Tories: Super bus idea

[overthewater]

I dont know what to make of this, I'm not even sure how it would work?

[URL]https://www.conservatives.com/sharethefacts/2019/09/conservative-housing-infrastructure-policy[/URL]

The Strategy will be funded by the £220 million announced in the Spending Review, with half of that funding going towards additional bus services. It will also give local authorities who want to create London-style franchised services in their areas more powers and support to do so.
This plan includes the creation of Britain’s first ever all-electric bus town to help deliver more eco-friendly and better value for money for passengers. We’ll make £50 million available for this project, and we have already invested around £150 million to replace and upgrade the bus fleet.

This will result in more than 1,300 low emission buses on our roads, as well as an extra 263 zero emission buses on the way.

We’re also launching new low-fare, high-frequency ‘superbus’ networks, allowing passengers more choice and lower prices. We will give local authorities the power to partner with bus companies to create new superbus networks. In exchange for the local authority investing more in bus lanes, bus operators will run more services, at a lower cost.

The first superbus network will be launched in Cornwall next year, with fares starting from just £1.

 

[Megafuss]

Well, they could've used a better picture of a bus than that clapped out old Dart

 

[Ianno87]

Well, they could've used a better picture of a bus than that clapped out old Dart

It's the Tories. Probably based on that one and only time they vaguely recall getting on a bus, because it was a drunken dare at Uni or something.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Even funnier is that they have used a photo for a service under threat because of austerity cuts courtesy of..... more details on the link

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-shropshire-47709163

 

[scosutsut]

It could be said the Dart has a lot in common with their policies: unkind to the environment, the elderly and the infirm.

 

[radamfi]

Obviously many people haven't forgiven the Tories for deregulation, but what did Labour do 1997 to 2010? Introduce Quality Contracts which were impossible to implement. There was the Rural Bus Grant and the ENCTS, neither of which helps fare paying adults in urban areas, the key people we need on buses to cut congestion and pollution. We had to wait until the extreme far right Tories of the mid 2010s to allow bus franchising.

 

[buslad1988]

Obviously many people haven't forgiven the Tories for deregulation, but what did Labour do 1997 to 2010? Introduce Quality Contracts which were impossible to implement. There was the Rural Bus Grant and the ENCTS, neither of which helps fare paying adults in urban areas, the key people we need on buses to cut congestion and pollution. We had to wait until the extreme far right Tories of the mid 2010s to allow bus franchising.

Here here - Labour seem to forget the opportunities they had when in power and the burden that now is ENCTS that has arguably crippled the industry. Re-nationalising buses and extending the free travel scheme to under 25’s is crazy, and how would it be paid for?! I’m not even sure how it would work... would the government need to buy all bus companies from Stagecoach, First etc? And there’d be no competition at all? Local councils can’t simply create networks over night - and they need fleets of buses and drivers for the job.

As for the use of the Dart in that conservative promotion thats just typical of how modern media portrays the bus. It’s such a shame as trains and planes don’t seem to suffer that problem. Just adds to the difficulty of trying to get people out of their cars and onto buses! At least Boris has the history of the ‘Borismaster’ and seems to want to make buses attractive and ‘sex them up’ (for want of a better phrase!).

 

[Megafuss]

Now, if someone would bring back the Kickstarter funding as a policy. That could be a winner

 

[Busaholic]

Surprised they didn't dig out an old photo of an AEC Swift on Stevenage's SuperBus Network from the early 1970s, the SB prefix for the routes and the SB on the sides of the buses, which included Metro Scanias, being later unimaginatively amended to Stevenage Bus.

 

[NorthOxonian]

When it comes to the first all-electric bus town, I suspect that would be Harrogate? The town services are already electric, most services are run by just one operator, and it has relatively few interurban services. Plus it's a fairly marginal seat where the Conservatives will want to try and be in the locals' good books where possible.

 

[winston270twm]

Even funnier is that they have used a photo for a service under threat because of austerity cuts courtesy of..... more details on the link

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-shropshire-47709163

Cornwall seems a odd choice for the launch of the first high frequency 'Superbus' networks.... other than Truro, most other parts of Cornwall are mostly just seaside towns & pretty rural in between.

 

[edwin_m]

Cornwall seems a odd choice for the launch of the first high frequency 'Superbus' networks.... other than Truro, most other parts of Cornwall are mostly just seaside towns & pretty rural in between.

The council and First do seem to be trying to do something a little different there, so they may be wanting to take some credit for that in an area with plenty of marginal seats.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Here here - Labour seem to forget the opportunities they had when in power and the burden that now is ENCTS that has arguably crippled the industry. Re-nationalising buses and extending the free travel scheme to under 25’s is crazy, and how would it be paid for?! I’m not even sure how it would work... would the government need to buy all bus companies from Stagecoach, First etc? And there’d be no competition at all? Local councils can’t simply create networks over night - and they need fleets of buses and drivers for the job.

As for the use of the Dart in that conservative promotion thats just typical of how modern media portrays the bus. It’s such a shame as trains and planes don’t seem to suffer that problem. Just adds to the difficulty of trying to get people out of their cars and onto buses! At least Boris has the history of the ‘Borismaster’ and seems to want to make buses attractive and ‘sex them up’ (for want of a better phrase!).

I don't know how many haven't forgiven the tories for deregulation; not something that I hear on the bus and, to be honest, there are many more acts that the Tories are held culpable on during the Thatcher/Major era. As we know, bus use was falling since the 1950s so hardly a roaring success.

Fact is that for years, transport hasn't been a major issue for voters (and by that, for politicians except a few more visionary ones). Even those things that have been dolled out have had very political motives. The Rural Bus Grant was merely a distraction tactic to mollify the issues with the increases in fuel prices and how that allegedly is disproportionately impacted on the rural populace. ENCTS was an election bribe to those people who are most likely to vote.

I'm a traditional labour voter (i.e. I don't like Corbyn, Momentum and the bunch of deadbeats like Diane Abbott and Richard Burgon). I wanted them to be bolder in the Blair/Brown years but appreciate the "ming vase" strategy in 1997 but they could have done more subsequently. I'd like to have seen more investment and boldness in areas such as bus priority and infrastructure so that buses have an advantage. Make it a condition for planning regs for developments over X number of houses. They did have things like Kickstart where both parties have "skin in the game" but again, they perhaps had more of an eye on the NHS and education.

As it is, Cornwall is an area where buses are much improved in quality from First. The amount of new fleet that has arrived in the county in the last three years is quite something. The council have also supported services (to an extent) but also have improved infrastructure at bus stops and bus stations, as well as improving connectivity with the trains. It is still far from perfect, as we've seen with the recent Ride Cornwall kerfuffle. However, all of that has been made possible by money being provided by the government under the devolution deal (as the Tories continue to hollow out the state). Beware of Tories bearing gifts is what I'd say though...

 

[PG]

Beware of Tories bearing gifts is what I'd say though...

What they giveth with one hand they taketh with the other...

 

[winston270twm]

The council and First do seem to be trying to do something a little different there, so they may be wanting to take some credit for that in an area with plenty of marginal seats.

Granted, but Cornwall is predominantly a rural location with seasonal demand due to it being a popular holiday destination, but some of the seaside towns are dead this time of year.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Granted, but Cornwall is predominantly a rural location with seasonal demand due to it being a popular holiday destination, but some of the seaside towns are dead this time of year.

You're both right.

Cornwall is a rural county. In summer, it has plenty of tourists that cause traffic chaos but also provide a decent wedge for bus companies and keeps the local economy buoyant. Outside of that, you have the long winter with limited usage although extensive college services, the University at Falmouth, and some good core services that serve the main commercial and industrial area in the centre of the county.

However, it has received a fair chunk of cash from the devolution deal with the option either to use it for franchising or for partnership. They chose the latter, subject to First playing ball that, in fairness, they have. It is still a county that has few frequent services (mainly around the main Tinner corridor and the Unibus services) and local routes have declined in recent years as in many counties where a service was lost and partially replaced by a diversion of an interurban route.

Cornwall was always strongly Liberal but the Tories targeted it and in 2015, routed the LDs. There are some marginals but given how big a Leave vote in the referendum, I'm not certain that it's a risky area that needs this sort of election bribe.

 

[SCH117X]

When it comes to the first all-electric bus town, I suspect that would be Harrogate? The town services are already electric, most services are run by just one operator, and it has relatively few interurban services. Plus it's a fairly marginal seat where the Conservatives will want to try and be in the locals' good books where possible.

The "relatively few interurban services" do however dominate operations; the electric local services account for less than a third of each hours departures from the bus station and those interurban operations feature three operators and across the board not sure how electric vehicles fit with low cost operators.

 

[Busaholic]

You're both right.

Cornwall is a rural county. In summer, it has plenty of tourists that cause traffic chaos but also provide a decent wedge for bus companies and keeps the local economy buoyant. Outside of that, you have the long winter with limited usage although extensive college services, the University at Falmouth, and some good core services that serve the main commercial and industrial area in the centre of the county.

However, it has received a fair chunk of cash from the devolution deal with the option either to use it for franchising or for partnership. They chose the latter, subject to First playing ball that, in fairness, they have. It is still a county that has few frequent services (mainly around the main Tinner corridor and the Unibus services) and local routes have declined in recent years as in many counties where a service was lost and partially replaced by a diversion of an interurban route.

Cornwall was always strongly Liberal but the Tories targeted it and in 2015, routed the LDs. There are some marginals but given how big a Leave vote in the referendum, I'm not certain that it's a risky area that needs this sort of election bribe.

When the Leavers in Cornwall finally wake up and see how much money the EU formerly provided is not being replaced, the Tories may find they need bigger bribes than this. Actually, Cornwall Council, a Unitary Authority, has more clout than you might realise. It has a wholly owned subsidiary Cormac which gets construction and other work allocated to it by the council and other public and private organisations. The need for some of these jobs to be put out to tender if worth more than £1 million is circumvented by their worth conveniently falling a few thousand short, even though the actual cost often far exceeds this! The council veers in political control between the Conservatives and the LibDems, with coalition support from independents and other smaller parties. As we've not had local elections for some considerable time due to political shenanigans, the LibDems remain in power for the present.