Kite159
Veteran Member
Which is funny as I always picture Cummings as an angry farmer whenever I see pictures of him.
Get off my land!
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Who is in control of Boris's Bus?
- Thread starter DerekC
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Which is funny as I always picture Cummings as an angry farmer whenever I see pictures of him.
Get off my land!
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RailUK Forums
On Day One? I would have thought that all unnecessary spending or overspending would have been squeezed out by now. If I was convinced that they would be cutting down on true extravagance (why do these banquets and dinners attended by ministers need so many courses and what do they achieve) I wouldn't mind, but I fear the targets will be the usual suspects with local government head of the list - I will be interested in seeing how the big cities in the north and midlands fare!
The trouble is that he over-promised (just like everybody else) at the election (https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/10412356/boris-johnson-conservative-manifesto-launch/) probably expecting a small majority but now there is no excuse.
If I thought they genuinely believed I'd agree, but remember: the Tories have been leading the government for more than a decade and none of those things have happened.
But we had ten years of Labour governments without nationalising the railways - does that mean Corbyn wasn’t going to do it?
Boris knows austerity is unsellable now
The difference being that Corbyn was a back bencher and about as far away from actual power as possible during those years.
And Boris wasn’t a minister until 2016. Was his mayorship famous for austerity measures?
PG
Established Member
Perhaps because those functions are often attended by various influential persons and/or conservative party donors!
He wasn't a minister, but he was never far from power.
His record as Mayor of London gets very mixed reviews. Things like the increase in bike lane provision need to be balanced against debacles such as the new Routemaster.
I would need to look up the figures, but my gut feeling is that the income disparity between the top and bottom in London increased during his tenure, rather than decreased. If that is the case then it rather puts a dent in his current "Champion of the under trodden" persona.
Both the things you mention involve spending money, not cutting it.
If he wasn’t a minister then he wasn’t near power.
Not sure what you expect a mayor to do about income inequality
Perhaps the biggest tool for economic and demographic change the GLA and the Mayor have is planning, and development policy. They have significant influence over the make up of the city, where, how and what sort of development takes place and so where money and jobs go. Transport policy is intertwined with it too.
Unfortunately, I believe neither Johnson nor Khan have shone in this area.
As @mmh notes, the Mayor has significant power over planning policy, as well as the provision of public services. A coherent transport policy is also essential as there's no point stimulating the creation of jobs if people can't actually get to them.
People aren't only negatively affected by cuts to spending, they're equally affected by poor choices over what money is spent on. Using the new Routemaster as an example, they cost around £350K each, as compared to a regular double-decker at £190,000. So by proceeding with the new Routemaster London has ended up with half as many buses as it could have, effectively a cut in service provision over what could have been done with the same money.
bramling
Veteran Member
Is there evidence to support the idea that the new Routemaster has led to cuts in service provision?
(Note this is a question as I don’t know the answer).
I don't believe any routes have actually been cut, but for what they spent on 1,000 new Routemasters they could have got ~1,800 regular double-deckers so it definitely hasn't helped.
bramling
Veteran Member
So 800 double deckers that by the sound of it wouldn’t actually have been needed.
From a financial point of view the concept seems to have been a bad one (I’m presuming there’s no lifespan benefit with a new Routemaster over a conventional bus?), but it doesn’t sound like there’s been much effect on the service.
Khan’s fares freeze has had a much more damaging effect on TFL.
There have been service cuts (sorry, route rationalization)
To provide the current level of service, yes. But that presumes that the current level of service is satisfactory. Oh, what's that? It isn't?
http://content.tfl.gov.uk/stp-20150715-part-1-item10-bus-customer-satisfaction.pdf
bramling
Veteran Member
Still doesn’t provide evidence that service enhancements are actually *needed*. My satisfaction levels with the service at my local station would increase if it had a 60tph service, but that doesn’t mean that level of service is justified, necessary or even desirable.
Likewise 800 extra buses doesn’t guarantee there’s the infrastructure or staffing levels to operate them.
Anecdotally I’d say London is over-saturated with bus provision.
True. But even if they aren't, the £140M could have been spent on other transport enhancements. Especially when you consider that the New Routemaster is slower, has less capacity and produces more pollution than the alternative products.
It does look good though.
Central London I agree, but once you get out to the peripheries there is a lot of scope for improvement.
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PG
Established Member
I don't know, I have a vision of Boris on one of those fairground carousel rides in a bus... the steering wheel turns but has no effect on the direction of travel!On a transport forum perhaps not the best title
Being even more mischievous someone has undone the bolts holding his bus onto the carousel so once it gets up to speed he flys off at a tangent
edwin_m
Veteran Member
The fares freeze has definitely put a squeeze on TfL's income (but let's not forget the loss of central government funding). In one way or another not having had to spend a lot of extra money buying 1000 New Routemasters instead of 1000 conventional London-spec deckers (which the operators would probably have bought themselves) is likely to have made that squeeze worse than it would otherwise have been. £50m-odd for the Garden Bridge also came out of TfL funds, and could have bought about 250 conventional buses or enough trains to run the Battersea extension.
Do you object to the New Routemasters as a concept or just the poor implementation?
Seemed like an excellent concept to me to update a London icon and hopefully promote better British bus technology. Clearly didn’t work out very well - was that the client or the supplier?
ps - I think they are bloody ugly too!
Seemed like an excellent concept to me to update a London icon and hopefully promote better British bus technology. Clearly didn’t work out very well - was that the client or the supplier?
ps - I think they are bloody ugly too!
There's nothing special about them and their technology is already out of date, - a hybrid bus, that was possible 15-20 years ago sold as 'new technology'. Johnson pushed them because he thought that with a rear platform and the magic name 'Routemaster', the London voters would have a nostalgic attraction to them. That went well didn't it, - both the cost of that long-distance electioneering and the functional success of the design.
bramling
Veteran Member
Is there any evidence to suggest that attempting to introduce something of an ‘iconic’ design might have gone some way to reducing the stigma many people associate with bus travel?
Personally I don’t have a problem with seeking a superior design, in my view the basic idea was sound. Surely if things haven’t quite worked out in practice is more down to those tasked with implementing the idea, i.e. TFL?
The implementation. As you note the Routemaster is a London icon, a new and updated version was a good idea.
edwin_m
Veteran Member
I get the impression the stigma is rather less in London than elsewhere (always has been, not a result of the New Routemaster).
Two of the obvious downsides of the design were the much higher capital cost and the much higher operating cost due to needing a second member of staff. Unless TfL failed to point these out before contracts were signed, the Mayor must have decided to go ahead anyway and therefore should be responsible for the economic consequences. Other defects such as being too hot inside would be somewhere between TfL and Wrights.
The cost would definitely have been known before contracts were signed, and I understand that TfL weren't in favour of the design specifically because of the second member of staff.
High Dyke
Established Member
When you mentioned Boris's bus there was me thinking it was about all those new routemasters around London. On a transport forum perhaps not the best title
I was beginning to think the wheels had come off already...I don't know, I have a vision of Boris on one of those fairground carousel rides in a bus... the steering wheel turns but has no effect on the direction of travel!
Being even more mischievous someone has undone the bolts holding his bus onto the carousel so once it gets up to speed he flys off at a tangent
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