London Buses Discussion

[TWBG]

How’s the progress on the MCV EV bodied Volvo BZL Electrics for the 58, 276, 277, D7 and N277?

 

[MasterSpenny]

There have been electric buses in Go Ahead London’s fleet for 10 years now!
Now, that doesn’t feel that long ago…

Go-Ahead London marks 10 years of electric buses

Go-Ahead London has celebrated the 10th anniversary of the introduction of the capital's first current-generation battery-electric bus.

www.route-one.net

Go-Ahead London marks 10 years of electric buses​

Go-Ahead London has celebrated the 10th anniversary of the introduction of the capital’s first current-generation battery-electric bus.

Exactly a decade on from the start of a trial of a pair of BYD K9Es in London, school children and other guests were invited to the event in Camberwell, where a bus-shaped birthday cake was cut.

The operator now runs 520 zero-emission buses for Transport for London (TfL) and plans to take this into to four figures by 2026. Across the UK, the Go-Ahead Group operates 670 zero-emission buses.

As noted by TfL in September, more than 1,100 battery-electric bus are in operation in London, representing 13% of the entire fleet.

Go-Ahead London says its fleet has led to a saving of 40,000 tonnes of cardon dioxide emissions over the last 10 years, the equivalent to taking 24,000 cars off the road.

David Cutts, Managing Director of Go-Ahead London, says: “It’s hard to believe it’s been 10 years since our first electric bus hit the road. The technology has developed at a rapid pace and electric buses are rapidly become the norm, rather than the exception, on London’s streets.

“We’re proud to work in partnership with Transport for London to deliver cleaner air and quieter journeys for Londoners. The Go-Ahead Group as a whole has been able to take experience from London and apply it to the roll-out of zero emission buses across the UK.”

Tom Cunnington, TfL’s Head of Buses Business Development, adds: “London’s red buses are iconic and are some of the greenest in the world, with the lower CO2 emissions per passenger kilometres compared to other global cities like New York, Paris and Vancouver.

“With more than 1,300 zero emission buses on our roads, our programme of decarbonising the fleet is playing a crucial role in the journey to net-zero. Zero-emission buses help Londoners breathe cleaner air and reduce the impact of road transport on our environment.

“We’re really proud to be celebrating this milestone with Go-Ahead London who are marking 10 years of their emission-free electric bus services on our roads.

“We are working closely with capital’s bus operators to convert the whole fleet and remain on track to be a fully zero-emission fleet by 2034, which could be accelerated to 2030 with further Government funding.”

 

[Edvid]

By chance I've learned that some TfL tickets/passes* are valid on the non-TfL 477, albeit for journeys within Greater London only (Orpington - Crouch Farm).

That provision doesn't apply to other London Service Permit routes, so what's special about that particular route?

[* Travelcards, Bus & Tram Passes, Freedom Passes and 11-15 Zip / Veteran / 60+ London Oyster photocards]

 

[Goldfish62]

By chance I've learned that some TfL tickets/passes* are valid on the non-TfL 477, albeit for journeys within Greater London only (Orpington - Crouch Farm).

That provision doesn't apply to other London Service Permit routes, so what's special about that particular route?

[* Travelcards, Bus & Tram Passes, Freedom Passes and 11-15 Zip / Veteran / 60+ London Oyster photocards]

Freedom passes legally have to be accepted on local bus services under LSPs. London Council provides the appropriate reimbursement. Eg routes into Kingston and Heathrow also accept Freedom passes.

As for the others, do you have reference to a fare chart? I know there are some concessions within Greater London but don't recall the acceptance being quite so broad as you've listed.

The 477 used to be under a London local service agreement where Arriva were required to charge TfL fares in Greater London, but they pulled out of this some years ago. Since then they've habitually had limited acceptance of TfL fares/passes, but get no reimbursement for this.

 

[MotCO]

By chance I've learned that some TfL tickets/passes* are valid on the non-TfL 477, albeit for journeys within Greater London only (Orpington - Crouch Farm).

That provision doesn't apply to other London Service Permit routes, so what's special about that particular route?

[* Travelcards, Bus & Tram Passes, Freedom Passes and 11-15 Zip / Veteran / 60+ London Oyster photocards]

Do TfL subidise this route within the GLA boundary, whereas other LSP routes are commercial?

 

[Edvid]

As for the others, do you have reference to a fare chart? I know there are some concessions within Greater London but don't recall the acceptance being quite so broad as you've listed.

Acceptance of those products is listed in Appendix 1 of the TfL Conditions of Carriage (page 27 onwards).

https://content.tfl.gov.uk/tfl-conditions-of-carriage.pdf

The 477 used to be under a London local service agreement where Arriva were required to charge TfL fares in Greater London, but they pulled out of this some years ago. Since then they've habitually had limited acceptance of TfL fares/passes, but get no reimbursement for this.

No reimbursement? Can't say I was expecting that.

Hypothetically speaking, in the event of TfL seeking acceptance of Z1-8 travelcards on the whole route (for the benefit of Swanley and Dartford), I imagine Arriva would want reimbursement.

 

[Goldfish62]

No reimbursement? Can't say I was expecting that.

Hypothetically speaking, in the event of TfL seeking acceptance of Z1-8 travelcards on the whole route (for the benefit of Swanley and Dartford), I imagine Arriva would want reimbursement.

TfL doesn't seek acceptance. There's no legal mechanism to do so and neither is there such a mechanism for reimbursing Arriva (s187(3) of the GLA act prohibits any conditions regarding fares being attached to an LSP).

As for why Arriva still accept certain passes, I imagine it's too much hassle to stop doing so after all this time. It's not a huge part of the route after all.

 

[Busaholic]

By chance I've learned that some TfL tickets/passes* are valid on the non-TfL 477, albeit for journeys within Greater London only (Orpington - Crouch Farm).

That provision doesn't apply to other London Service Permit routes, so what's special about that particular route?

[* Travelcards, Bus & Tram Passes, Freedom Passes and 11-15 Zip / Veteran / 60+ London Oyster photocards]

It also used to apply to non-TfL 402 in much the same area and with the same operator until it was withdrawn from Greater London.

The 84 route was another with 'special status' dating back into the mists of time, and has been the subject of learned articles in specialist publications.

 

[Goldfish62]

It also used to apply to non-TfL 402 in much the same area and with the same operator until it was withdrawn from Greater London.

The 84 route was another with 'special status' dating back into the mists of time, and has been the subject of learned articles in specialist publications.

Yes indeed. I'm actually a bit surprised the 477 still exists in Greater London.

 

[MotCO]

Yes indeed. I'm actually a bit surprised the 477 still exists in Greater London.

Orpington, just inside the boundary, is probably seen as an important traffic objective with the station and shops. It probably generates traffic from outside the boundary for those who would not otherwise catch this bus.

 

[Edvid]

Sticking with cross-boundary routes, I see Abellio have taken the deep-into-Surrey 465 from RATP. From LOTS:

Friday 22 December

LBSL intends to enter into new contracts for the following routes with the operators listed below:

Route	Current Operator	New Operator	PVR​	Vehicles
411	London United	London United	5​	Existing diesel single deck
465	London United	Abellio West London	7​	Existing diesel single deck

The diesel vehicles detailed above will meet Euro VI emissions standards.

The start and end dates for the above contracts are detailed in the following table:

Route	Contract Start Date​	Contract End Date​
411	28th September 2024​	27th September 2030​
465	29th June 2024​	28th June 2030​

 

[Busaholic]

Yes indeed. I'm actually a bit surprised the 477 still exists in Greater London.

I briefly owned and worked in a shop in Orpington when the Roundabout stand-alone operation started in 1986, the forerunner of the current R routes, and was surprised that the section of the 477 within Greater London wasn't incorporated into it. My understanding was that London Country South East wouldn't play ball (Swanley Garage, which operated the 477, had just gained the contract to run the 51, so they may have had big ambitions.) In the event, putting a bunch of clapped out ex-Glasgow Atlanteans on the 51 impressed no-one, especially as they hadn't recruited enough drivers (or mechanics!)

 

[Cesarcollie]

Sticking with cross-boundary routes, I see Abellio have taken the deep-into-Surrey 465 from RATP. From LOTS:

Friday 22 December

LBSL intends to enter into new contracts for the following routes with the operators listed below:

Route	Current Operator	New Operator	PVR​	Vehicles
411	London United	London United	5​	Existing diesel single deck
465	London United	Abellio West London	7​	Existing diesel single deck

The diesel vehicles detailed above will meet Euro VI emissions standards.

The start and end dates for the above contracts are detailed in the following table:

​

Route	Contract Start Date​	Contract End Date​
411	28th September 2024​	27th September 2030​
465	29th June 2024​	28th June 2030​

The 465 has been operated by Abellio previously (or certainly its predecessor TGM)

 

[Busaholic]

The 465 has been operated by Abellio previously (or certainly its predecessor TGM)

TGM was part of Arriva, surely, and National Express before that?

 

[Goldfish62]

TGM was part of Arriva, surely, and National Express before that?

Apart from a stint in Midland Fox ownership (a complete shambles!) TGM operated London contracts as an independent, having being bought back by Steve Telling in 1993. It was sold to Arriva in 2007.

 

[AB93]

TGM was part of Arriva, surely, and National Express before that?

TGM London operations (and Byfleet ops in Surrey) sold to National Express in 2005 as part of Travel London, including the then 465 contract. That then became Abellio on sale in 2009.
TGM itself was sold to Arriva in 2007 (December) as mentioned above.

Slightly confusingly, the 465 contract was lost by Travel London/NatEx from June 2007 to Arriva (who ran it until 2009), but that was a different part of Arriva, being run from the Southern Counties depot at Warnham! (Until sold to Metrobus in October 2009.)

 

[renegademaster]

There have been electric buses in Go Ahead London’s fleet for 10 years now!
Now, that doesn’t feel that long ago…

Go-Ahead London marks 10 years of electric buses

Go-Ahead London has celebrated the 10th anniversary of the introduction of the capital's first current-generation battery-electric bus.

www.route-one.net

Some of the older electric buses are quite horrible reliability wise; it's a lottery what bus is going to turn up. Sometimes an electric Optare, sometimes a double decker or single decker diesel.

 

[dmncf]

There have been electric buses in Go Ahead London’s fleet for 10 years now!
Now, that doesn’t feel that long ago…

Go-Ahead London marks 10 years of electric buses

Go-Ahead London has celebrated the 10th anniversary of the introduction of the capital's first current-generation battery-electric bus.

www.route-one.net

If you Google "LC63CYA" that's shown in the article, sad photos show that this BYD K-9 vehicle is no longer on the road today. But of course this vehicle was a demonstrator. I wonder how the 'production series' BYD D9UR vehicles from routes 507/521 are doing these days - do they still have their original batteries?

 

[Goldfish62]

I wonder how the 'production series' BYD D9UR vehicles from routes 507/521 are doing these days - do they still have their original batteries?

I believe so.

 

[Edvid]

Some of the older electric buses are quite horrible reliability wise; it's a lottery what bus is going to turn up. Sometimes an electric Optare, sometimes a double decker or single decker diesel.

Sounds like you're talking about the Metrocities on the 312.

Going by Tangytango chatter it appears they're still on their original batteries after 8/9 years of service. New batteries would surely help - especially with a route extension planned for March 2024 - but they likely won't come cheap, and Arriva's 312 contract has less than 2 years left as things stand.

 

[PGAT]

Sounds like you're talking about the Metrocities on the 312.

Going by Tangytango chatter it appears they're still on their original batteries after 8/9 years of service. New batteries would surely help - especially with a route extension planned for March 2024 - but they likely won't come cheap, and Arriva's 312 contract has less than 2 years left as things stand.

Looks like they’re gonna be in trouble, since double deckers can’t substitute for the Metrocities after the extension due to a low bridge at Old Lodge Lane

 

[Goldfish62]

Sounds like you're talking about the Metrocities on the 312.

And these are old technology now, so they've lasted pretty well if they haven't had a battery change yet.

 

[Somewhere]

The argument applies to public services. Incidentally, such trade-offs can happen even in unpleasant regimes - average life expectancy in Cuba is higher than for poorer people in the USA.



How does competitive tendering magically make things cheaper? Other than by pushing down wages of the staff of course. There's little else that can be varied. I've obviously read different history...

Creative accountancy, most likely

 

[MotCO]

The busiest buses in London has been revealed by the Daily Mail. However, what they mean is the busiest bus stop as measured by how packed the buses are at that stop.

London's busiest bus routes operating at up to 96% occupancy

The busiest section of any London route is the 482 from Southall to Heathrow, at the Great West Road stop in Hounslow with an average peak capacity of 96 per cent at 5am.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Revealed: London's busiest bus routes with some services operating at 96% occupancy at peak times... where's the most packed section of YOUR route?

London's most packed buses have an average peak occupancy of up to 96 per cent, MailOnline can reveal as the full list of the busiest section of all routes was released.

Transport for London (TfL) has made internal data public on peak bus occupancy levels based on the busiest section of each route by location, time and direction.

The busiest section of any route is the 482 from Southall to Heathrow, at the Great West Road stop in Hounslow, with an average peak capacity of 96 per cent at 5am.

This is thought to be due to large numbers of workers and passengers heading to Britain's busiest airport before the first Piccadilly line train runs on the same route.

The second busiest route is the N18 night bus from Harrow to Whitehall, which has a 92 per cent average capacity at 5am at the Wyld Way bus stop in Stonebridge Park.





The busiest section of any London bus route is the 482 from Southall to Heathrow, at the Great West Road stop in Hounslow (pictured), with an average peak capacity of 96 per cent at 5am



In third place is the Superloop SL9 - previously known as the X140 - from Harrow to Heathrow - with a 91 per cent capacity at 7am at White Hart Roundabout in Yeading.

The six busiest sections of London bus routes

1) 482 Southall to Heathrow

• Stop - Great West Rd / Basildene Rd
• Peak: 96% capacity at 5am

2) N18 Harrow to Whitehall

• Stop - Wyld Way
• Peak: 92% capacity at 5am

3) SL9 [X140] Heathrow to Harrow

• Stop - Yeading / White Hart R'about
• Peak: 91% capacity at 7am

4) 265 Tolworth to Putney

• Stop - Fairacres
• Peak: 89% capacity at 4pm

5) 487 Harrow to Willesden

• Stop - Cleveley Crescent
• Peak: 88% capacity at 5.45am

6) W6 Edmonton to Southgate

• Stop - North Middlesex Hospital
• Peak: 88% capacity at 7.45am

The 265 from Tolworth to Putney comes in fourth with an 89 per cent capacity at 4pm at Fairacres bus stop in Barnes.

Following closely behind are two routes both at 88 per cent capacity - the 487 from Harrow to Willesden at 5.45am at Cleveley Crescent stop; and the W6 from Edmonton to Southgate at 7.45am at North Middlesex Hospital.

TfL released data for every bus route in London following a Freedom of Information (FOI) request made in October 2023 for the average peak bus occupancy of capacity provided on the busiest section of each route.

The figures come from TfL's 'Busto' dataset giving a snapshot of bus demand in November 2022, which is usually the network's busiest period of the year.

It calculated an average from several weekdays during that month and is used to represent an average weekday.

The bus occupancy was given as the total load divided by the total capacity in each hour, with the peak being the highest and the associated hour termed the busiest.

The direction and location of where that peak occupancy occurs was also given. TfL uses quarter hour intervals - so, for example, 7.30am represents the 60-minute interval from 7.30am to 8.30am.

Calculations from the data also revealed there are 608 different bus routes in London, and the average peak hourly bus occupancy on all routes is 56 per cent.

Separate data from TfL previously revealed that the busiest bus stop in London is Marble Arch stop R, where 7,500 people board on a typical weekday.

This is followed by Wood Green station stop H, Stratford bus station stop A, Elephant and Castle station stop R, Woolwich Arsenal station stop N and Harrow bus station stop B.



The second busiest route is the N18 night bus from Harrow to Whitehall, which has a 92 per cent average capacity at 5am at the Wyld Way bus stop (pictured) in Stonebridge Park

Other TfL data shows the busiest bus route in London is the 18 between Sudbury and Euston which carried 12.6million passengers in the 2022/23 recording period.

This was followed by the 149 route from Edmonton to London Bridge which carried 12million, and the 29 from Turnpike Lane to Trafalgar Square which had 11.3million.

A TfL spokesperson told MailOnline: 'Buses play a vital role in enabling people across the capital to travel affordably and sustainably and we're working hard to improve services, including through the launch of the new Superloop network which will transform travel for millions of Londoners.

'Data such as this is hugely important to us when planning the capital's bus services and enables us to run services which benefit everyone.'

I actually wonder this is a good indicator of how busy a bus route is. I have taken the PVR of each route, divided by its length. Clearly a high PVR may be required because the route is so long and vice versa. Source: http://www.londonbusroutes.net/details.htm

The highest PVR per mile is route W7, with a PVR of 17 over its 3 mile route:

Busiest:
Rank		Route		PVR	Length	PVR per Mile
1​		W7		17	3	5.667​
2​		38​		36	7	5.143​
3​		73​		29	6	4.833​
4​		29​		31	7	4.429​
5​		18​		35	9	3.889​
6=​		EL1		19	5	3.800​
6=​		41​		19	5	3.800​
8​		55​		34	9	3.778​
9​		453​		30	8	3.750​
10=​		63​		26	7	3.714​
10=​		109​		26	7	3.714​
Least busy:​
Rank​		Route		PVR	Length	PVR per Mile
1​		347​		1	12	0.083​
2=​		375​		1	8	0.125​
2=​		R5/R10		1	8​	0.125
2=​		R8		1	8	0.125​
5=​		H3		1	6	0.167​
5=​		146​		1	6	0.167​
5=​		U10		1	6	0.167​
8=​		549​		1	5	0.200​
8=​		242​		2	10	0.200​
10​		246​		4	15	0.267​

 

[TWBG]

VMSL2846 (LF73DXK) is now at Edgware bus garage (EW)

Metroline have released a publication about their electrification process

2023: A year of Electrifying Progress for Metroline - Metroline

Having paved the way for zero emissions with 2 electrified garages, the first double deck electric buses in London and end-to-end electric routes, this year saw the electrification of Edgware and the commencement of works at Willesden Junction. With Cricklewood and Perivale set to follow in the...

www.metroline.co.uk

 

[MasterSpenny]

I can’t believe this has even happened, DW424 fell into a pit at a garage…
https://x.com/thatoptarelover/status/1743020150465442018?s=46&t=NwCcaynuPR-k7xjMa0OtGQ

Needs saving by TW.

 

[Busaholic]

I can’t believe this has even happened, DW424 fell into a pit at a garage…
https://x.com/thatoptarelover/status/1743020150465442018?s=46&t=NwCcaynuPR-k7xjMa0OtGQ

Quite easily I'd say, I could probably do it.

 

[MotCO]

I can’t believe this has even happened, DW424 fell into a pit at a garage…
https://x.com/thatoptarelover/status/1743020150465442018?s=46&t=NwCcaynuPR-k7xjMa0OtGQ

Ouch! What is TW by the way?

 

[dodecahedron67]

Ouch! What is TW by the way?

Tunbridge Wells arriva depot, has a reputation for saving the unsaveable of buses

 

[Hophead]

Tunbridge Wells arriva depot, has a reputation for saving the unsaveable of buses

And then operating them locally