It's nothing to do with Boris, the 507 and 521 have gone because they're not needed anymore, even before covid loadings have been in steady decline especially from the London Bridge end of the 521 since City Thameslink opened. I don't understand why you think they were the most successful rebrand since WW2 either, the Red Arrow branding was almost irrelevant and was hardly used outside enthusiasts circles anyway.
I'm sure I have heard people talking about catching the Red Arrow, rather than the 507 etc.
I think so because it was so! Far from 'hardly being used outside enthusiasts circles' the name was wrongly applied by the media to other operations like suburban flat fare opo schemes, was copied by other bus companies up and down the country and featured in tourist literature almost as much as the Routemaster, Perhaps you can suggest a more worthy candidate. I wait with unbated breath,
Of course you have!
A more worthy candidate for what exactly? The Red Arrow network was great 50 years ago but things have changed considerably since then.
Leaving aside covid and the reluctance of some office workers to return to their desks, I'd suggest TfL's deliberate policy to discourage vehicular traffic . prioritise cyclists over other road users and generally mess around with historic thoroughfares and junctions has put off many previous bus users who have an alternative. Bank Junction works and their effect on surrounding traffic will have dissuaded many previous 521 users from London Bridge. The 507 will have suffered from all those civil servants 'working from home' with such positive benefits to us all.
Pretty much concur.Leaving aside covid and the reluctance of some office workers to return to their desks, I'd suggest TfL's deliberate policy to discourage vehicular traffic . prioritise cyclists over other road users and generally mess around with historic thoroughfares and junctions has put off many previous bus users who have an alternative. Bank Junction works and their effect on surrounding traffic will have dissuaded many previous 521 users from London Bridge. The 507 will have suffered from all those civil servants 'working from home' with such positive benefits to us all.
Which stop was this? All the stops down the South Norwood Hill with bus shelters had the roundel
The first part of your first sentence and your jibe in the last sentence are hardly consistent. Oh, and as one of those much maligned civil servants l can only work in the office for an average 40% of the time because my employer chose to reduce the available office space significantly.Leaving aside covid and the reluctance of some office workers to return to their desks, I'd suggest TfL's deliberate policy to discourage vehicular traffic . prioritise cyclists over other road users and generally mess around with historic thoroughfares and junctions has put off many previous bus users who have an alternative. Bank Junction works and their effect on surrounding traffic will have dissuaded many previous 521 users from London Bridge. The 507 will have suffered from all those civil servants 'working from home' with such positive benefits to us all.
I feel your pain. I also see how many more office workers have returned in other European countries, though I can imagine their governments have rather different agendas from our own self-destructive one.
A lot has changed in 50 yearsLeaving aside covid and the reluctance of some office workers to return to their desks, I'd suggest TfL's deliberate policy to discourage vehicular traffic . prioritise cyclists over other road users and generally mess around with historic thoroughfares and junctions has put off many previous bus users who have an alternative. Bank Junction works and their effect on surrounding traffic will have dissuaded many previous 521 users from London Bridge. The 507 will have suffered from all those civil servants 'working from home' with such positive benefits to us all.
It's actually much the same across Europe and probably the world
SK - Upper Beulah Hill. Now sporting a shiny new stop!
) to solve the problem of litter blowing around street.
Yes, but London has the largest fleet of buses full stop, so that's only to be expected, no real reason to boast. So many of the cities offered in comparison also make far more use of tram lines, equally zero emitting, and generally grant public transport much more respect and investment than London now does. The first section of Paris's new tram line, the T10, opened in June. line T12 opens in December. Croydon's Tramlink, marvellous though it is. opened in 2000, its two lines (in effect) have never been added to and there are no plans for any more trams elsewhere in London. London is clutching at straws!
That's still impressive, I'd say
www.iledefrance-mobilites.fr
What definition of Paris are you using here? Paris "proper" seem to me to have a somewhat less dense bus network than London because the metro is so comprehensive. How many buses are there in the definition of Paris that you are using?
In the wider region it says here there are 10,500 buses and coaches, so that would eclipse London, although the population is somewhat more as well.
The Île-de-France Mobilités network
Au cœur du réseau de transports Franciliens, Île-de-France Mobilités fédère tous les acteurs (voyageurs, élus, constructeurs, transporteurs, gestionnaires d’infrastructures…), investit et innove pour améliorer le service rendu aux voyageurs.
Transport for London as an organisation is responsible for operating more buses than any other I believe, though the numbers being in decline recently doesn't help. Perhaps needlessly to say, the number of buses and bus routes in Paris and the Ile-de-France is increasing all the time, which reinforces my argument.
I saw recently that National Express West Midlands claimed to be the country's largest operator with 1,800 vehicles. However, that's not true. GoAhead London under the London General O licence have over 2,400 vehicles.
A high proportion of London buses are double deckers. That isn't the case in Paris. What that means for total capacity is an interesting questionIt is clear that London is a leader when it comes to electric buses, there's no doubt about that, certainly in the UK but internationally as well. The Netherlands would also be considered a leader in electric buses as they passed the 1,000 electric bus landmark in 2020. As that covers a large proportion of inter-urban routes and even rural/regional routes that seems particularly impressive to me.
I think it is still interesting to compare the number of buses in Paris and London, aside from the debate about zero emission buses. Are Londoners being short-changed compared to the Paris region? The London fleet size was mentioned as 8,643 earlier on. So that is just under 1 bus per 1,000 population. Île-de-France has a population of 12.3 million according to Wikipedia which is about 0.85 buses per 1,000 population. The discrepancy could be explained by the greater density of the metro, or by lower density in the outer areas of the Paris region compared to outer London (not sure if lower density is in fact the case - I suspect it is may not be). London's population (and therefore fleet) is artificially restricted by the Greater London boundary that doesn't include several hundred thousand people in the urban area outside the Greater London boundary. Although London's bus fleet does actually cover a fair proportion of cross-boundary routes.
Île-de-France - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
There could be many factors affecting bus provision in those regions, but without doing too much detailed analysis, it looks like that London does OK compared to Paris.
I think, respectfully, you were reading too much into my posting. I wasn't intending to insinuate my opinion into the question of the number of buses operating in London. merely suggesting the decline over the last three years or so has made it more difficult to sustain the argument that London has indubitably the largest number of buses of European cities. I can see there has been less passenger usage in Central London in particular due to a number of factors and this has caused TfL to address the problem of overbussing, particularly in the peaks. How they have chosen their solutions beyond straight frequency cuts is where I would argue.
