First West of England (Bristol, Bath & The West)

TheGrandWazoo · 5 Jun 2020

swifty said:
I’ve had a little bit of a Google and this Cotswold Distrcit Council funding form (https://bit.ly/3f0nGiR) suggests it was a twice a day in each direction service funded by the RBG. From other old links I can find it seems to run during 99 - 01 only and didn’t carry many.

Great discovery. Using the last page, with a departure to Bath at 1058 that returns at 1530 and gives you 2h 14 in Bath, that means a Moreton to Bath journey is 2h18 whereas my calculation was about 2h39.

So was a bit quicker than I thought but even then, probably looking at 3h 20 one way from Stratford for 2 hrs in Bath?

RailUK Forums

carlberry · 5 Jun 2020

TheGrandWazoo said:
Great discovery. Using the last page, with a departure to Bath at 1058 that returns at 1530 and gives you 2h 14 in Bath, that means a Moreton to Bath journey is 2h18 whereas my calculation was about 2h39.

So was a bit quicker than I thought but even then, probably looking at 3h 20 one way from Stratford for 2 hrs in Bath?

The timetable from 23 Jan 2000:

Tommy Walters · 5 Jun 2020

carlberry said:
The timetable from 23 Jan 2000:
View attachment 79017

Did Bath depot supply both vehicles on that route? Surely a dead run to & from Stratford would be impossible!

freetoview33 · 5 Jun 2020

carlberry said:
The timetable from 23 Jan 2000:
View attachment 79017

Thank you for this

freetoview33 · 5 Jun 2020

Tommy Walters said:
Did Bath depot supply both vehicles on that route? Surely a dead run to & from Stratford would be impossible!

I was thinking the same

matt_splat · 5 Jun 2020

Talking of outstation work there was a period when 178 shorts to Norton tescos ran during the day I remember frome having 2 round trips on them and melksham also doing one if I remember correctly the melksham duty on the 178 short use to finish up with a random single collage day trip on the 77 in trowbridge

BBC · 6 Jun 2020

New timetable from the 14th June now live on firsts website. Can’t see any differences tho (must admit only looked at the 42/3 timetable)

Whiteway215 · 6 Jun 2020

The daily sight of Uni students crammed and standing in a bendi may be a thing of the past either because there won’t be any students travelling to the Unis or because the bendis are for scrap now. I was wondering how many would be allowed on a bendi under the present situation?

TheGrandWazoo · 6 Jun 2020

carlberry said:
The timetable from 23 Jan 2000:
View attachment 79017

TheGrandWazoo · 6 Jun 2020

carlberry said:
The timetable from 23 Jan 2000:
View attachment 79017

Lovely but quite quick between Chipping and Stratford!!

Tommy Walters said:
Did Bath depot supply both vehicles on that route? Surely a dead run to & from Stratford would be impossible!

Guess it could have been outbased. Perhaps a Stratford based driver. Note the vehicles passed in the afternoon at Northleach (driver swap) but not in the morning.

matt_splat said:
Talking of outstation work there was a period when 178 shorts to Norton tescos ran during the day I remember frome having 2 round trips on them and melksham also doing one if I remember correctly the melksham duty on the 178 short use to finish up with a random single collage day trip on the 77 in trowbridge

Yeah, I remember those 77 journeys.... operated by an Eclipse at one point.

-Colly405- · 6 Jun 2020

BBC said:
New timetable from the 14th June now live on firsts website. Can’t see any differences tho (must admit only looked at the 42/3 timetable)

4 - existing 30 min freq becomes every 15 min City - Crow Lane
24 - no obvious change
43 - daytime 10 min freq supplemented by additional 2ph City-Kingswood which themselves give a 20 min frequency with the hourly 42
45 - daytime 30 min freq supplemented by additional 30 min freq City - Longwell Green
48A - daytime 40 min freq becomes every 20 min full route
73 - daytime 30 min freq becomes every 15 min Temple Meads - Parkway
75 - daytime 15 min freq becomes every 7-8 min Bedminster-Gipsy Patch Lane

freetoview33 · 6 Jun 2020

-Colly405- said:
4 - existing 30 min freq becomes every 15 min City - Crow Lane
24 - no obvious change
43 - daytime 10 min freq supplemented by additional 2ph City-Kingswood which themselves give a 20 min frequency with the hourly 42
45 - daytime 30 min freq supplemented by additional 30 min freq City - Longwell Green
48A - daytime 40 min freq becomes every 20 min full route
73 - daytime 30 min freq becomes every 15 min Temple Meads - Parkway
75 - daytime 15 min freq becomes every 7-8 min Bedminster-Gipsy Patch Lane

Brilliant! Although there is still the age old problem of a 90 min gap at night between 22:30 and 00:00 on the 4 from Cribbs Causeway

martyjon · 6 Jun 2020

Was there at one time a Bath to Cheltenham service which had connections at Cheltenham for Stratford ?

carlberry · 6 Jun 2020

martyjon said:
Was there at one time a Bath to Cheltenham service which had connections at Cheltenham for Stratford ?

Not that I'm aware of.
There was the X26 between Bath and Cheltenham in the 1980s/1990s and a few express services that ran to Stratford upon Avon at about the same time from Stroud/Gloucester/Cheltenham but they didnt connect. There was a Stratford Blue service between Cheltenham and Stratford upon Avon which might have passed to Midland Red however I suspect it had gone by the 1970s.

Bath to Cheltenham

BOCL services to Stratford

freetoview33 · 6 Jun 2020

-Colly405- said:
4 - existing 30 min freq becomes every 15 min City - Crow Lane
24 - no obvious change
43 - daytime 10 min freq supplemented by additional 2ph City-Kingswood which themselves give a 20 min frequency with the hourly 42
45 - daytime 30 min freq supplemented by additional 30 min freq City - Longwell Green
48A - daytime 40 min freq becomes every 20 min full route
73 - daytime 30 min freq becomes every 15 min Temple Meads - Parkway
75 - daytime 15 min freq becomes every 7-8 min Bedminster-Gipsy Patch Lane

Also

In Weston the 1 restarts with 5 services each way, and the 2 hourly X5 between Portishead and Weston

martyjon · 6 Jun 2020

When I moved to Yate there was the 31 to Swindon, the 32 to Cirencester, the 400 to Stroud, the 128 ? to Chippenham from Chipping Sodbury and there was a couple of services using the A46 at Old Sodbury which I thought ran Bath - Cheltenham but I can't recall service number.

That was in the days when BOCL covered the whole area.

matt_splat · 6 Jun 2020

I beleve the X55 was ran with a driver from Stratford Blue and a bus was out-stationed there

TheGrandWazoo · 6 Jun 2020

matt_splat said:
I beleve the X55 was ran with a driver from Stratford Blue and a bus was out-stationed there

Evidence https://flic.kr/p/isU33K

Justin Tyme · 6 Jun 2020

Here are scans of X55 timetable leaflets from 1999 and 2000.

ValleyLines142 · 7 Jun 2020

freetoview33 said:
Brilliant! Although there is still the age old problem of a 90 min gap at night between 22:30 and 00:00 on the 4 from Cribbs Causeway

In this given climate, bearing in mind The Mall would be long closed for the night by then, is that really an issue? If the 4 served Southmead Hospital and NHS workers were finishing late, I could potentially see an issue, but Cribbs Causeway?

freetoview33 · 7 Jun 2020

ValleyLines142 said:
In this given climate, bearing in mind The Mall would be long closed for the night by then, is that really an issue? If the 4 served Southmead Hospital and NHS workers were finishing late, I could potentially see an issue, but Cribbs Causeway?

I know now it isn't as much of a major issue, but it is a long term problem that never seems to be sorted. Although as said before I think past about 23:00/23:30 they should all run as the 3 and not the 4. For workers at Avonmouth (That you still have currently) and in normal times Students in Stoke Bishop to (Avoids the need to also run late services on the U1) The only problem is the service takes a little bit too long, to operate to a regular timetable. At the moment end to end off peak on the 3 is 53/5 mins (I think in normal times its a bit longer again)

ValleyLines142 · 7 Jun 2020

freetoview33 said:
I know now it isn't as much of a major issue, but it is a long term problem that never seems to be sorted. Although as said before I think past about 23:00/23:30 they should all run as the 3 and not the 4. For workers at Avonmouth (That you still have currently) and in normal times Students in Stoke Bishop to (Avoids the need to also run late services on the U1) The only problem is the service takes a little bit too long, to operate to a regular timetable. At the moment end to end off peak on the 3 is 53/5 mins (I think in normal times its a bit longer again)

Can see your point re Avonmouth but not Stoke Bishop. Then again, part of me wonders whether it makes sense to split the 3 at Avonmouth?

freetoview33 · 7 Jun 2020

ValleyLines142 said:
Can see your point re Avonmouth but not Stoke Bishop. Then again, part of me wonders whether it makes sense to split the 3 at Avonmouth?

Splitting the service wouldn't work it would put too much pressure on the 4 and the 3 would fade away. Stoke Bishop would get quite a few students to and from town/clifton.

ValleyLines142 · 7 Jun 2020

freetoview33 said:
Splitting the service wouldn't work it would put too much pressure on the 4 and the 3 would fade away. Stoke Bishop would get quite a few students to and from town/clifton.

I meant both the 3 and the 4. Is there the demand for a through service from the city centre to Cribbs?

-Colly405- · 7 Jun 2020

ValleyLines142 said:
I meant both the 3 and the 4. Is there the demand for a through service from the city centre to Cribbs?

I can't imagine that there is - the evening journey time from the Centre to Cribbs on the 3 (52 mins) and 4 (47 mins) is greater than on any of the m1 (29 mins), 1 (33 mins), 2 (40 mins), or 75 (41 mins), so through traffic on the 3/4 is unlikely to be high.

Marcus Fryer · 7 Jun 2020

-Colly405- said:
I can't imagine that there is - the evening journey time from the Centre to Cribbs on the 3 (52 mins) and 4 (47 mins) is greater than on any of the m1 (29 mins), 1 (33 mins), 2 (40 mins), or 75 (41 mins), so through traffic on the 3/4 is unlikely to be high.

But there is from Lawrence Weston inwards, and likewise from Shirehampton to/from Cribbs, so there is no obvious place to split the 4. There's probably also a reasonable amount of cross-Avonmouth village (to/from the industrial estate) traffic which means you wouldn't want to split the 3 there.

TheGrandWazoo · 7 Jun 2020

Marcus Fryer said:
But there is from Lawrence Weston inwards, and likewise from Shirehampton to/from Cribbs, so there is no obvious place to split the 3. There's probably also a reasonable amount of cross-Avonmouth village (to/from the industrial estate) traffic which means you wouldn't want to split the 4 there.

Very true.

ValleyLines142 · 7 Jun 2020

-Colly405- said:
I can't imagine that there is - the evening journey time from the Centre to Cribbs on the 3 (52 mins) and 4 (47 mins) is greater than on any of the m1 (29 mins), 1 (33 mins), 2 (40 mins), or 75 (41 mins), so through traffic on the 3/4 is unlikely to be high.

This is my theory. I think First could do with the 3 and 4 from the City Centre to Avonmouth only, and then I could see Stagecoach extending the 11/11A from Southmead onto Cribbs Causeway, thus retaining the link from Avonmouth. Lawrence Weston and Shirehampton are each served separately by the 11 and the 11A respectively, but I'm sure a minor route deviation could take place to ensure both areas are served in one.

TheGrandWazoo · 7 Jun 2020

ValleyLines142 said:
This is my theory. I think First could do with the 3 and 4 from the City Centre to Avonmouth only, and then I could see Stagecoach extending the 11/11A from Southmead onto Cribbs Causeway, thus retaining the link from Avonmouth. Lawrence Weston and Shirehampton are each served separately by the 11 and the 11A respectively, but I'm sure a minor route deviation could take place to ensure both areas are served in one.

They could but why would they want to give up a profitable element of the service?

ValleyLines142 · 7 Jun 2020

TheGrandWazoo said:
They could but why would they want to give up a profitable element of the service?

I don't know about the financial side of the route in all honesty.

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