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Buses that change number or say its connection guaranteed but same vehicle.

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Olympian

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The 185 was the Gilsland short service from Carlisle, the full distance services via Gilsland ran as the 685. And as someone who used the 685 a lot, I wasn't sad to see the diversion go.
I wasn’t either, but only because it now means that double deckers can be used on the route although Arriva do seem good at using those with route branding for local services around Newcastle. Mind you I followed a 306 branded single decker on the 685 between Brampton and Carlisle a couple of weeks ago...
 
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Mwanesh

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Its not a loophole its just to make it easier to operate. If roads go bonkers for 2 days try finding drivers legal to work. Domestic rules simplify things when it comes to driver working hours. If you look at most places that do coach and service work its a challenge at times keeping track of regulations.
 

Tetchytyke

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Arriva do seem good at using those with route branding for local services around Newcastle.

Arriva never seem too bothered about the right branding on the right bus, but I've seen it mentioned the Omnicitys struggle with the distance these days. Dunno how true it is.
 

156443

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Go North East do this with the X9/X10 to eliminate the need for tachographs

X9 displays Peterlee for Middlesbrough

X10 displays Dalton Park for Middlesbrough

The same goes for the return journey back to Newcastle.
 

bobslack1982

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Before EU rules Arriva ran the Sunday Hexham short service as 85, and when the EU rules first came in they registered the Newcastle-Haydon Bridge section as 85, and onwards to Carlisle as 685, with the EU split at Haydon Bridge. Stagecoach had splits at Brampton and Hexham but ran as 685 throughout. I think Arriva were just more cautious about the fudge; the old X1 Newcastle-Middlesbrough had a split put in at Durham, also with a number change (X12 north of Durham IIRC).

I think the 685 is aligned now, but I'm not sure if Arriva do a split at Brampton (the timetable suggests so).

I’ve found the old timetable and it’s as I remembered with different service numbers and splits on the route.

https://www.arrivabus.co.uk/globala...8-685-x85-carlisle/neje85685x85_071214aps.pdf
 

Robertj21a

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As others have said, there must be hundreds of examples of these split routes. I seem to recall that Stagecoach used the 700 (when it ran through from Brighton to Southsea) as a test case, and were told it was acceptable to do such splits, provided that a clear indication for through passengers was included in the timetable.
 

TheGrandWazoo

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As others have said, there must be hundreds of examples of these split routes. I seem to recall that Stagecoach used the 700 (when it ran through from Brighton to Southsea) as a test case, and were told it was acceptable to do such splits, provided that a clear indication for through passengers was included in the timetable.

It's a bit like the "unnecessarily long route" thread where you will just get people throwing in example after example without it really adding anything to the discussion.
 

Tetchytyke

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I’ve found the old timetable and it’s as I remembered with different service numbers and splits on the route.

https://www.arrivabus.co.uk/globala...8-685-x85-carlisle/neje85685x85_071214aps.pdf

I thought you were right, including the split at Haydon Bridge, interesting to see it.

As @TheGrandWazoo says, it's probably that Arriva were more cautious about the fudge and wanted to make a clear distinction. It didn't stay like that after DfT clarification IIRC.
 

Kuyoyo

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Go North East do this with the X9/X10 to eliminate the need for tachographs

X9 displays Peterlee for Middlesbrough

X10 displays Dalton Park for Middlesbrough

The same goes for the return journey back to Newcastle.

The X10 is one of the more interesting ones as it’s split in two different locations depending on time and day. The Monday to Saturday daytime journeys are indeed split at Dalton Park, however the late evening and Sunday journeys which operate as the X10 but are a combination of the two routes, are split at Peterlee Bus Station. The bus which works the 1815 from Newcastle Monday to Saturday is the interesting journey - it’s the first one of the day that runs as an X10 in both directions , and it’s also the only trip that runs the daytime route heading for Middlesbrough but returns via the evening route.
 

Kuyoyo

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It's a relatively new change though, coinciding with the new Gemini 3s , it ran under EU rules for a long time.

Despite the new B5TL/Gemini 3s actually being fitted with tachographs - hence photographs appearing of them in Edinburgh, Whitby and York on private hire work.
 

Failed Unit

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Could someone explain to me what these rules actually are as I don't get it to be honest.

If I take a local route to me Lincoln - Skegness the journey time is about 1h45 so well within the driving limits of a single driver. Has this rule forced the driver to get off at Horncastle (in this case) and return to Lincoln. So they are probably doing the same amount of driving but with a break?

My simple brain seems to just think of this as passenger unfriendly as having "Skegness" as the destination is a lot more use then "Horncastle and onwards to Skegness"

but that could be just me,
 

SeveerYeliab

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Randomly in East Kent the 10 displays

HYTHE
(For Folkestone)

However the timetable doesn’t mention anything about this and the display doesn’t say this on the way back.

There also seems to be a blind just displaying

Sellindge hythe
Folkestone


So I’m not sure what’s happening there
 

Simon75

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Arriva 64/164 Hanley to Shrewsbury (Shrewsbury garage) 25 miles (52km,)
Shrewsbury to Market Drayton 164 , Market Drayton to Hanley 64, was X64 a few years back, also was jointly run by PMT
 

peterblue

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A more interesting question, instead of naming all examples, would be to find the bus route that has the most connections. Scotland seems like the obvious place to look to start with, and I found a few examples with 4 connections, and I also found one journey on the X99 Inverness to the Far North, departing Inverness at 0850 arriving Thurso 1302 with 5 connections
 

njlawley

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Could someone explain to me what these rules actually are as I don't get it to be honest.

If I take a local route to me Lincoln - Skegness the journey time is about 1h45 so well within the driving limits of a single driver. Has this rule forced the driver to get off at Horncastle (in this case) and return to Lincoln. So they are probably doing the same amount of driving but with a break?

My simple brain seems to just think of this as passenger unfriendly as having "Skegness" as the destination is a lot more use then "Horncastle and onwards to Skegness"

but that could be just me,

It isn't so much about the hours, but the length of the service which falls within the same set of regulations. If a bus service is more than 50 km / 31.07 miles long, drivers need to use a tachograph. When the rule was introduced, it affected a lot of existing bus services. The result was to either split services into individual non-connecting routes, or to interwork two or more services that effectively use the same route number. Internally, they would have different route numbers, but externally they would keep use the same number to make it easier for passengers.

It just comes down to how UK driving rules differ from the rest of the EU, in that we have two sets of regulations running side-by-side. It's just that domestic rules mean that a tacho isn't needed, because what the driver does is already printed on paper.
 

MarlowDonkey

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It just comes down to how UK driving rules differ from the rest of the EU, in that we have two sets of regulations running side-by-side

If you look even deeper, it's actually driven by an agreement for the whole of Europe so that non-EU countries are included. The Europe wide agreement specifically excluded domestic only bus services so how did the UK get saddled with the rather ridiculous 50 kilometre definition as to what constituted a local bus? Outside of Ireland, all bus services are domestic only.
 

traction22

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It isn't so much about the hours, but the length of the service which falls within the same set of regulations. If a bus service is more than 50 km / 31.07 miles long, drivers need to use a tachograph. When the rule was introduced, it affected a lot of existing bus services. The result was to either split services into individual non-connecting routes, or to interwork two or more services that effectively use the same route number. Internally, they would have different route numbers, but externally they would keep use the same number to make it easier for passengers.

It just comes down to how UK driving rules differ from the rest of the EU, in that we have two sets of regulations running side-by-side. It's just that domestic rules mean that a tacho isn't needed, because what the driver does is already printed on paper.


Therefore, as others have suggested, it's a loophole.

As a passenger, and using the example above, I'd much rather the destination be Skegness via Horncastle rather than Horncastle Connecting to Skegness. The "connecting with/to" is the confusing part especially to the non enthusiast who wants to get from A to B.
 

Tetchytyke

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The Europe wide agreement specifically excluded domestic only bus services so how did the UK get saddled with the rather ridiculous 50 kilometre definition as to what constituted a local bus?

It didn't exclude domestic only services. If the route is more than 50km it needs a tacho as its under Eu rules.
 

MarlowDonkey

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The EU Regulations are derived from a United Nations organisation.

https://www.unece.org/trans/main/sc1/sc1_about.html

The Working Party on Road Transport (SC.1) promotes the development and facilitation of international transport by road—of goods and passengers—by harmonizing and simplifying the rules and requirements at transport. To meet this objective, SC.1 draws up, manages and updates international legal instruments. SC.1 occasionally is a parent body to technical expert groups such as those concerning the digital tachograph rules or transport of passengers by coach and bus.

Note that it says "international" transport which the UK and EU somehow interpreted as being applicable to local bus routes.
 

carlberry

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If you look even deeper, it's actually driven by an agreement for the whole of Europe so that non-EU countries are included. The Europe wide agreement specifically excluded domestic only bus services so how did the UK get saddled with the rather ridiculous 50 kilometre definition as to what constituted a local bus? Outside of Ireland, all bus services are domestic only.
The UK saddled itself with it! The UK domestic rules mean the UK can apply it's own regulations to what it calls local bus services (most people would not regard 50km as local after all). The way round it is to operate completely on EU rules (i.e tachgraph fitted) and you can have bus services of any length.
 

MedwayValiant

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There are some very long bus routes in Ireland, and they don't appear to use this device. Buses leaving Cork on the 4½ hour run to Galway say Galway on the front, not some intermediate point.

Does Bus Eireann use tachos on longer distance routes, or is there an understanding that the EU rules are ignored and everyone pretends not to notice?
 

Tetchytyke

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There are some very long bus routes in Ireland, and they don't appear to use this device. Buses leaving Cork on the 4½ hour run to Galway say Galway on the front, not some intermediate point.

Ireland has the same rules, so I would guess that Bus Eireann use tachos on their Expressway services, in the same way NatEx and Megabus use tachos here.

There are examples of similar in Ireland, though, including Rosslare-Tralee.
 

jay38a

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There are some very long bus routes in Ireland, and they don't appear to use this device. Buses leaving Cork on the 4½ hour run to Galway say Galway on the front, not some intermediate point.

Does Bus Eireann use tachos on longer distance routes, or is there an understanding that the EU rules are ignored and everyone pretends not to notice?

There are also domestic driving rules in Ireland. They are very very hard to find but they are there. They are slightly different to UK rules:
  • you can drive for 11 hours in a day
  • Minimum rest is 9 hours but must be followed by 12 hours the next day. You can give a standard 10 every day though.
 

Eyersey468

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East Yorkshire'x55, x46, 121 and 155 are all split to get round tachograph.
 

Flying Snail

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Ireland has the same rules, so I would guess that Bus Eireann use tachos on their Expressway services, in the same way NatEx and Megabus use tachos here.

There are examples of similar in Ireland, though, including Rosslare-Tralee.

No there aren't. Everything over 50km is EU rules and Tacho, pretending long routes are a bunch of short ones to dodge driving hour rules is a UK only thing.
 

Statto

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Arriva Wales have a few that change number but passengers can stay on board as buses travel through
4/4A/4H/X4/44/44A Bangor-Holyhead, change numbers in Llangefni
11/11A, Chester-Holywell then become 11C/11F/11M Holywell-Rhyl
5/X5 Llandudno-Bangor then become 5C Bangor Caernarfon
X51 Wrexham-Denbigh becomes 51B Denbigh-Rhyl
 

RT4038

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No there aren't. Everything over 50km is EU rules and Tacho, pretending long routes are a bunch of short ones to dodge driving hour rules is a UK only thing.

But the Dublin-Galway is not a local bus service, nor are the Falcon Plymouth-Bristol, or Citylink Glasgow-Portree, by any stretch of the imagination, even if they may act as such over sections. All of them use tachos.
Perhaps Ireland (with its sparser population) does not have any examples of long local bus services, serving every stop, for which this UK 'workaround' is aimed at.
And yes, there will always be some grey areas.........
 

Statto

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Careful what you wish for, changing the rules, would mean adding onto operating costs with 2 depots running services were one runs it as a through service, with some services being cut short, then leaving areas without bus services, were as now they have a service.
 
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