First Bus - no new Buses

[mbonwick]

Yes however sadly it seems the new scannia stagecoach ordered for service 172 Aberdare - Porthcawl which were supposed to be very good at climbing hills seem to be having some problems tackling Maerdy mountain.

Now in this case I say keep our Volvo B10m's stagecoach.

Give them time, its almost inevitable that some adjustment will be required to the EMS and gear mappings and I'm sure they'll turn out fine.

 

[overthewater]

They're about 5 years old.

What do you expect though? Should the driver have to apologise to every person that gets on the bus because it's running 4 minutes late?

Falkirk get to see the nice solos which are 7 years old or the E200 which are year old, from stagecoach. which butts area he was talking about not edinburgh:P

First Edinburgh does have new stock there have 09 plate Volvo at Falkirk along with 57 plates, but there only used on Circler and 38. Rest of the depot is filled with crap, no other words to describe them. There falling apart down at the heel, needing replaced, with alot of stock at least 10 years +

Livingston is also the same there have 55 and 57 plate double deckers, and the rest are pure crap falling to bits and held together with tape or something.

But again if depots are not making the money then how can there buy newer buses?

 

[tbtc]

The only newish First buses I see in the Sheffield are on the X78 service. These are painted in a strange varient of the First livery. Stagecoach seem to have a lot more newish buses, most noticably the hybrids on the 120 service and the 'Wifi' ones on the Matlock service

The X78 has recently been upgraded from 07reg Geminis to, erm, 08reg Geminis. But painted in a different livery so that people will think they are younger than they look.

The 08/58 delivery of Geminis was the newest that we've seen in SY (apart from three Darts for the tendered FreeBee service plus we had five 09 plate B7RLEs for a few months between Leeds letting them go and Manchester wanting them).

The 53 plate Geminis moved to Glasgow, the 06 plate Geminis moved to Glasgow, many of the 07 plate ones (at Rotherham - formerly on the X78) moved to Leeds and Sheffield lost many of its other 08/58 plate Geminis to Rotherham (for the X78) or Glasgow. The 55 plate B7RLEs that replaced the 53/06 plate Geminis moved to Rotherham for the 22 to Barnsley (meaning that Sheffield lost around thirty 53/06 plate Geminis for around ten B7RLEs and a bunch of ex-Rotherham B10BLEs).

Sheffield has lost around fifty modern double deckers over the last few years from First's fleet - whilst Stagecoach has introduced almost as many (if you add the E400s on the 88 and X17 to the E400Hs on the 120 - with a further twenty one E400Hs due next year too).

 

[Butts]

They're about 5 years old.



What do you expect though? Should the driver have to apologise to every person that gets on the bus because it's running 4 minutes late?

No - but when it is about twenty minutes late (out of peak hours when its one an hour) a sorry wouldn't go amiss
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

I know whenever I use the 38 I am the only one that pays, but it is so unreliable I use a bike and train combo now.

If you want to see a nice first bus hit route 66 in Glasgow . Although the majority of thier buses in Glasgow are under 10. Maybe SPT help out a bit.

The soon to be closed Linlithgow garage seems to have some fairly new deckers.

I find the 38 to be quite reliable from first thing in the morning to the late night services between Falkirk and Edinburgh. They do turn up eventually even if late !!!

The one downside is the gap in the service between Edinburgh and Linlithgow early in the mornings - particularly Sundays.

In the past I have had to get a bus to Haymarket , A train to Linlithgow and join the 38 there ( crazy I know but like to utilise the old bus pass)

As I mentioned before Falkirk Bus Station needs the automated departure boards

 

[BuhSnarf]

Is that really such a big problem? When I've used First Bus services sometimes a service has been cancelled and the next one can't take all the passengers and we don't get an apology.

In any other service industry an apology would be defacto given.

Unfortunately it seems most bus drivers don't feel they are a service that is run for customers and that they should take pride in giving a high class service. Sadly that is one of the many reasons that people will prefer a car.

Sent from my Galaxy S2 with Tapatalk.

 

[sonic2009]

What happened to all the Optare solos from the shuttles in Manchester, that were replaced by Optare Versas?.

Sent from my GT-I9000 using Tapatalk

 

[transportphoto]

What happened to all the Optare solos from the shuttles in Manchester, that were replaced by Optare Versas?.

Sent from my GT-I9000 using Tapatalk

We have some of them in Norwich Along with the horrible ex London deckers that seem to be going everywhere! But as always the University route has the new deckers (25/35), the rest of the city only sees hang me downs.

TP

 

[Ivo]

We have some of them in Norwich Along with the horrible ex London deckers that seem to be going everywhere! But as always the University route has the new deckers (25/35), the rest of the city only sees hang me downs.

Solos aren't that bad, although I'm a bit surprised to hear that they're hanging around Norwich. The 25 and X1 aside I don't really know much if anything about the operations there (and even the 25 was because I had a friend who went there a few years ago). And the ex-London deckers aren't that bad either, although you can tell that they were designed for London just from the staircases! I think Hadleigh depot (the one that serves Southend) have 18 of the things, with registrations varying from T-reg to 51-reg. And that's assuming they haven't had any new ones since December.

 

[Blindtraveler]

gotta agree to a point with Butts on the state of some of the fleat I recently had reason to take a return trip on the X19 which had a Gemini on it out and an olimpian on way back. The olie performed better, had nicer seats and rattled less!
Proof that it aint all bad!

 

[BestWestern]

In any other service industry an apology would be defacto given.

Unfortunately it seems most bus drivers don't feel they are a service that is run for customers and that they should take pride in giving a high class service. Sadly that is one of the many reasons that people will prefer a car.

Unfortunately many of the larger bus operators, and some of the less professional smaller ones, instill a total 'lack of care' attitude into their staff by treating them with the bare minimum of respect and rewarding them with the bare minimum of pay. It is often inevitable that drivers will take little pride in their job when they are so frequently made to feel that the job is worthless. It's a scandal that the same companies who look after their railway staff so very well are able to treat their bus colleagues so much worse. Ho hum

Regarding fleet ages, it's worth bearing in mind that First and Stagecoach have different disposal policies. Stagecoach will sell surplus vehicles on for further use when they are no longer required, and so there is a clear benefit in ensuring the maintenance and upkeep is to a generally good standard. First however have a strict policy of not allowing it's unwanted vehicles to be re-used elsewhere, and so they will run everything into the ground with the bare minimum of upkeep, to ensure they get the maximum 'value for money' before eventually giving in to the scrapman. This might well explain why most Stagecoach fleets can manage to turn out a 20 year old bus looking immaculate while First struggle to make anything more than a few years old look vaguely presentable.

 

[tbtc]

Regarding fleet ages, it's worth bearing in mind that First and Stagecoach have different disposal policies. Stagecoach will sell surplus vehicles on for further use when they are no longer required, and so there is a clear benefit in ensuring the maintenance and upkeep is to a generally good standard. First however have a strict policy of not allowing it's unwanted vehicles to be re-used elsewhere, and so they will run everything into the ground with the bare minimum of upkeep, to ensure they get the maximum 'value for money' before eventually giving in to the scrapman. This might well explain why most Stagecoach fleets can manage to turn out a 20 year old bus looking immaculate while First struggle to make anything more than a few years old look vaguely presentable.

Good point - Stagecoach have an incentive to keep their vehicles in a decent state.

First do tend to buy nicer buses (when new), but quickly run them into the ground! I'd take a five/ten year old Stagecoach bus over a First vehicle over a similar age any day.