Bus services that are increasing soon

[Andy Pacer]

Arriva in Leicestershire do indeed increase from tomorrow. A lot of it is peak time only (double the daytime frequency on some routes).
Consensus is these timetables will last for a couple of weeks until the next milestone of June 15th.

 

[Andy Pacer]

With services increasing from tomorrow can more people travel by bus or is the advice still to avoid travelling by bus/public transport wherever possible?

I'm not planning on massive trips out by bus but was wondering if it will be now possible to use the bus as part of my daily exercise to go for walks in different places instead of staying in my locality.

If it helps I've got an ENCTS pass and unable to drive due to disability so haven't been able to get out as much as someone in a car could.

From what I can gather the advice is to still avoid where possible. The increases in my area are to satisfy the gradually increasing demand and an assumption that more people may travel to/from work from tomorrow if their children are back at school etc.
Remember some buses have an advisory capacity of around 20% of their usual load so still not much availability.

 

[overthewater]

How will School buses work?

 

[Andy Pacer]

How will School buses work?

It will be interesting to see if contracted bus services by a local authority end up having additional vehicles contracted (or will the original resource have to do multiple trips)

 

[darloscott]

How will School buses work?

The simple answer is none of us running them even know yet. All we have done is marked out coaches compliant to 2m distancing, but literally nobody knows.

 

[M60lad]

It is going to be difficult trying to enforce it and actually run a School Service in general with the measures in the place, I've seen a few School Buses in/around Manchester area and most run at full standing loads and thats with a standard service bus, not to sure how their going to enforce it with a standard Schoolbus that has 3x2 seating throughout.

Actually with Schools talking about and some Schools rotaring which pupils go in and when their might not be that many pupils travelling on Schoolbuses at the same time anymore for the time being now.

 

[Typhoon]

The simple answer is none of us running them even know yet. All we have done is marked out coaches compliant to 2m distancing, but literally nobody knows.

I've spoken to a couple of bus drivers from different companies. The same, except some staggered starts/ ends might not be possible as the bus is used elsewhere in off peak times.

EDIT: replaced If by I've

 

[darloscott]

If spoken to a couple of bus drivers from different companies. The same, except some staggered starts/ ends might not be possible as the bus is used elsewhere in off peak times.

Indeed, not to mention a good proportion of our fleet does two school runs to two different schools, so if you were to stagger start times and/or have to do 3 or 4 runs then you may find the capacity just isn't available. 4 runs each way on most school runs would utilise all of your driving time and not be able to do anything else.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

With services increasing from tomorrow can more people travel by bus or is the advice still to avoid travelling by bus/public transport wherever possible?

I'm not planning on massive trips out by bus but was wondering if it will be now possible to use the bus as part of my daily exercise to go for walks in different places instead of staying in my locality.

If it helps I've got an ENCTS pass and unable to drive due to disability so haven't been able to get out as much as someone in a car could.

The guidance is clear

“ If you cannot work from home and have to travel to work, or if you must make an essential journey, you should cycle or walk wherever possible. Before you travel on public transport, consider if your journey is necessary and if you can, stay local. Try to reduce your travel. This will help keep the transport network running and allows people who need to make essential journeys to travel.”

Unless it’s absolutely essential, do not travel.

Being a bit bored of your locality isn’t an essential reason.

 

[Typhoon]

Indeed, not to mention a good proportion of our fleet does two school runs to two different schools, so if you were to stagger start times and/or have to do 3 or 4 runs then you may find the capacity just isn't available. 4 runs each way on most school runs would utilise all of your driving time and not be able to do anything else.

And even if you were able to fit the runs to different schools in, what chance the staggered opening times of the two schools fitting neatly with the arrival time of the buses.
I don't envy you!

 

[MB162435]

Cornwall by kernow have increased the number of services on some routes, and are running the A5 service between Newquay and Padstow again

Transport for Cornwall have gone to a full timetable, for the first time due to them starting during the lockdown

 

[darloscott]

And even if you were able to fit the runs to different schools in, what chance the staggered opening times of the two schools fitting neatly with the arrival time of the buses.
I don't envy you!

Especially as we have a mix of private contracts and council contracts and getting the two to fit together will be nothing short of impossible. As an example my regular run is one of the private college contracts and have ~65 students on a 70 seater. How do we operate this with 2m distancing allowing 12 pax per coach? Bearing in mind the route has a low bridge so DDs are out of the question. You'd have to operate 5 coaches minimum, depending on staggered start/finish times.

 

[markymark2000]

How will School buses work?

By September when most years are back in, social distancing might be reduced to 1M. This then means 1/2 capacity rather than 1/4 so you might have it a bit easier.

1 thing which Transdev are doing on the BooHoo trips is running a longer distance trip and getting workers in a bit earlier, the bus then runs back for a short run arriving at the normal time. This is a bit of extra time but could work for some schools. It's worth saying that there will not be a 1 size fits all for school buses and it will depend on local resource availability, the size of those available vehicles and the PVR of services between schools (of course buses which don't do as much between schools have a bit more leeway for staggered times).

 

[Mitch in Notts]

Hulleys of Baslow massively increased the frequency of their Peak District services from today.
Nottingham City Transport reintroduced a substantial number of routes yesterday.
Stagecoach East Midlands increased the frequency of many services today with some back to full timetable (eg 27, 99 in Retford 28/9 Mansfield-Newark), others still reduced (eg Pronto)
Trentbarton remains unchanged....

 

[cnjb8]

Hulleys of Baslow massively increased the frequency of their Peak District services from today.
Nottingham City Transport reintroduced a substantial number of routes yesterday.
Stagecoach East Midlands increased the frequency of many services today with some back to full timetable (eg 27, 99 in Retford 28/9 Mansfield-Newark), others still reduced (eg Pronto)
Trentbarton remains unchanged....

Stagecoach East Midlands have also reopened Gainsborough depot.

 

[Mitch in Notts]

Trent Barton improvements from Monday which include return of Amberline & Rushcliffe Villager. Still no bus service at all to the Belper estates which amazes me!

Notts & Derby reintroducing 71-72-73 from Monday so some service for more of Belper.

 

[43055]

Trent Barton improvements from Monday which include return of Amberline & Rushcliffe Villager. Still no bus service at all to the Belper estates which amazes me!

Notts & Derby reintroducing 71-72-73 from Monday so some service for more of Belper.

They could of at least brought the 6.3 back being the main Belper - Ripley route. The one that is even more amazing is the Skylink Express having a 10 min service in the morning peak and then being hourly for the rest of the day.

 

[DunsBus]

Borders Buses are reverting to normal timetables on the 267 and 464 services between Berwick and Wooler (with a slight route change) along with the B1 Berwick town service from next Monday, 8th June. No change to the Scottish services as yet.

 

[43055]

More Trent barton changes from next Monday.

Frequency increases on the two, calverton, keyworth, cotgrave, skylink Nottingham

Black cat is reintroduced at 2 hourly and the 6E is introduced hourly to provide a service between Belper and Ripley.

 

[WM Bus]

Claribels are back on the 94 today alongside National Express. Claribels hadn't operated it for 10 weeks, last time I saw one on the 94 prior to today was Saturday 28th March.

 

[Mitch in Notts]

Nottingham City Transport are running a full service except for Night Buses from the 28th June. That actually means a reduction in the very early Sunday Morning service as current timetables are running 7 days a week.

 

[RELL6L]

More Stagecoach increases from next weekend.

So far published are:
South West - which didn't increase from 1st June. Some routes back to normal, some back to a reduced timetable. If anybody from Stagecoach checks this, the link to the 7/7A timetable only actually shows you the 7A and the Sunday times, no weekday 7. No summer services though.
East - which barely increased last week, return to nearer normal. The X5 goes back to hourly throughout, at present it only runs to Milton Keynes and uses entirely deckers. Will be interesting to see if that continues or whether the coaches get dusted off and brought back. Allocation goes from 5 to 8 which will stretch them on deckers.
Greater Manchester - further uplift on some routes and increased running times. Not so user friendly to see what the changes are, you have to look at routes one by one, first with the current timetable then the one from 15 June. I only looked at three: 23 continues x 30 but much longer running time, 11 from x20 to x15 and much longer running time, 330 from x20 to x10 and no change in running time.
North East - further steps up at all depots. Example the Hartlepool 7, normal is x10, original lockdown was x30, now x20, going to x15. But the 1 to Middlesborough looks to be going to the full timetable including the short journeys to Seaton Carew.
Maybe other regions to come...

 

[duncanp]

More increases at National Express West Midlands from 14th June, including the restoration of my local route into the centre of Birmingham to its' full pre lockdown level.

They also have a fleet of vehicles on standby each day to provide extra services where needed, and are continually monitoring services to see if further timetable increases are required.

Service updates

Get the latest updates on the National Express West Midlands bus network here.

nxbus.co.uk

From Sunday 14th June we are putting more buses back into service across Birmingham and the Black Country so that people returning to work can safely social distance on board.

Shops selling clothes, toys, books and electronics are allowed to open on Monday 15th June. So we will be returning to about 85% of pre-coronavirus levels, with buses arriving more frequently across the network.

In this ‘new normal’, we would like to thank customers for staying apart to stay safe. We are continually gathering data from the buses and our inspectors are out patrolling busy areas. We have a mini-fleet of “sweeper” vehicles on standby every day to double up where it gets busy so there are more buses available, giving more space on board each bus.

As the lockdown continues to ease, we will adjust our services to match our customers’ needs as best we can.

We have worked closely with Transport for West Midlands through the Bus Alliance to co-ordinate these latest changes.

 

[route101]

Nothing changing here in Glasgow , my local route is still off and may not come back. 25 mins walk to nearest bus stop or 30 min s walk to railway station

 

[richardjones21]

Diamond Bus will be returning most services to either a 20 minute frequency or normal timetables from 15th June 2020

Service Updates | Diamond Bus

www.diamondbuses.com

 

[Bayum]

Considering that the government wants rail timetables to be restored on the 6th July, when can we expect to see bus timetables restored?
I get that the government wants to reduce the number of people travelling by public transport, but is increasing the number of services by restoring original timetables going to spread passengers across a larger amount of buses, or will it attract more passengers?

I only ask as the bus service through my village is on an hourly frequency, whereas pre-COVID we had a two per hour service, and I know a few others in the area are still reduced.

 

[WM Bus]

Considering that the government wants rail timetables to be restored on the 6th July, when can we expect to see bus timetables restored?
I get that the government wants to reduce the number of people travelling by public transport, but is increasing the number of services by restoring original timetables going to spread passengers across a larger amount of buses, or will it attract more passengers?

I only ask as the bus service through my village is on an hourly frequency, whereas pre-COVID we had a two per hour service, and I know a few others in the area are still reduced.

National Express West Midlands will be restoring services to normal frequencies on many routes from Monday in Birmingham and surrounding areas (And have gradually been increasing, from their heavily reduced frequencies back in March/April, with several increases over the past 2 month or so).
X20/X21/X22 are all going back up to their normal every 20 minutes each (which combines to every 6/7 mins between Birmingham City Centre and University Station).

With a slightly reduced timetable remaining on certain services e.g. the 28 (Great Barr - Heartlands Hospital), 65 and 67 which will be every 15 mins rather than every 12 mins, which is possibly what would normally be reduced timetables due to the school summer holidays. So a full service might resume on those services in September.

Service updates

Get the latest updates on the National Express West Midlands bus network here.

nxbus.co.uk

 

[PeterC]

Considering that the government wants rail timetables to be restored on the 6th July, when can we expect to see bus timetables restored?
I get that the government wants to reduce the number of people travelling by public transport, but is increasing the number of services by restoring original timetables going to spread passengers across a larger amount of buses, or will it attract more passengers?

I only ask as the bus service through my village is on an hourly frequency, whereas pre-COVID we had a two per hour service, and I know a few others in the area are still reduced.

My village used to have 5 buses a day, now we have a single round trip. The whole group of services is now covered by one vehicle rather than three. I suspect that we won't see an improvement until the schools go back when all three buses are needed.

 

[route101]

My local route is still suspended , its operating hourly part route but not up to my bit, bit of a pain with 25 min walk to nearest bu stop on anothe route. Id thought it would come back hourly. Got my suspcions it may not come back.

 

[Andyh82]

In West Yorkshire it now tends to be

Mon to Fri - Most are normal, but a small number of very high frequency services are reduced in frequency and some secondary non-core routes are still reduced with a small number not running. None of the peak time commuter expresses are running and neither is Leeds Park & Ride.

Saturday - Many high frequency routes are reduced in frequency (such as every 10 reduced to 12/15, every 15 reduced to every 20), and some secondary routes are either running on sunday frequencies or not running at all

Sunday - Most running normal sunday timetables, but some services in Halifax and Huddersfield are still running a less than Sunday frequency