does not allow selfishness to prevail. It
needs to be organised and charged for for the greater good.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-04 08:03:22 +0000, Roland Perry said:

But a day ticket is the same price as a return, isn't it? Are there a
lot of people making one-way trips.

Personally, my main bus use at the moment is home to station for a
multi-day trip. For a one day trip, I will mostly cycle, but cycling
with a trolley case or large rucksack is not wonderfully practical. To
go into town I'm probably more likely to drive but may also cycle. I
don't commute when not working away because I work from home, so that
is out.

In Cambridge I would expect that effect to be even larger with the
predominance of the bicycle.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 03/03/2016 10:24, Neil Williams wrote:
On 2016-03-02 23:27:16 +0000, Paul Corfield said:

Unfortunately I think we are going to see the partial destruction of
Central London's bus network off the back of pedestrianising Oxford
St. All the candidates support it and believe Crossrail will be some
sort of cure all. They are wrong. It has also been reported that TfL
have apparently decided that Central London is no longer a priority
for investment so what money there is will go to the suburbs and
capacity will be lost in Zone 1. Oddly I can't recall where the
public were asked if they supported this fundamental change in policy.

I'm afraid I agree with the proposal - Oxford St is at times a horrible
place to be, and it would be much nicer if it was pedestrianised. I'd
cope with a tram running up and down every 5-10 minutes, but other than
that it is the epitome of the oppressive feel of much of London caused
by the predominance of large, often aggressively-driven vehicles. Though
I'd admit that builders' lorries are far worse.

Along similar lines, I don't get the Edinburgh hate for the tram network
idea (other than its appalling project mismanagement). Princes St is
oppressive with the number of buses running up and down it at all times
of day. I like Lothian as an operator, but it really isn't becoming of
a European capital city in 2016.

The implementation of Edinburgh Trams was a nightmare in the city centre
(even worse for Leith Walk as they had all the disruption of utilty
works but ended up with no tram service)

The whole thing was mired in partisan party-politics from the start -
it's political poison in Edinburgh now

We also seem to have bought the slowest trams on the planet. Compared
with trams I've experienced in Vienna, Prague, Darmstadt, Croydon and
Nottingham they tippy-toe through the city centre. This, combined with
their length (significanltly longer than say Croydon) means they can
cause a noticeable blocking and delay at junctions (although the popular
perception and reporting of this is wildly exaggerated)

Edinburgh's city centre road layout doesn't lend itself well to NOT
running almost everything along Princes Street or George Street.
The key routes into the city centre all converge at opposite ends of the
New Town. There are not many East-West and North-South through routes.
You could run more buses on George Street but I think you'd end up with
2 streets full of buses with poor interchange



I also, as you're aware, agree with the idea that the primary purpose of
buses should be to run outside central London taking people to/from
railway stations. I do accept that some parallel running is needed, but
that should be limited to where capacity on the rail network is inadequate.

I also don't like the "first and second class" nature of bus vs Tube. It
should be one fare set for a journey on TfL, regardless of what mode or
combinations thereof are used. If that causes certain groups economic
difficulties, then a concessionary scheme for travel on the whole
network, not just buses, needs to be looked at.

Neil

More Boris buses ordered
 

On Fri, 4 Mar 2016 11:23:06 +0000
Ian Cunningham wrote:
We also seem to have bought the slowest trams on the planet. Compared
with trams I've experienced in Vienna, Prague, Darmstadt, Croydon and
Nottingham they tippy-toe through the city centre. This, combined with

The "trams" (some rubber tyred guided abortion) in Clermont Ferrand in france
could probably give them a run for their money. They seem to go at barely
faster than a fast jogging pace in the outskirts then slow down to walking
pace in the city centre. Its the one city I've been to where I've thought
having buses would be a better option if only because they would do twice the
speed.

--
Spud

More Boris buses ordered
 

In article ,
(Neil Williams) wrote:

On 2016-03-03 22:19:00 +0000, said:

Since the point is to allow simpler routing by changing buses rather
than allow people to travel further that's hardly a problem. If people
want to travel more than an hour by bus it's not unreasonable to pay
more.

You've seen London traffic, right?

Since childhood in the 1950s. I was brought up in Putney and went to school
in Hammersmith. If traffic was bad enough to take me an hour to get home I
would walk, in the worst case all the way. It was quicker though wasn't like
that more than rarely.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

More Boris buses ordered
 

In article ,
(Paul Corfield) wrote:

On Thu, 03 Mar 2016 16:19:01 -0600,
wrote:

In article ,
(Neil Williams) wrote:

On 2016-03-03 14:45:58 +0000, Mizter T said:

No need for that level of complexity - you already said it, "a
second touch-in free" - i.e. one free transfer - within a time
limit. No people 'restarting the clock' like that.

Why only one? I can change as many times as I wish on a Tube
journey. It is not out of the question that the quickest way to do a
particular journey may be three buses (though four is heading towards
the proverbial goat herding), or Tube-bus-bus or bus-Tube-bus or
whatever.

A single journey should be, like it is in Hamburg, a single journey.
No matter what you use to do it, it is one fare for a journey from
point A to point B.

Hence Caroline's proposal for a one hour bus ticket. Routes could be so
much simpler if changing buses wasn't penalised.

I appreciate you're going to support her policies but depending on the
scale of discount offered for a one hour ticket you are looking at
something like £70m pa cost. That's a lot of money when the bus
budget is likely to be savaged as a result of the revenue grant going.
I am also not aware that Caroline is proposing a related restructuing
of the bus network by removing through services and enforced
interchange. Depending on where you make that sort of change you may
well get a riot on your hands especially if older people lose through
services where today they have one. The existence of a 1 hour ticket
is irrelevant to those people.

There were so many more through services in my youth. Almost all the Putney
services I knew were split into at least two years ago. The splits were
presumably done for cost reasons. So doing so without penalising passengers
financially should save money in the end.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

More Boris buses ordered
 

On 2016-03-04 11:23:06 +0000, Ian Cunningham said:

We also seem to have bought the slowest trams on the planet. Compared
with trams I've experienced in Vienna, Prague, Darmstadt, Croydon and
Nottingham they tippy-toe through the city centre. This, combined with
their length (significanltly longer than say Croydon) means they can
cause a noticeable blocking and delay at junctions (although the
popular perception and reporting of this is wildly exaggerated)

They aren't exceptionally well designed vehicles at all, in my view -
the very short sections mean few sensibly arranged seats. But that's
slightly by the by, as vehicles can be replaced or have the seating
layout changed. But the very short sections with huge amounts of
length wasted on articulations seems to be a current tram fad. Not a
sensible one in my eyes.

As for speed, the junction priorities are poorly designed; it seems
they are always given their own phase, which is mostly completely
unnecessary. And pedestrians don't get a green during that phase
either even though on two of the crossings there is no conflict.

But that doesn't say "trams are bad", that says "Edinburgh has
implemented trams incompetently". It can be fixed, and the other UK
"new-generation" tram systems seem popular and effective, by and large.

Edinburgh's city centre road layout doesn't lend itself well to NOT
running almost everything along Princes Street or George Street.
The key routes into the city centre all converge at opposite ends of
the New Town. There are not many East-West and North-South through
routes.
You could run more buses on George Street but I think you'd end up with
2 streets full of buses with poor interchange

I did actually think it was more pleasant when everything ran on George
St, not that it was perfect. (I have spent two several-month chunks of
time working in Edinburgh, once very recently and one when the debacle
was first starting out). On the other hand, the main problem is not so
much the presence of the buses, it's more the continuous noise and
diesel fumes. Once all the buses can be electric, which will be viable
in maybe 5-10 years, they won't be any more or less pleasant than
trams. Which may actually count against further tram expansion.

Neil
--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the @ to reply.

More Boris buses ordered
 

In message , at 12:21:41 on
Fri, 4 Mar 2016, Paul Corfield remarked:

We are in the same situation as prevails with the concessionary pass -
spend millions on free travel with the consequence being that support
for the actual bus services cannot be funded so services get cut /
abolished forever. That's the economics of the mad house - I suspect
users would rather keep their services even if they had to pay a bit
more to do so.

There's a rural bus service where I live that the council is proposing
to ask passengers-with-twirly-cards to pay the fare one day a week, in
order to provide enough funding to keep it running at all.

On balance, I think this sort of "voluntary" tax is the thin end of a
wedge. Next we'll be asked to pay a "voluntary" £50 to visit the GP, and
so on. I suppose this sort of thing started a long time ago with the
museums going free, and subsequently twisting people's arms for a
contribution.
--
Roland Perry