On of those questions that came to me: as the title says, do those producing bus schedules take account of road, stop, etc. capacity constraints, or will they just schedule as many buses as they want/think appropriate at any particular stop, over any particular bit of road, etc.?
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Do bus schedulers take account of road, etc., capacity?
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pjnathanail
Member
Depends how good the scheduler is! There’s no legal requirement to do so in most cases.
At busy locations and in particular bus stations the local authority will often operate a slot booking system to prevent stand / bay congestion.
Beyond that, it’s down to the skill, attention to detail and local knowledge of the scheduler. Where buses just pick up / drop off it doesn’t really matter for the most part, but certainly where layover time (eg 5 minutes recovery time mid route) is being scheduled it’s good practice to do this at a location where it won’t conflict with other departures if possible.
If you run a commercial service in London you have to apply for the relevant Service Permit - sometimes this will come with restrictions on how many buses can use a particular stand at once.
Internally, in TfL, any shared stands between routes are notionally split between the routes so it's easy to see which are likely to be full if a new route may use it. Sometimes operators are told there's a maximum number of buses on any one route can stand at any particular place.
The Traffic Commissioner can place restrictions on particular roads, but rarely does. The one that springs to mind where they did was on the 192 in Manchester when 5 operators were running it in the late 1990s/ early 2000s and the frequency on parts of the route was 120 bph.
Internally, in TfL, any shared stands between routes are notionally split between the routes so it's easy to see which are likely to be full if a new route may use it. Sometimes operators are told there's a maximum number of buses on any one route can stand at any particular place.
The Traffic Commissioner can place restrictions on particular roads, but rarely does. The one that springs to mind where they did was on the 192 in Manchester when 5 operators were running it in the late 1990s/ early 2000s and the frequency on parts of the route was 120 bph.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
Professional operations do. The impression I have, though, is that many small companies just send the office junior to rag round it in his souped up Vauxhall Corsa on a Sunday afternoon and do timings based on that for weekday rush hours and weekends alike. Certainly one could have been forgiven for thinking the former Milton Keynes tendered routes were scheduled on that sort of basis, as the timetables were often totally unachievable (and as a result drivers tended to cut parts of the route to keep up).
Around here they didn't use to, and put me off using local bus services for ever.
The 130 used to run to Manchester but used to have the same interval timings all day. Which meant that afternoon bus services from Manchester ran 30 minutes late or more by the time they got to Didsbury, yet you had to be at the bus stop before the advertised departure times because they would leave early too.
Utterly dreadful. The services now only go to Manchester Airport, presumably because people stopped using them from Manchester, not least because of the unrealistic timetables. I'd hope they're better now, but I'm not motivated to find out.
The 130 used to run to Manchester but used to have the same interval timings all day. Which meant that afternoon bus services from Manchester ran 30 minutes late or more by the time they got to Didsbury, yet you had to be at the bus stop before the advertised departure times because they would leave early too.
Utterly dreadful. The services now only go to Manchester Airport, presumably because people stopped using them from Manchester, not least because of the unrealistic timetables. I'd hope they're better now, but I'm not motivated to find out.
Shaw S Hunter
Established Member
It would appear the OP's main question is about quantity. But the whole point of Deregulation was to do away with such limits. In practice the limiting factor was access to bus station stands, particularly for terminating services, though in the early years bus station operators were slow to realise the need for such controls. As such any properly licensed operator is free to schedule services at whatever frequency they like. Equally obvious over-bussing, especially where it causes nuisance to other road users, can lead to Traffic Commissioners intervening in conjunction with the LA to introduce limits by applying restrictions to service registrations. Ultimately the need for profitability leads to an appropriate level of service being provided.
Of course worsening traffic congestion has changed operators' attitudes as unreliable timetables are not conducive to generating repeat custom. Not to mention TC's (& LA's) taking a dim view of "planned" unreliability. As to whether the increasing use of A.I. to generate robust timetables will prove to be useful in the long term is very much open to question.
Of course worsening traffic congestion has changed operators' attitudes as unreliable timetables are not conducive to generating repeat custom. Not to mention TC's (& LA's) taking a dim view of "planned" unreliability. As to whether the increasing use of A.I. to generate robust timetables will prove to be useful in the long term is very much open to question.
Pyewipecarshed
Member
In the late 80s the established, large and professional company my father worked for used to work out route timings by getting an inspector to drive it in a van... the problem of course being that the van didn't have to stop at the bus stops!!
Busaholic
Veteran Member
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Short answer - it depends on their job description! Seriously, it'll vary enormously between bus companies and in more and more cases that company is not a ''free agent'' in the traditional sense, being contracted to a higher authority which will dictate the terms in no uncertain fashion. It has evolved an enormous amount since I was the lowest of about 150 bus schedulers in London fifty five years ago.
My question was - funadamentally - about what on the railway are paths. But which don't apply in the same way on the highway.
You have to consult with TfL and the local authority. Between them they control the stops and lack of stand space - and especially lay over space - has been a major factor in proposed new routes not coming to fruition.
Pyewipecarshed
Member
Generally the answer is no, there are no limits.
However as other commentators have alluded to there are sometimes departure "slots" put onto stands in bus stations which give a limit as to how many departures per hour there can be.
Sometimes staff have been employed to enforce these; I recall at Piccadilly Gardens in Manchester in the early 2000s buses were only allowed to occupy the stands for a certain length of time (3 minutes IIRC) and would be shooed away if they exceeded that.
In Scarborough at around the same period inspectors were employed at the termini of the sea front open-top service to ensure buses departed at an even frequency and didn't hog the stop.
In other places local councils have placed limits on the number of buses allowed on a particular section of road per hour, Sheffield City Centre springs to mind after the chaos of the late 80s. I'm not sure if any of these restrictions still apply.
But all of that would have had to be taken into account by schedulers in producing the timetables for the period.
The simple answer is 'it depends'
To start with, scheduling buses is not as exact a science as timetabling trains. Even at 'timing point' stops, the traffic commissioners 'timekeeping window' is that buses should be no more than 1 minute early and no more than 5 minutes late departing, 95% of the time. There are a lot of unknowns including other road traffic (one badly parked delivery van, or following the dustcart, can make a big difference to odd journeys on odd occasions, for example) and each passenger transaction is an unknown (more so outside London) and there will be the occasional stop where there's passengers with mobility issues, or push-chairs, who need a bit more time to get on and off safely.
In London, most of it is in TFL's hands - they specify times of first and last bus, and frequencies during different parts of the day / week. TFL have bus stop design standards which vary depending on how many buses per hour are expected to use it. On paper, it's in TFL's tender specifications that operators should try to space buses on route X to run at an even headway with route Y that shares the route between these points and with route Z that shares the route between those points. Although in practice, it's not always possible to do that within the tender specification that TFL put out (frequencies may be different at least some of the time), and doing it is likely to cost additional service journeys both to do that and comply with the basic specification, so operators tend not to give much if any thought to it, and TFL don't seem to when assessing tenders. Operators are not going to want to offer a bid that complies with that if it will cost more than a bid from an operator that doesn't bother.
TFL tend to specify maximum number of buses on any route can be scheduled to be on each stand at any one time. TFL also have right of veto over where operators can do on-route driver change-overs if it's got the potential to cause problems for other buses / traffic.
(London Bus Route Histories site includes current or last set of tender specifications for many routes - example on route 1 page here, button towards the bottom of the page.)
Outside London, there are a few examples where local authorities, in consultation with the traffic commissioners have imposed a limit on the number of buses / buses per hour on particular roads - the only ones I'm aware of (which of course doesn't prove the absence of others) are Sheffield City Centre in the early 90s when the city was more or less gridlocked with buses, and (from memory) a limit on sightseeing buses in (I think) Bath. This is a power in the 1985 Transport Act (as amended) but is rare enough to be newsworthy when it's invoked.
But unless it has been invoked, there's no restriction on competing operators using the same stops / roads and competing with each other.
Operators will generally liaise with bus station owners over allocations of routes to particular stands, and this can be a can of worms where there are competing services, and more so if one operator owns the bus station.
There's no compulsion on operators to co-ordinate their own services, although many will try and have an even headway between A and B when there's one route that runs A - B - C and another route that runs A - B - D. Although this isn't always as simple as it looks if the time taken to go from B to C and back isn't the same as (or a multiple of) the time it takes to go from B to D and back, or if the routes don't warrant the same headway. And there may be times when there's a sound traffic reason (particularly round school or college or works journeys) for multiple buses to arrive and depart at the same point close to each other, or for odd journeys to step outside the regular headway.
It depends what a scheduler's been told to do on any particular occasion - it may just be that a new timetable is needed urgently for route X, there might (in theory) be time for a full network review (although the latter will also include more variation fees, and costs of producing more printed / electronic information, as well as schedulers' time.)
But many planning / scheduling teams are under-resourced - smaller operators often don't have specialists, and the manager is expected to do it all, many 'big group' operators have teams centralised at regional offices - who can end up trying to do several changes across multiple local operating companies at the same time, and the people doing it may not have the local knowledge that's an important part of doing it well.
Route timings is another one where there isn't a simple answer. Some operators have gone down the marketing friendly approach of having buses at exactly the same time past each hour at all points all day, so a bus at 0600 Saturday has the same running time as one at 1700 on a weekday. Which means some buses will run late, and others will be standing to wait time at every timing point, which annoys drivers, passengers and residents of homes near the timing point. (and passengers waiting at intermediate points, where a bus will often 'run early' compared to the calculated 'approximate time' that Traveline / Bus Times etc works out based on an even speed between stops.)
Some other operators have gone down the path of analysing data so much that every journey through the day is subtly different, even if it's the odd minute or two here and there.
To start with, scheduling buses is not as exact a science as timetabling trains. Even at 'timing point' stops, the traffic commissioners 'timekeeping window' is that buses should be no more than 1 minute early and no more than 5 minutes late departing, 95% of the time. There are a lot of unknowns including other road traffic (one badly parked delivery van, or following the dustcart, can make a big difference to odd journeys on odd occasions, for example) and each passenger transaction is an unknown (more so outside London) and there will be the occasional stop where there's passengers with mobility issues, or push-chairs, who need a bit more time to get on and off safely.
In London, most of it is in TFL's hands - they specify times of first and last bus, and frequencies during different parts of the day / week. TFL have bus stop design standards which vary depending on how many buses per hour are expected to use it. On paper, it's in TFL's tender specifications that operators should try to space buses on route X to run at an even headway with route Y that shares the route between these points and with route Z that shares the route between those points. Although in practice, it's not always possible to do that within the tender specification that TFL put out (frequencies may be different at least some of the time), and doing it is likely to cost additional service journeys both to do that and comply with the basic specification, so operators tend not to give much if any thought to it, and TFL don't seem to when assessing tenders. Operators are not going to want to offer a bid that complies with that if it will cost more than a bid from an operator that doesn't bother.
TFL tend to specify maximum number of buses on any route can be scheduled to be on each stand at any one time. TFL also have right of veto over where operators can do on-route driver change-overs if it's got the potential to cause problems for other buses / traffic.
(London Bus Route Histories site includes current or last set of tender specifications for many routes - example on route 1 page here, button towards the bottom of the page.)
Outside London, there are a few examples where local authorities, in consultation with the traffic commissioners have imposed a limit on the number of buses / buses per hour on particular roads - the only ones I'm aware of (which of course doesn't prove the absence of others) are Sheffield City Centre in the early 90s when the city was more or less gridlocked with buses, and (from memory) a limit on sightseeing buses in (I think) Bath. This is a power in the 1985 Transport Act (as amended) but is rare enough to be newsworthy when it's invoked.
But unless it has been invoked, there's no restriction on competing operators using the same stops / roads and competing with each other.
Operators will generally liaise with bus station owners over allocations of routes to particular stands, and this can be a can of worms where there are competing services, and more so if one operator owns the bus station.
There's no compulsion on operators to co-ordinate their own services, although many will try and have an even headway between A and B when there's one route that runs A - B - C and another route that runs A - B - D. Although this isn't always as simple as it looks if the time taken to go from B to C and back isn't the same as (or a multiple of) the time it takes to go from B to D and back, or if the routes don't warrant the same headway. And there may be times when there's a sound traffic reason (particularly round school or college or works journeys) for multiple buses to arrive and depart at the same point close to each other, or for odd journeys to step outside the regular headway.
It depends what a scheduler's been told to do on any particular occasion - it may just be that a new timetable is needed urgently for route X, there might (in theory) be time for a full network review (although the latter will also include more variation fees, and costs of producing more printed / electronic information, as well as schedulers' time.)
But many planning / scheduling teams are under-resourced - smaller operators often don't have specialists, and the manager is expected to do it all, many 'big group' operators have teams centralised at regional offices - who can end up trying to do several changes across multiple local operating companies at the same time, and the people doing it may not have the local knowledge that's an important part of doing it well.
Route timings is another one where there isn't a simple answer. Some operators have gone down the marketing friendly approach of having buses at exactly the same time past each hour at all points all day, so a bus at 0600 Saturday has the same running time as one at 1700 on a weekday. Which means some buses will run late, and others will be standing to wait time at every timing point, which annoys drivers, passengers and residents of homes near the timing point. (and passengers waiting at intermediate points, where a bus will often 'run early' compared to the calculated 'approximate time' that Traveline / Bus Times etc works out based on an even speed between stops.)
Some other operators have gone down the path of analysing data so much that every journey through the day is subtly different, even if it's the odd minute or two here and there.
Stagecoach update their timetables based on data from a piece of software in their ticket machines. It records exact arrival times at each point, and it is used to retime if it’s noted a specific point is being delayed every day or getting somewhere ahead of time every day. It’s trip specific so each timetabled journey can be analysed.
It’s clearly used as on the timetables some trips are timed differently between points.
It’s clearly used as on the timetables some trips are timed differently between points.
markymark2000
Established Member
Something I've always wondered with this technology, does it record when buses are turning up to stops and sitting there as well? I've noticed more and more time being added to trips because it's needed in a certain area, but it completely ignored the fact that the bus was sitting around for 3 minutes at the timing point before, and so rather than redistributing the trip time, it just simply added more time to the journey.
greenline712
Member
There is a danger with the increasing amounts of data available being interpreted in such a way that timetabling becomes a product of the data just being used, rather than interpreted. It's a subtle difference, but . . .
We've seen what happens when bus stop data is simply fed into scheduling software . . . we get a route that should be every 30 minutes being every 28-32 minutes, with 1-2 minute differences over long routes that make the timetable unintelligible. In my long career, I've always said that running times can only ever be an average . . . the trick is to look at the data and create that average run time that looks sensible.
If the route requires it, then place some "hesitation" minutes along the route, but ONLY where there is a reason for the bus to hesitate (so NOT one bus stop before the Town Centre!). Passengers will accept occasional lateness, but delaying at every chimney along the route will drive them away.
To my mind, trying to set a run time that ALWAYS meets the 1 minute early / 5 minutes late criteria is impossible, without always defaulting to the worst-case scenario . . . and that in itself will create exactly the problem that I think the OP is referring to.
The skill of the schedule compiler is in understanding the huge amounts of data available, and from that creating a timetable that is both sensible to the passengers, reasonably reliable across the traffic day and tolerably robust (so that it can cope with occasional delays, but not every possible delay). That takes time to do, if it is to be done properly.
As @Roger1973 says: it depends; there isn't a simple answer . . .
We've seen what happens when bus stop data is simply fed into scheduling software . . . we get a route that should be every 30 minutes being every 28-32 minutes, with 1-2 minute differences over long routes that make the timetable unintelligible. In my long career, I've always said that running times can only ever be an average . . . the trick is to look at the data and create that average run time that looks sensible.
If the route requires it, then place some "hesitation" minutes along the route, but ONLY where there is a reason for the bus to hesitate (so NOT one bus stop before the Town Centre!). Passengers will accept occasional lateness, but delaying at every chimney along the route will drive them away.
To my mind, trying to set a run time that ALWAYS meets the 1 minute early / 5 minutes late criteria is impossible, without always defaulting to the worst-case scenario . . . and that in itself will create exactly the problem that I think the OP is referring to.
The skill of the schedule compiler is in understanding the huge amounts of data available, and from that creating a timetable that is both sensible to the passengers, reasonably reliable across the traffic day and tolerably robust (so that it can cope with occasional delays, but not every possible delay). That takes time to do, if it is to be done properly.
As @Roger1973 says: it depends; there isn't a simple answer . . .
Again, it depends.
Yes, doing everything on end to end timings can hide the 'this bus is being held to regulate the service' time.
With at least some varieties of software, you can ask it for 'depart to depart' times, or 'depart to arrive' times between stops / timing points.
Obviously, timing everything only on 'depart to arrive' times would be flawed, especially if it's the sort of route that has a town centre / major interchange somewhere in the middle of the route, or (going to journey by journey level) on a journey that regularly serves a major school somewhere in the middle of that journey.
And to add to the complications, you can also get dodgy data if the bus either occasionally or regularly doesn't stop exactly where the GPS kit thinks the bus stop is, which can mean the arrival is not recorded until the bus sets off, or departure is recorded just before the bus arrives at the point.
As with most things, it depends if operator has people who can, will - and are allowed the time to - look in to data and ask questions and think about it all.
depends which bit of Stagecoach.
Stagecoach Bedford's MK1 (the V shaped service Bedford - Luton - Milton Keynes) doesn't do much of that - on Bustimes here (something seems to have gone wrong and two morning peak journeys from Bedford to Luton that form the 0830 and 0940 Luton - Milton Keynes seem to have gone missing - maybe confusion over school term / school holidays has caused - I believe those two journeys do have different running time on school days.)
X5 (Bedford - Milton Keynes - Oxford) seems to have standard running time all day every day (again on Bustimes here)
Detailed article by Roger French 'bus and train user' blog about First Berkshire doing this here.
markymark2000
Established Member
Thank you. Very helpful.
ChrisC
Established Member
At Nottingham Victoria Bus Station, Stagecoach services 141 and Sherwood Arrow both share Bay 9. For most of each hour Bay 9 remains unused then both services, which run hourly, arrive and depart within a few minutes of each other. In the afternoon peak both buses are timed to occupy Bay 9 at the same time on 2 occasions. This seems bad organisation when there are other bays at the bus station which are not allocated to any bus services.
Yes, if there are other bays close by, then it would seem to make sense to re-allocate one of the routes.
Although allocating stands in bus stations is not an exact science either, as routes A and B might be well separated for most of the day but for whatever reason have a few journeys that want to go at the same time.
There's an argument for routes heading in the same general direction to go from stands near each other, there's also an argument for each operator to have a batch of stands close to each other, but operators may complain if their route is banished to a distant corner of the bus station and their competitor gets a 'prime' stand near the main entrance.
I can't remember where it was now (somewhere in either Australia or New Zealand, I read about it rather than going there) where one bus station had stands allocated dynamically by the real time system, and an arriving bus driver would pass an automated sign as the bus pulled in saying which stand to go to, and passengers would be advised that the next bus on route A would go from stand X.
This was the sort of bus station round a central island that could be turned in to a passenger lounge / waiting area. The theory was there were enough stands for the number of buses at a time that used the Bus Station, but not enough for the traditional allocation of different routes to different stands without some conflicts. I'm not sure how successful it was...
I lived in Stockport from 1997 and I must admit I don't recall as many as 5 operators - most I can think of was 4 if you count Magic Bus as separate from Stagecoach, plus from memory Finglands only operated evening runs?
Didn't stop 30+ minute gaps in the evening peak being common - what eventually led to me buying a car...
Tetchytyke
Veteran Member
Stagecoach
(Magic Bus)
UK North
Bullocks
Finglands.
It was mostly UK North and Magic Bus that caused the issues. They brought Manchester to gridlock on more than one occasion between them.
Sorry, I should have clarified at the same time. I'd forgotten UK North from that list (from memory they started after I'd given up on the buses being reliable).
I mainly remember Finglands being an evening operator - they actually accepted Stagecoach tickets and made up a decent proportion of the services. Their main day-time services were the 42 and the link as they were closer to their depot I believe?
Magic Bus caused a bit of chaos on a Monday morning - the weekly tickets were cheaper on there but were still valid on Stagecoach so everyone used to wait for one to come along.
Tetchytyke
Veteran Member
At one point in the early 2000s all five were running at the same time at the north end of Oxford Road.
UK North then lost their O-licence, Bullocks wound down after they were bought by Stagecoach, and Finglands wound down after they were bought by First. Wikipedia says that Finglands originally bought Stagecoach Ribble’s Manchester operations, but that’s before my time.
RJ
Established Member
I spent a few years working as a schedule compiler and a bus service planner for a city that shall remain nameless. For my own operation, I'm in charge of scheduling.
Not sure I fully understand the question about road capacity. Fundamentally this is considered in the runtimes, which increases from base times when more of the road capacity is utilised. And yes, this does mean that it's impossible to deliver a reliable clockface timetable during times when road speeds significantly change. This is why in London, high frequency services are advertised in buses per hour rather than publishing the schedule. As for detection of scratching and unnecessary regulation, this is entirely possible through use of AVL data and observance of regulation button presses and can been used to reduce PVRs without compromising frequencies.
Generally speaking, it's down to the service controllers and the dedicated service delivery team to manage what happens on the ground on a day to day basis. In London there are some very specific examples where physical constraints are considered. An example is the 464 on Saltbox Hill, where the buses are scheduled not to clash on the narrow section, and drivers going towards New Addington are instructed not to enter it until it is confirmed the section is clear. When Hammersmith Bridge was open, there was a limit of one bus at a time on the bridge, which was enforced by a lookout. So long as the combined service frequency was lower than the road capacity, this arrangement was considered adequate.
Bus stop capacity again, is managed by the teams on the ground. Prior to service changes, there is a process which will see any concerns from internal and external stakeholders flagged and if necessary mitigation will be put in - that may be by relocating and/or extending bus stop cages, or splitting stops into a more spaced out cluster of stops, or in some cases omitting to serve it entirely. An example being the erstwhile 521, which didn't stop at the south end of London Bridge.
Stand space is the main one that has to be considered by planners and schedulers. The frequency is set by peak passenger demand and sufficient stand space has to be found to support the service frequency, not the other way around. As a planner, the relationship between service frequency and stand space requirement is known and any proposed changes take it into active consideration. Sometimes this does put constraints on schedulers and controllers as limited stand space might mean drivers who keep the bus for their meal relief can't park there, and buses that have been curtailed can't hang around either.
Not sure I fully understand the question about road capacity. Fundamentally this is considered in the runtimes, which increases from base times when more of the road capacity is utilised. And yes, this does mean that it's impossible to deliver a reliable clockface timetable during times when road speeds significantly change. This is why in London, high frequency services are advertised in buses per hour rather than publishing the schedule. As for detection of scratching and unnecessary regulation, this is entirely possible through use of AVL data and observance of regulation button presses and can been used to reduce PVRs without compromising frequencies.
Generally speaking, it's down to the service controllers and the dedicated service delivery team to manage what happens on the ground on a day to day basis. In London there are some very specific examples where physical constraints are considered. An example is the 464 on Saltbox Hill, where the buses are scheduled not to clash on the narrow section, and drivers going towards New Addington are instructed not to enter it until it is confirmed the section is clear. When Hammersmith Bridge was open, there was a limit of one bus at a time on the bridge, which was enforced by a lookout. So long as the combined service frequency was lower than the road capacity, this arrangement was considered adequate.
Bus stop capacity again, is managed by the teams on the ground. Prior to service changes, there is a process which will see any concerns from internal and external stakeholders flagged and if necessary mitigation will be put in - that may be by relocating and/or extending bus stop cages, or splitting stops into a more spaced out cluster of stops, or in some cases omitting to serve it entirely. An example being the erstwhile 521, which didn't stop at the south end of London Bridge.
Stand space is the main one that has to be considered by planners and schedulers. The frequency is set by peak passenger demand and sufficient stand space has to be found to support the service frequency, not the other way around. As a planner, the relationship between service frequency and stand space requirement is known and any proposed changes take it into active consideration. Sometimes this does put constraints on schedulers and controllers as limited stand space might mean drivers who keep the bus for their meal relief can't park there, and buses that have been curtailed can't hang around either.
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WibbleWobble
Member
Yes, was a move to allow Stagecoach to buy GM Buses South.
One to look at is St Ives in Cornwall - there are restrictions aplenty on the campsite shuttle buses:
The full conditions amount to nearly three pages (17 to 19) in this Notices and Proceedings, hence the snippet of the first paragraph
greenline712
Member
An excellent example of this is Route 134 in London. Stand capacity at Tottenham Court Road is 1 bus . . . no exceptions. Drivers know that this must not be exceeded, and, if running a couple of minutes early inbound, will hang back south of Warren Street to ensure an on-time arrival. If a bus does arrive early, then the front bus MUST depart . . . if a TfL official sees two buses there, then a report will be submitted and penalties may accrue.
The other end of the route at North Finchley has a 3 bus stand, intended to compensate for the 1 bus stand at TCR. All well and good, but this does make service control difficult.
In addition, drivers changed over on live buses just south of Archway, and getting your bus on-time at the changeover point wasn't easy, if you'd been ejected from TCR early!
In compiling the schedule, obvious care was necessary, especially when the running time was changing between peak and off-peak. When the route was operated by HT (Holloway) Garage, we also had peak extras between HT Garage and TCR, which had to be fed into the service just right, and pulled out of the service correctly as well. This was always considered a job for an experienced compiler . . . a junior compiler could do the job, but would need careful monitoring to ensure all the criteria were met.
Oh, and something else relevent . . . TfL contracts specify that "buses must pass point X every 6 minutes between 0730 and 0830" . . . this is how they ensure sufficient buses are provided for expected loadings. That is another constraint for the compiler to meet.
Not on the 192 though - I do recall the Oxford Road buses had more variety of operators than the 192. I'd actually imagine that section would have more buses than the A6 for the 192 as several routes converged there.
I never rode on UK North but I do recall they weren't the best regarded of operators. Didn't they get banned twice, or is my memory faulty?
Pyewipecarshed
Member
UK North had their operator licence reduced (halved IIRC) c.2003 for maintenance problems.
Towards the end (around 2006) they had been called to an inquiry after one of their buses was de-roofed on a low bridge and the investigation found that the driver didn't understand English sufficiently to appreciate the meaning of the warning signs.
Whilst that was pending another of their buses which was speeding lost control and hit a worker in a "cherry picker" killing him. The driver had apparently not had sufficient rest days beforehand.
They then ceased operations and at least one of the directors was subsequently jailed, again if memory serves they had falsified drivers hours records etc
Incidentally the proprietors had previously run Mybus who ceased trading for a period due to maintenance issues, then restarted and disappeared again.
Yes, BBC news item from 2008 here.
I was vaguely aware they had a previous incarnation, but couldn't remember what they previously traded as.
Pyewipecarshed
Member
They ran a shop by the name of Denton Discount Warehouse originally, so the legal lettering of Mybus was Denton Discount Warehouse t/a Mybus.
Couldn't make it up!
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