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Britain's obscurest bus tickets

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TheGrandWazoo

TheGrandWazoo

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The other day, I had a day off and sampled the Worcestershire County Council "Connecta" ticket that permits travel on all of the county's operators. It's pretty well hidden. If you know where to look on the First website, it has details (albeit the wrong price) and a link to the WCC site. Diamond has only the link. Even on the WCC site, the price is wrong - 7.20 quoted rather than the actual 8 quid.

That's a plethora of information compared to the Cotswold Discoverer that appears on Pulhams web site and a Visit Cotswold page (both with massively incorrect info). Shame as it's really useful.

Anyone care to put forward the UK's least publicised bus ticket?
 
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TAS

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I don't think it was publicised anywhere online that Arriva and First accepted each other's rovers in Colchester.

This arrangement recently came to an end and the (only slightly better publicised) Colchester Boroughcard has gained a day ticket instead. This is better as it also covers Hedingham and Essex CC contracted services. It remains slightly unclear if the ticket includes Chambers services or not (it's listed on their website, so I assume that it is, but the accompanying text says that it's accepted on Hedingham, First, Arriva and Essex CC services).
 
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alangla

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Daytripper? Not all that useful these days. It used to cover pretty much everything the Zonecard did, but now I think it's down to basically Stagecoach and First, not other big operators like McGill's. Still good for a day out on the train though
 
NorthernSpirit

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There's Connect that covers Berkshire, the only place I've seen it advertised is on West Berkshire Council's website.
 
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Typhoon

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Andyh82 said:
There is the Bws About in Flintshire and Denbighshire that allows all day travel on buses across the two counties. Great stuff...

https://www.flintshire.gov.uk/en/PDFFiles/Roads-and-Travel/Bws-About.pdf

Except it’s only valid on the tendered services and not on Arriva’s commercial network. So you can basically travel all day on a load on separate minor obscure minibuses etc but not on the major links.
Click to expand...
Interesting!

Denbighshire have a more up-to-date version
https://www.denbighshire.gov.uk/en/resident/parking-roads-and-travel/public-transport-information/bus-timetables/timetable-for-denbighshire-bus-services-from-18-june-2018-v2.pdf (page 83)
which acknowledges GHA are no more - doesn't mention Flintshire.

It might not be entirely useless - an adult return for some of the longer routes (X51?) must be pushing £5.50 and pensioners setting out early might be able to use it at the start of a day out before their pass kicks in. Still, I don't suppose it is the most popular purchase.

Do you know anything about the popularity of the Dee Rover? https://www.flintshire.gov.uk/en/PDFFiles/Roads-and-Travel/Dee-Rover.pdf . The leaflet hasn't been updated for over five years.
 
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Hophead

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TAS said:
I don't think it was publicised anywhere online that Arriva and First accepted each other's rovers in Colchester.

This arrangement recently came to an end and the (only slightly better publicised) Colchester Boroughcard has gained a day ticket instead. This is better as it also covers Hedingham and Essex CC contracted services. It remains slightly unclear if the ticket includes Chambers services or not (it's listed on their website, so I assume that it is, but the accompanying text says that it's accepted on Hedingham, First, Arriva and Essex CC services).
Click to expand...

Aaagh! One of my personal bug-bears! There are numerous examples of ticket inter-availability, but the information is almost impossible to find.

Metrobus are good enough to list all routes of other operators who will accept their tickets (albeit that it's not completely up-to-date). No idea if they equally accept tickets in return as there's no information I can find either at Metrobus or elsewhere. None of the other operators make any mention of this ticket acceptance, nor will you find details on the Metrobus fare charts of the routes in question. I doubt take-up is particularly high.

I seem to remember that Safeguard in Guildford would accept Arriva tickets on some sections of route at certain times, but that information was, naturally, not on the Arriva website (that I could find).

Is it any wonder that bus use is declining when most passengers believe that they must travel out and back on the vehicles of one operator (with the inevitable reduction in frequency which that entails)?
 
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Dai Corner

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I think Cardiff Bus and Newport Transport still accept each other's tickets on the 30 between the two cities, though it doesn't seem to be well publicised.
 
TheGrandWazoo

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NorthernSpirit said:
There's Connect that covers Berkshire, the only place I've seen it advertised is on West Berkshire Council's website.
Click to expand...

I seem to recall seeing that before but, by Lord, it's very obscure and not that much use.

Typhoon said:
Interesting!

Denbighshire have a more up-to-date version
https://www.denbighshire.gov.uk/en/resident/parking-roads-and-travel/public-transport-information/bus-timetables/timetable-for-denbighshire-bus-services-from-18-june-2018-v2.pdf (page 83)
which acknowledges GHA are no more - doesn't mention Flintshire.

It might not be entirely useless - an adult return for some of the longer routes (X51?) must be pushing £5.50 and pensioners setting out early might be able to use it at the start of a day out before their pass kicks in. Still, I don't suppose it is the most popular purchase.

Do you know anything about the popularity of the Dee Rover? https://www.flintshire.gov.uk/en/PDFFiles/Roads-and-Travel/Dee-Rover.pdf . The leaflet hasn't been updated for over five years.
Click to expand...

Wow - really industry leading obscurity there!
 
[.n]

[.n]

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TAS said:
I don't think it was publicised anywhere online that Arriva and First accepted each other's rovers in Colchester.

This arrangement recently came to an end and the (only slightly better publicised) Colchester Boroughcard has gained a day ticket instead. This is better as it also covers Hedingham and Essex CC contracted services. It remains slightly unclear if the ticket includes Chambers services or not (it's listed on their website, so I assume that it is, but the accompanying text says that it's accepted on Hedingham, First, Arriva and Essex CC services).
Click to expand...


I'm impressed it lasted that long, I first used that must be about 20 years ago! I always assumed (it being my first experience outside of London) that it was a standard thing to accept rovers on different companies
 
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gingerheid

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Does the Multibus Day still exist in Cambridgeshire? Multi-operator ticket not valid on the key route with multiple operators (the guided busway) so haven't used it since that opened. Before that it was nearly impossible to get anyone to sell you it (easier once I found out where it was on the ticket machine) and nearly as hard to get anyone that's paper it wasn't printed on to accept it :(
 
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MrTurbostar170

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gingerheid said:
Does the Multibus Day still exist in Cambridgeshire? Multi-operator ticket not valid on the key route with multiple operators (the guided busway) so haven't used it since that opened. Before that it was nearly impossible to get anyone to sell you it (easier once I found out where it was on the ticket machine) and nearly as hard to get anyone that's paper it wasn't printed on to accept it :(
Click to expand...
I bought one last month. Took a couple of drivers a few seconds to realise what it was but otherwise ok.
 
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