And for someone in Taddy or Bethnal Green exactly how many Manchester-Leeds City Zaps have you seen. And what of all the people who have tweeted pictures of reasonably full vehicles.
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317 forever
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I am just curious as to what route reallocations have occurred.
Seems to be a lot of complaints about Rosso reliability this week. Roadworks aren't helping, but there are also suggestions the fleet, for one reason or another, isn't running very well, and they also seem keener than usual to recruit drivers. Their contact address has been moved to Burnley, rather than anywhere they actually operate many services.
Baxenden Bank
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The buses moved to Burnley too. The contact address is where many of the services are operated from, seems sensible to me.
Overheard on the bus 'all of the drivers who had visited Queensgate (Burnley depot) for driver familiarisation elected to work from Rochdale instead'.
My mum waited 45 minutes last week for a bus out of Accrington - supposed to be 4 per hour on the 464 and 2 per hour on the stupendously mangled X41. When I was in Haslingden, there was a dead 464 transferring it's passengers to the following service. Only a random observation but that's how it was. Also picked up a copy of the old route map still in the on bus rack!
A lot of their buses are in Rochdale as well, and they seem to operate more buses in Greater Manchester than Rossendale nowadays.
It would also seem to me to make sense when they've moved the buses from Haslingden to Burnley and Blackburn to change the timetables so more buses finish in those towns, or Accrington on the 464. I was at the Waggoners just out of Burnley the other evening, and there must have been a dozen Rosso buses pass not in service.
I won't be surprised if the new X41 routing doesn't work and the route is axed entirely. They must be betting on filling the buses in Ramsbottom - however there is presumably a reason why no one was already doing that. But what can you do if it's losing money?
Might be partly explained by these tweets from Apr 17 :
We would like to apologise to our 464 customers for the recent delays to this route at Peak times. There are 3 way temporary traffic lights situated in Bacup centre causing lengthy delays.
We apologise for delays on route X41 Red Express in Manchester which are being caused by severe traffic congestion.
Baxenden Bank
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I was looking at that the other day. There is a requirement of just two buses for the Rossendale local services nowadays (routes 10 to 13) and one for the 466. Everything else operates routes that start/end outside the borough.
I suspect that will happen in due course. The times involved aren't that great anyway - less than 20 minutes Accrington to Intack. Over Grane from Intack to Haslingden. As you saw, through Crawshawplonk from Queensgate to Rawtenstall.
It is quite common nowadays for operators to run than sort of distance 'private' to take up service. In the Potteries most buses have that sort of pre-service run. Running all the way from Bury to Burnley seems excessive. Time for a new depot in the Bury area! Des anyone know of any premises, close to the interchange, suitable for bus maintenance?
The reasons given (that Blackburn - Manchester traffic has been lost to the improved train service) is, I suspect, something of a red herring. It is intermediate traffic and traffic from the intermediate points to Manchester rather than Blackburn to Manchester which the route serves.
I suspect it will be soon be diverted via Bury town centre, thus eliminating the motorway section entirely. As with the recent revision, passengers will still be able to make most journeys they can now, they will just be slower (and much less attractive).
I get the off-peak requirement to be:
Pure Rossendale - 3 buses for the 10, 11, 12, 13 and 466.
Mainline 464 - 11 buses.
Bury - Rawtenstall and beyond 481/2/3 - 10 buses.
Rochdale local services - 7 buses.
Bury local services - 19 buses.
Rochdale to Bury service - 9 buses.
I hadn't realised Rochdale was such a small operation vehicle wise.
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Baxenden Bank
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Those three ways will be:
Back in time; further back in time; and ancient history.
Bacup, what a town. The town that ought to have been Royston Vasey (The League of Gentlemen). The town where they still have street performers 'blacked-up'. It's tradition you know.
Posting 89 in the thread gave the allocation of the vehicles, which are 13 B7RLEs and 4 Geminis to Intack and 9 B7RLEs, 7 Presidents, 6 Geminis and 8 Solos to Burnley with Rochdale having the rest of the Rosso fleet. The Tottington Line Streetlights for example only need to travel the 7 miles to Bury from Rochdale rather than the 20 miles from Burnley
185143
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Try the err... bus depot closed by WorstBus!
I assume that’s what they were getting at.
The old First depot is far too big though. The Greater Manchester depot would make sense to be more towards Bury than Rochdale, although they do run lots of school routes in both areas.
One thing of note is that all the Solo worked Bury locals are being run out of Burnley, with presumably dead runs all the way between the two towns.
Regarding reliability, when I used the 464 the other Saturday, there were first roadworks in Rochdale Town Centre, then the 3 way lights in Bacup, then once through them, more roadworks with temporary lights in Waterfoot.
The old First depot is far too big though. The Greater Manchester depot would make sense to be more towards Bury than Rochdale, although they do run lots of school routes in both areas.
One thing of note is that all the Solo worked Bury locals are being run out of Burnley, with presumably dead runs all the way between the two towns.
Regarding reliability, when I used the 464 the other Saturday, there were first roadworks in Rochdale Town Centre, then the 3 way lights in Bacup, then once through them, more roadworks with temporary lights in Waterfoot.
Lack of space, or lack of sufficient drivers, at Rochdale?
TheGrandWazoo
Veteran Member
Apart from being too large, and being a massive fixed cost, I think the plan is to redevelop the site.
Another branded service has been launched - Lakeline for the Rochdale-Littleborough service with Streetline SK66HRE (a pre Transdev purchase now with fleet no 612) in a blue/yellow livery. Flickr photo https://www.flickr.com/photos/jongr...VCs-LDiAkC-LNTHXH-LFRqYz-KRKJSx-Ln8q75-KRhcNH
I doubt many people care about the branding when the timetable is a work of fiction, and that's assuming there is actually a bus running your route at all today. This week they've said on Twitter : "We are sorry for the issues, and these are symptomatic of us heightening standards in vehicle quality."
As long as it doesn't break down more than walking distance from their destination, I suspect most passengers would rather a rust bucket with a knackered engine than routinely waiting over an hour for a bus supposedly running every 15 mins.
Off-topic, going back to Blackburn's poor bus services, Moving People have announced another cut this week, axing the 33, thus leaving Hoddlesden and Lower Darwen without any buses.
The Littleborough circulars are subsidised IIRC, how long does the contract have to run?
Solo/Darts have to be the most common, doesn't stop other single deckers straying onto it though.
Sam
Not exactly plain English that. Reading between the lines could it be that Intack and Queensgate have found issues with the standard of maintenance of the Rosso vehicles they have been allocated. It would not to be first time a Council owned operation had been running things on very cost saving basis, one such operator was reported as running vehicles on non recommended tyre pressure to extend tyre life but at what cost to suspension components?
Stan Drews
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There is certainly a noticeable difference in the standards of the internal/external appearance of the Rosso buses, when compared with the native Blackburn/Burnley Bus Co buses, so if that is evident underneath too, then you may well be right.
Tetchytyke
Veteran Member
It's (obviously, because they can't really say it publicly) a guarded way of saying the buses they've inherited haven't been looked after very well.
Clean, well maintained buses might be nice to have, but they've got to be careful on costs. Rosso have managed to keep the buses on the road, and for most passengers who don't have a choice of transport thats good enough. Transdev's Burnley and Pendle and Lancashire United operations have no tendered regular bus routes and very few school runs. If Rosso goes the same way it practically won't exist especially with franchising to come.
Pink/purple for the 464? Is there any colour Transdev haven't painted a bus? https://mobile.twitter.com/Rossobus/status/991390755011907584/photo/1
Stan Drews
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For a fair comparison, Rosso only have one regular tendered contract with LCC and no tendered LCC/BwD school runs, so very similar to the Transdev Blazefield ops in Lancs. Across in Yorks Transdev have a wide variety of tendered school and regular bus routes, so no reason to think they won’t have a similar level of success in GM. I’m sure they’ll have gains and losses, just like Rosso have had over the years.
Some recent journeys on Rosso routes have shown a big difference in the standard of internal and external vehicle presentation, when compared with the nearby Transdev offerings from their Blackburn and Burnley depots. So, not a great surprise to hear they have been struggling with vehicle availability for Rosso routes, if they are now trying to introduce the same higher maintenance standards. Also good to hear that they are taking action and bringing in some additional buses to assist.
That one contract does cover all tendered services in Rossendale though. I thought they had more school runs - looking at the council's lists, it turns out Rosso have won quite a few contracts in the last few years but aren't actually running them. Rosso certainly do have lots of contracts in GM though.
They'll have to hope you're right about their future success in GM given how dependent Rosso is on it. What's not likely to be franchised if it happens - the 464, that Lancashire CC contract, the Lancashire parts of the 48x routes? If they lose Bury and Rochdale Transdev won't have bought much of a bus company.
Tetchytyke
Veteran Member
There is being careful on costs and there is cutting corners. I wouldn't know whether it's the former or the latter, but clearly Transdev are implying that there is remedial work required on the vehicles they've bought.
As for franchising, Transdev wouldn't have problems maintaining their market share if they need to. They have been good at winning tendered contracts in West and North Yorkshire. I'd have no reason to think that Transdev Blazefield would suddenly lose their touch now.
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