The 57 has been dying on its @r5£ for the last few years, losing its off peak times (save the 67 runs). You’re right in that it has little singular attraction in that the 349/X39 and the 2 duplicate the main flows at much higher frequencies.
Indeed. I used to use it back in the days when I was at Weston College: I used to get the 57 to Hotwells and pick up the X1 from there. Used to work well as the connection time was about 10 minutes.
What route did that take then?
From BVBG
And the Ralph Allen runs?
Looks like they have been cancelled too!
Whilst the Burnett depot has closed, it is still rare to see anything other than some battered e200 on the 10/11
Depends if they’re selling rather than closing. Also, Wessex do make some interesting decisions like the Bath uni fast link appearing towards the end of the academic year and then going with all the rest of the uni routes (save the 20)
Yes around 7-10 years ago, maybe even 5 years ago, they did force First to up their game. But in the last five years almost everything they have done has been counter-innovative (copying First routes two minutes ahead of First) or low-risk (Council contracts).
I think Rotala were committed to Bristol but I think they moved resources to Birmingham when better opportunities came up. I can't see a future for Abus or Wessex much past the end of this year.
A lot of mights and maybes. They might buy Wessex or not or decide that they aren’t so keen on low margin tenders?
Abus is an interesting one. I may be very wide of the Mark, but it looks as though Alan has decided to focus on one type of income (i.e. the work with/for First, however that is funded), rather than the work contracted to LAs and supermarkets, which I would think may be lower margin?
That and the challenge of getting and keeping drivers. Given that they have just repainted the first Citaro into Excel colours, think Abus might well be focussing on the commercial work.
