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35 Minute Frequency

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Tetchytyke

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if I was a regular user of such a bus route I know I'd almost certainly prefer the extra journeys

Regular users learn the timetable regardless of the frequency. It's the less frequent users who get put off by random timings, as it makes it more likely to just miss a bus. A 35 minute headway is just bizarre.
 
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Bwsbro

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Arriva have announced some bus service changes in North Wales from the end of January.

Perhaps the most puzzling is the introduction of a 35 minute frequency on route 13 between Llandudno and Prestatyn! Not a cat in hells chance of remembering when the buses run, you need a smartphone with you.

Are there any other silly non clockface frequencies that anyone can think of?

Other changes include:
Virtually all daytime Arriva buses will no longer operate via Llandudno Junction Station, perhaps now that Arriva are not running the Welsh trains they are less interested in rail/bus integration?

Route X5 Llandudno to Bangor all Sunday buses withdrawn.

Route 5 will still operate hourly, but no doubt in the summer will be full and standing, leaving passengers behind and thereby be running late!


The 13 was already confusing to passengers on a 40 minute frequency, moving to every 35 is even more strange. Once again Arriva are introducing more lettered services with evening journeys via Llysfaen operating as 13L

Regarding the X5.

From the 27th of Jan, the X5 will no longer server Dwygyfylchgi & Abergwyngregyn. But will operate through to West Shore in Llandudno as partial replacement for the 12 which stopped serving West Shore last year.

The first 5 X5 Services from Bangor & first two from Llandudno & all Sunday X5 will now operate as Service 5D operating to the X5 route via Deganwy. These journeys will operate via Dwygyfylchgi & Abergwyngregyn
 

Deerfold

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A counter argument would run something like this. If a route ran between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. from one terminus, that's 13 journeys at 45 minute intervals as against 10 at 60 min intervals with the same crew resources i.e. a more productive use of the driver's time, and the possibility, on the face of it, of an extra 30% in fare revenue, which could be crucial for profitability. That alone could overrule the perceived desirability to some passengers of a clockface hourly service: actually, if I was a regular user of such a bus route I know I'd almost certainly prefer the extra journeys.

The X58 mentioned before runs every 70 minutes. It shares a large part of its route with the hourly First-run 560.
This means that at certain times of the day the routes are close to opposite sides of the clockface. Whenever I'm going for one they seem to be within 10 mins of one another with an hour gap each side.

I'm sure this most contribute to putting people off buses even more than contacting subsidised services out to different operators did (when Yorkshire Tiger won assorted local contracts they registered the 528 (now X58) commercially and First deregistered theirs. However First continued to run the other main road service Ripponden to Halifax.

It went from an unchanged hourly timetable for 15 years to changes at least 3 times a year.
 
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Statto

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The 13 was already confusing to passengers on a 40 minute frequency, moving to every 35 is even more strange. Once again Arriva are introducing more lettered services with evening journeys via Llysfaen operating as 13L

Regarding the X5.

From the 27th of Jan, the X5 will no longer server Dwygyfylchgi & Abergwyngregyn. But will operate through to West Shore in Llandudno as partial replacement for the 12 which stopped serving West Shore last year.

The first 5 X5 Services from Bangor & first two from Llandudno & all Sunday X5 will now operate as Service 5D operating to the X5 route via Deganwy. These journeys will operate via Dwygyfylchgi & Abergwyngregyn

The 5, X5 could really do with deckers, these can often be standing room only especially in summer, but main problem with that though are the low height castle walls in Conway.
 

nw1

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London has recently seen the reintroduction of non-clockface times to some services, as a result of economies and congestion. TfL routes are classed as frequent where there’s at least 5 buses per hour (14 minute Headway minimum). There’s now examples of services running every 15/16 mins. , 21 minutes etc. Londonbusroutes.net has the details.
Nationwide, It’s also become more common for times to be non clockface during the contra peaks or peaks, the idea being to give extra running or recovery time to allow for congestion . It also means that the PVR (Peak Vehicle Requirement) doesn’t rise and therefore cost neutral.

And that is the problem of the current philosophy of how to run peak bus services.

I accept congestion will more or less enforce a deviation away from the normal 'off peak' clockface pattern, as it will take longer to travel the route, but due to the dictat that you should not deploy additional vehicles for peak use only, it means that the frequency during the peaks actually _reduces_; the complete opposite of what should happen in a demand-driven service. For example, Bluestar 1 Winchester to Southampton, every 15 mins off peak, 20 to 25 minute gaps at the height of the morning peak (and those buses are unreliable having travelled all the way from Winchester... we really need some additional short journeys covering the Southampton end of the route only during the peak!) Then as soon as the morning peak is over, there are two buses within 10 mins of each other as reducing congestion causes journeys to catch up with each other!

It is a shame that we do not have a government that believes in public transport and can subsidise bus companies to buy additional vehicles to at least allow the off peak frequency to be maintained during the peaks on these kinds of busy commuter routes.
 
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nw1

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A general observation here. Although clockface intervals are desirable if at all possible, it is far better to have a bus every 35, or even every 38 or whatever, minutes if the service can continue to operate commercially on that frequency than to introduce an extra bus in order to achieve a 30 minute frequency and then the route gets withdrawn as loss-making. There are some 'purists' on here who'd disagree with that, but they are what I'd describe as 'armchair purists' i.e. not out there using the services concerned.

.. although presumably with more imaginative diagramming and sharing vehicles between routes, they could probably still achieve clockface with a relatively minimal number of vehicles. Part of the problem seems to be down to the insistence of keeping one vehicle on one route these days; something less rigorously adhered to in the 80s and 90s. I remember living on an Alder Valley route (end-to-end about 1h30, I think; hourly clockface most of the day) in the 80s and most hourly journeys were run with a completely different vehicle, with only a small number instances where the same vehicle would do two journeys on that route during the course of the day. The timing on that route meant that three buses was a non starter but four would involve long layovers, so cleverer diagramming was used. The interworking of that route with other routes was such that those buses that did return would do so 6 hours later and in even hours only, but due to school variations, the need for busy journeys to be double-deck when most were single-deck, etc, that only happened about twice a day.
 
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TheGrandWazoo

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The 5, X5 could really do with deckers, these can often be standing room only especially in summer, but main problem with that though are the low height castle walls in Conway.

Back in the day, the 5 was operated by deckers (remember being on VRs and doing it) - has the route changed to preclude deckers now?

There's the instance of two Somerset services that were both hourly until 2018 running Taunton - Somerton - Yeovil and Wells - Somerton - Yeovil, combining to provide a half hourly frequency from Somerton to Yeovil. Both are now every 90 mins so it's sort of every 45 mins... Looking at it now, the next ones are 1448, 1532, 1618, 1702
 

krus_aragon

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In the case of the number 13 service in Llandudno, on the existing 40-minute interval the bus arriving at Llandudno would work the next service back again. From a glance at the new 35-minute timetable, this appears to no longer be the case. Are they interworking with other services at Llandudno? (Not that anything else in the area operates at a 35-minute interval...)
 

tbtc

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And that is the problem of the current philosophy of how to run peak bus services.

I accept congestion will more or less enforce a deviation away from the normal 'off peak' clockface pattern, as it will take longer to travel the route, but due to the dictat that you should not deploy additional vehicles for peak use only, it means that the frequency during the peaks actually _reduces_; the complete opposite of what should happen in a demand-driven service. For example, Bluestar 1 Winchester to Southampton, every 15 mins off peak, 20 to 25 minute gaps at the height of the morning peak (and those buses are unreliable having travelled all the way from Winchester... we really need some additional short journeys covering the Southampton end of the route only during the peak!) Then as soon as the morning peak is over, there are two buses within 10 mins of each other as reducing congestion causes journeys to catch up with each other!

It is a shame that we do not have a government that believes in public transport and can subsidise bus companies to buy additional vehicles to at least allow the off peak frequency to be maintained during the peaks on these kinds of busy commuter routes.

I agree that it's not great for passengers wanting a simple timetable, but what are the realistic options?

Employ a driver for an hour or two a day (and keep one extra bus in your fleet to allow that additional service to run)?

Bus companies struggle to find drivers to work full time, so asking one to commit to earn just an hour or two's wages a day is going to be a huge struggle.

In the low floor world we are now in, we don't have huge stocks of ancient buses sat around that can be pressed into serve for the sake of such marginal use - fleets are tightly managed - so any additional resource means finding monies to cover an asset still worth tens of thousands of pounds for the sake of an additional journey (or two).

I accept that there's a problem (with reduced frequency at the busiest time of day) but not convinced that there's any simple problem. Of all the Government spending priorities, buses are quite low down the list... and even if the Government had a pot of money to throw at the subsidising the bus industry, I'm not sure that this would be a great use of it (when you consider that villages are losing their entire services etc, as economics bite).
 

nw1

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I agree that it's not great for passengers wanting a simple timetable, but what are the realistic options?

Employ a driver for an hour or two a day (and keep one extra bus in your fleet to allow that additional service to run)?

Bus companies struggle to find drivers to work full time, so asking one to commit to earn just an hour or two's wages a day is going to be a huge struggle.

In the low floor world we are now in, we don't have huge stocks of ancient buses sat around that can be pressed into serve for the sake of such marginal use - fleets are tightly managed - so any additional resource means finding monies to cover an asset still worth tens of thousands of pounds for the sake of an additional journey (or two).

I accept that there's a problem (with reduced frequency at the busiest time of day) but not convinced that there's any simple problem. Of all the Government spending priorities, buses are quite low down the list... and even if the Government had a pot of money to throw at the subsidising the bus industry, I'm not sure that this would be a great use of it (when you consider that villages are losing their entire services etc, as economics bite).

I appreciate it costs money but as a first-world country it's surely something we can afford; I think it's simply a case that in the UK (and maybe increasingly in other countries too) we don't see PT as the priority it ought to be these days. I agree that preserving rural services should be given particular priority but the real question is: if we could afford to run a non cut-down peak service _and_ run those rural services in say 1995, why can't we now? I also remember through visits to the USA (not exactly the most PT-enthusiastic country) in 2002-2011, those areas I visited (metro Denver and LA) which had decent PT did see an increase in bus frequency in the peak. Admittedly these were public sector services, but I'm not suggesting the bus companies to fork out more of their profits, just for government to provide more subsidy.

Regarding the driver and bus usage, it would help a great deal (and help overall reliability too) if both vehicles and drivers had a slacker schedule (as was certainly the case with vehicles in the 'old days', not so sure about drivers), which could then be tightened up in the peaks (only) minimising the requirement for peak extras.

I appreciate this is never going to happen unless we see a radical change in political priorities, but it would be nice...
 
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Tetchytyke

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I agree that it's not great for passengers wanting a simple timetable, but what are the realistic options?

Split-shift working isn't ideal, but the major bus companies all make plenty of money from schools traffic. Which is perhaps the problem: the buses that would be used in the morning peak for commuters are actually ferrying children about.

That said, clever timetabling can work. Stagecoach used to maintain peak headways at the same PVR by increasing running time during the peaks, with the shoulder peak frequency dropping to allow everything to catch up. They originally did it very bluntly by dropping some runs but now they just gently increase the headway by a couple of minutes for a short period. It's similar to why Go's 4 service has an 11-minute off peak headway.
 

Bletchleyite

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It is a shame that we do not have a government that believes in public transport and can subsidise bus companies to buy additional vehicles to at least allow the off peak frequency to be maintained during the peaks on these kinds of busy commuter routes.

In a sensible world those extra vehicles and drivers would be used to maintain peak frequency then put on off-peak "shopper" type services around estates and villages not justifying a full service.
 

Busaholic

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.. although presumably with more imaginative diagramming and sharing vehicles between routes, they could probably still achieve clockface with a relatively minimal number of vehicles. Part of the problem seems to be down to the insistence of keeping one vehicle on one route these days; something less rigorously adhered to in the 80s and 90s. I remember living on an Alder Valley route (end-to-end about 1h30, I think; hourly clockface most of the day) in the 80s and most hourly journeys were run with a completely different vehicle, with only a small number instances where the same vehicle would do two journeys on that route during the course of the day. The timing on that route meant that three buses was a non starter but four would involve long layovers, so cleverer diagramming was used. The interworking of that route with other routes was such that those buses that did return would do so 6 hours later and in even hours only, but due to school variations, the need for busy journeys to be double-deck when most were single-deck, etc, that only happened about twice a day.
I grew up with London buses, on which that sort of arrangement was a complete non-starter (A) because the TGWU would never allow such a thing and (B) because, even if they did a complete volte-face, management would have regarded it as unsatisfactory in many aspects. I do, however, recollect my first encounter with the nationalised Western National in Minehead when working there during the summers of 1966/7 and the arrangements for their two 'trunk' services, the 215 to Bridgwater and the 218 to Taunton. Minehead depot was then still open and provided two of the three buses used on these jointly-compiled services, each running every two hours during the day, with a clockface hourly service from Minehead to the point where the routes split (forgive me, I can't remember exactly where after fifty years!) This splitting point was very significant, because buses from Taunton were timed to connect into buses to Bridgwater, and vice versa, and IIRC you sometimes had to physically change bus too if you were coming from Minehead in order to get to the destination on your original bus. Thus I believe only the two Minehead allocated buses ever worked into Minehead Bus Station/Depot during this period, one being a short Lodekka (LS) and the other a long Lodekka, with front entrance, a FLF. British Railways still maintained a Taunton to Minehead branch service then, which was used by the sensible plus myself! Anyway, it was an ingenious (I thought) way to avoid using an extra bus and you could never tell whether you were going to get the FS or Flf, both VERY foreign buses to a Londoner!
 

nw1

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Split-shift working isn't ideal, but the major bus companies all make plenty of money from schools traffic. Which is perhaps the problem: the buses that would be used in the morning peak for commuters are actually ferrying children about.

That said, clever timetabling can work. Stagecoach used to maintain peak headways at the same PVR by increasing running time during the peaks, with the shoulder peak frequency dropping to allow everything to catch up. They originally did it very bluntly by dropping some runs but now they just gently increase the headway by a couple of minutes for a short period. It's similar to why Go's 4 service has an 11-minute off peak headway.

The 'school journeys' thing is an interesting one. School journeys are very necessary of course but the timing of the school day (8.45 - 3.30pm or 4pm, at least it was in my day, I presume it's similar now) means that you could actually provide _evening_ peak extras using buses used for school traffic, but not morning peak.

A school bus finishing its school journey at say 4.30pm could then work empty to the local bus station to produce an additional peak working between 5 and 6pm, and if all the school buses did this, you could have quite a few evening peak extras!

In the morning such an arrangement is of course impossible because work and school begin at around the same time of day. Perhaps morning peak extras could be produced by operating a very minimal contra-peak flow service and running the morning peak extras empty to the 'country' end of the route once they reach the major town, so they can get back in time for a regular off-peak service?
 

nw1

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In a sensible world those extra vehicles and drivers would be used to maintain peak frequency then put on off-peak "shopper" type services around estates and villages not justifying a full service.

This certainly happened a lot in the past. I remember superficially-bizarre but really quite sensible anomalies like double-deckers being used for certain journeys on the old 502 Haslemere town service (late 80s); most were run with minibuses but some of the estates had some additional morning and afternoon shopper services. These double deckers (Hindhead depot based) were used for Alton College journeys in the peak.

Perhaps a variation on the theme, to avoid school double-deckers plying country lanes, would be to use the school double-deckers on _busy_ routes when not required for school traffic, and divert single deckers (perhaps more suited to country routes) from the busy route onto these country services.

At this time (this was actually post-privatisation, just) the diagramming of Hindhead depot seemed to be cleverly designed to ensure double-deckers (the depot had about 20 Nationals and 10 VRs) were on all the busy school and college journeys, which often meant vehicles had to be swapped; at some points in the day you had one bus come into Haslemere and terminate, go back up to Hindhead empty, and its return journey arrive from Hindhead empty and work on.
 

nw1

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I grew up with London buses, on which that sort of arrangement was a complete non-starter (A) because the TGWU would never allow such a thing and (B) because, even if they did a complete volte-face, management would have regarded it as unsatisfactory in many aspects. I do, however, recollect my first encounter with the nationalised Western National in Minehead when working there during the summers of 1966/7 and the arrangements for their two 'trunk' services, the 215 to Bridgwater and the 218 to Taunton. Minehead depot was then still open and provided two of the three buses used on these jointly-compiled services, each running every two hours during the day, with a clockface hourly service from Minehead to the point where the routes split (forgive me, I can't remember exactly where after fifty years!) This splitting point was very significant, because buses from Taunton were timed to connect into buses to Bridgwater, and vice versa, and IIRC you sometimes had to physically change bus too if you were coming from Minehead in order to get to the destination on your original bus. Thus I believe only the two Minehead allocated buses ever worked into Minehead Bus Station/Depot during this period, one being a short Lodekka (LS) and the other a long Lodekka, with front entrance, a FLF. British Railways still maintained a Taunton to Minehead branch service then, which was used by the sensible plus myself! Anyway, it was an ingenious (I thought) way to avoid using an extra bus and you could never tell whether you were going to get the FS or Flf, both VERY foreign buses to a Londoner!

I remember even in the 90s some journeys on the old Wilts and Dorset 5 (Salisbury to Swindon) were marked with a 'Please change vehicles at Pewsey' note; presumably something to do with ensuring drivers didn't have an excessively long shift.
 

carlberry

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I remember even in the 90s some journeys on the old Wilts and Dorset 5 (Salisbury to Swindon) were marked with a 'Please change vehicles at Pewsey' note; presumably something to do with ensuring drivers didn't have an excessively long shift.
This would be because of the need to return each bus to it's home depot. The operational need overriding the needs of the passengers that were turfed out of the bus. Even more of an issue if the 'other' bus is significantly late or dosent operate
 

Cesarcollie

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Split-shift working isn't ideal, but the major bus companies all make plenty of money from schools traffic. Which is perhaps the problem: the buses that would be used in the morning peak for commuters are actually ferrying children about.

That said, clever timetabling can work. Stagecoach used to maintain peak headways at the same PVR by increasing running time during the peaks, with the shoulder peak frequency dropping to allow everything to catch up. They originally did it very bluntly by dropping some runs but now they just gently increase the headway by a couple of minutes for a short period. It's similar to why Go's 4 service has an 11-minute off peak headway.

‘The major bus companies all make plenty of money from schools traffic’? Sadly not true in most cases nowadays. The requirement for extra and/or bigger buses for an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening, 39 weeks a year, and extra drivers too for extra buses, with no profitable opportunity for their use during the day, means such traffic is often actually a cost not a profit. This is made worse by the tradition/expectation that schoolchildren should pay a half, or reduced, fare. To take a random example - a child return fare of £3 per day x 50 students = £150. That will most certainly not cover the cost of a bus and driver!
 

Tetchytyke

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The major bus companies all make plenty of money from schools traffic’? Sadly not true in most cases nowadays. The requirement for extra and/or bigger buses for an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening, 39 weeks a year, and extra drivers too for extra buses, with no profitable opportunity for their use during the day, means such traffic is often actually a cost not a profit.

Around here it can't be too bad, Go run some schools services commercially and Stagecoach are back running Nexus-supported schools services as far out as North Shields. Must be some benefit
 

Busaholic

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I can see that an hourly frequency is preferable to a 52 minute one, say, but I really wouldn't complain if an hourly one became every 35 minutes, rather than half hourly. I would, however, feel peeved if a 35 minute one became hourly! A lot longer to wait if you just missed one.
 

spargazer

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Dwygyfylchi, going back many many years, the mid 50s, a small bus use to go to this village from Penmaenmawr, it was dark green, had a long bonnet (Bedford?) and was a bit unreliable, and underpowered, also it was only two or three times a day; if that. The driver/owner was Mr Kimber who lived in Trafford, nr Manchester. Does anyone have any further information please.
 
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700007

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TfL Route 362 between King George Hospital in Goodmayes and Grange Hill tube station has that weird every 35 minute frequency the OP is speaking of.

And for many years I think the 395 between Harrow and Greenford, Westway Cross had a frequency of one bus after every 22 minutes although I believe with the incorporation of an extra bus a couple years back it is now a flat every 20 minutes.

For the more high frequency routes, 260 between Golders Green and White City and the 75 between Lewisham and Croydon Fairfield Halls both operate at a weird every 13-14 minute frequency.
 

Busaholic

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TfL Route 362 between King George Hospital in Goodmayes and Grange Hill tube station has that weird every 35 minute frequency the OP is speaking of.

And for many years I think the 395 between Harrow and Greenford, Westway Cross had a frequency of one bus after every 22 minutes although I believe with the incorporation of an extra bus a couple years back it is now a flat every 20 minutes.

For the more high frequency routes, 260 between Golders Green and White City and the 75 between Lewisham and Croydon Fairfield Halls both operate at a weird every 13-14 minute frequency.
In that N.W. London area, when the 112 was converted to opo its frequency on Saturdays was 21-24 minutes, but on Sundays had the highly memorable headway of 42 minutes, although it did get it up to 30 minutes in the afternoon. I can imagine just missing a bus and hanging around for another 41 minutes by the side of the North Circular: enough to put some off bus travel for life!
 

Darklord8899

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Lothian service 63 (council tender) runs every 40 mins (Mon to Fri, every 60 mins Sat/Sun)
Also on a Sat/Sun they leave Queensferry at xx:01 - very precise! :lol:
 

philthetube

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TfL Route 362 between King George Hospital in Goodmayes and Grange Hill tube station has that weird every 35 minute frequency the OP is speaking of.

And for many years I think the 395 between Harrow and Greenford, Westway Cross had a frequency of one bus after every 22 minutes although I believe with the incorporation of an extra bus a couple years back it is now a flat every 20 minutes.

For the more high frequency routes, 260 between Golders Green and White City and the 75 between Lewisham and Croydon Fairfield Halls both operate at a weird every 13-14 minute frequency.
Not sure if this is still the case but London buses used to slightly understate frequencies so, for example the 13/14 might mean 12. The less frequent examples here would, presumably, run to a published timetable.
 

Busaholic

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Not sure if this is still the case but London buses used to slightly understate frequencies so, for example the 13/14 might mean 12. The less frequent examples here would, presumably, run to a published timetable.
No longer the case: every route, even the most frequent, runs to a published timetable. Having been a scheduler for LT I would say that 13/14 minutes being 12 occasionally would almost certainly be at 'shoulder' times when running times began to increase or decrease or, alternatively, when an extra bus gets inserted .
 

Llandudno

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Arriva have just announced the end of the short lived 35 minute frequency on route 13 between Llandudno and Prestatyn. From the end of July the service will revert back to a 40 minute headway.

Of course, on certain sections of the route, buses will still operate in pairs, as frequencies on other sections of the route are either every 30 minutes or every hour, so bunching occurs.

Then after a large gap in service without a bus, the first bus comes along and gets slowed down by an increased amount of (mainly OAPs) passengers which then cause knock on delays.

Perhaps if Arriva won’t fund a 30 minute service on route 13 (they have never even tried it) they may be better operating every 60 minutes but with trying to coordinate the timetable with other services.
The busiest section between Llandudno and Old Colwyn could perhaps be augmented to every 30 minutes to operate opposite the X5.
 

Andyh82

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I think i'd prefer a service every 40 mins than hourly. Yes you need a timetable, but thats better than knowing its only hourly.
 
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