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Worst Bus and Operator

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ReverendFozz

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Again a follow, this time going on from the best bus and operator thread.

What is peoples nominations for the worst.

Mine would be Arriva North East, some of there buses were around when Noah built the Ark, some of the drivers are so miserable at times and my local Arriva Services do not understand the concept of a timetable and how to keep to it.

As for worst vehicle, it would be the Marshall Dart that Go North East used to run on there Service 60 a few years ago, my mate is a driver and once opened the doors on the Marshall and one of the doors fell off.

In the case of Double Deckers, any GNE Yellow Decker and the East Lancs Pyoneers that GNE took off the road lately
 
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trentside

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We've had quite a few bad operators around here, but things seem to be on the up now. Our worst had to be MASS Transit, despite having a great fleet of Titans and Nationals, the reliability, maintenance and service performance was shocking. Their Lincoln operation was sold to Dunn-Line, who in turn sold to Veolia - the improvements were marginal, but Veolia later managed to sink to similar lows.

As for the worst bus, Stagecoach Lincolnshire's fleet of East Lancashire Myllenium bodied MAN 14.220s and DAF SB220s. Rattly, horrible, unreliable things with no leg room.
 

MK Tom

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Arriva in the Aylesbury area for me. They have total unchallenged monopoly and have the most bizarre practise of assigning double deckers to quiet rural routes and single deckers to packed intercity ones. Late running is more common than on time in my experience and the condition of the vehicles is not brilliant.
 

trentside

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Arriva in the Aylesbury area for me. They have total unchallenged monopoly and have the most bizarre practise of assigning double deckers to quiet rural routes and single deckers to packed intercity ones. Late running is more common than on time in my experience and the condition of the vehicles is not brilliant.

Stagecoach Lincolnshire also often assign double deckers to quiet country routes. There seem to be two main driving factors, the fact that they don't want high floored buses on the town services and the need to do school runs, which inter-work with the rural routes. It still seems bizarre to see a packed Optare Solo leaving the bus station, followed by an empty double decker.
 

ReverendFozz

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GNE always put a double decker on the Seaham-Durham 65 route, the only time it is busy is the service about 8am and 3pm-5pm, a single decker would be better between 9am and 3pm with deckers at peak times
 

Firesprite

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Stagecoach in the Fens. Unreliable old wrecks which are forever breakdown. Buses always late, often not been cleaned and the heating not turned on in the winter (Always turn on in the summer to dump heat from the overheating engine).
 

martinsh

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What - 6 months in this thread, and nobody has yet mentioned any "First" operator ?!:shock:

First Potteries - shocking unreliability, and bunching of buses on 20 min interval services. Most vehicles are wrecks as well (though my local route uses nice Scania Omnicitys)
 

redthunder

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Any first operator that has an FTR in its fleet needs SHOOTING!!!!! They are horrid buses!!!!!!

But in terms of customer service the worst ive experienced is Centrebus (and the driving standards are terrible too)
 

deltic1989

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We've had quite a few bad operators around here, but things seem to be on the up now. Our worst had to be MASS Transit, despite having a great fleet of Titans and Nationals, the reliability, maintenance and service performance was shocking. Their Lincoln operation was sold to Dunn-Line, who in turn sold to Veolia - the improvements were marginal, but Veolia later managed to sink to similar lows.

As for the worst bus, Stagecoach Lincolnshire's fleet of East Lancashire Myllenium bodied MAN 14.220s and DAF SB220s. Rattly, horrible, unreliable things with no leg room.

I'll second that, we are regularly treated to these rattle boxes on the 44 route to Birchwood. And if you like your spine intact if one appears on a 66 (Birchwood via Hartsholme) just wait for an Enviro 200 to show up, the speed humps on the hartsholme estate do the shocks on the MANs nad DAFs no favours. I think the best thing that ever happened to me on one of these horrors was last winter during the week of snow i got on a MAN to go to Weccy and going round a bend in Fulmar road the back end of the bus decided to take a route all of its own and not follow the front (drifting in lay terms), the driver re gained control and asked me (the sole passenger) if I was ok, to which my reply was "You're a genius.....do it again".

To pass to another operator that I use regularly NCT whilst providing an exellent service overall, really need to fit some suspension to thier Scania Omni-Decker fleet the ones that run the 48 round clifton (for those that that don't know Nottingham this is the home of the speed hump) just seem to try and demolish bumps rather than ride over them.
 

Heinz57

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Not sure on worst operator.

But for worst bus it would be the Optare Tempo. Completley useless. Break down a lot, rattle like they're going to fall to bits and then some Einstein at Optare had the great idea of putting the heaters at the top, facing the ceiling. Above the passengers. And as we all know from primary school science, heat rises. So these heaters do nothing accept make a noise.

Actualy, lets make that anything by Optare. Sure most of them look visualy pleasing. But they just don't work!
 

redthunder

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Not sure on worst operator.

But for worst bus it would be the Optare Tempo. Completley useless. Break down a lot, rattle like they're going to fall to bits and then some Einstein at Optare had the great idea of putting the heaters at the top, facing the ceiling. Above the passengers. And as we all know from primary school science, heat rises. So these heaters do nothing accept make a noise.

Actualy, lets make that anything by Optare. Sure most of them look visualy pleasing. But they just don't work!

Remember good old 306 in its Ilkeston Flyer days, now that was off the road every other day!!!!!
 

150222

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Worst bus and operator to be found in this sentance: First West Yorkshire's ALX200 bodied dart SLF's.
 

redthunder

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Oh the MAN 18.220 with ALX 300 body are even worse than than FWY's darts.

Arriva Yorkshire/Stagecoach North East ones especially
 

Schnellzug

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So now apparently Stagecoach is the worst operator in the country?
Or is it just that frequently encountered phenomenon, that people always think that their local bus/rail service is the worst in the country?
 

redthunder

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So now apparently Stagecoach is the worst operator in the country?
Or is it just that frequently encountered phenomenon, that people always think that their local bus/rail service is the worst in the country?

Stagecoach aint a bad operator, the MAN buses mentioned earlier that Stagecoach NE got are just shocking!!!!!!
 

trentside

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So now apparently Stagecoach is the worst operator in the country?
Or is it just that frequently encountered phenomenon, that people always think that their local bus/rail service is the worst in the country?

I'd certainly not describe Stagecoach East Midlands as the worst operator. They have some horrible vehicles in Lincoln and Skegness, but their services have been enhanced since RoadCar days and they're fairly reliable. Some drivers let the side down but most are ok.
 

Statto

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What - 6 months in this thread, and nobody has yet mentioned any "First" operator ?!:shock:

First Potteries - shocking unreliability, and bunching of buses on 20 min interval services. Most vehicles are wrecks as well (though my local route uses nice Scania Omnicitys)

:p

BTW First Potteries is no more, it merged into First Midlands 18 months ago, Wirral & Chester is now part of First Manchester

First Wirral, newest bus is 8 years old, vehicles run regully without working blinds, just a paper sticker, & more expensive than Arriva for a single journey. Read on another forum & it's reliable infomation that First Wirral Depot alone is losing £10,000 a day.:shock:
 

WestCoast

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UK North in Manchester if anyone remembers them...:lol:

"SystemOne day ticket please.."
"day ticket £2.00"
"no the SystemOne day ticket for all buses"
"yes day ticket"
"no the £3.60 one"
"£2.00 day ticket"

:roll:
 

Statto

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UK North in Manchester if anyone remembers them...:lol:

"SystemOne day ticket please.."
"day ticket £2.00"
"no the SystemOne day ticket for all buses"
"yes day ticket"
"no the £3.60 one"
"£2.00 day ticket"

:roll:

Oh yes, cowboy operator who got banned after a fatal incident with Cherry Picker. The Directors were jailed for other offences, & had the cheak to use GM Buses name.
 

CC 72100

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UK North in Manchester if anyone remembers them...:lol:

"SystemOne day ticket please.."
"day ticket £2.00"
"no the SystemOne day ticket for all buses"
"yes day ticket"
"no the £3.60 one"
"£2.00 day ticket"

:roll:

Were'nt they also the people on ITV 1 'Tonight' programme, with the show entitled 'Manchester bus wars' or something like that? I also remember reading an article citing how many defective vehicles they had, and incidents in which they have gone under too low bridges as the drivers couldn't read the english road signs
 

Statto

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Were'nt they also the people on ITV 1 'Tonight' programme, with the show entitled 'Manchester bus wars' or something like that? I also remember reading an article citing how many defective vehicles they had, and incidents in which they have gone under too low bridges as the drivers couldn't read the english road signs

They were also featured on a BBC2 programme about the modern bus industry, just before the fatal incident with the Cherry Picker. UK North started new services in 2006 which caused chaos around Piccadilly Gardens with buses blocking the Metrolink lines, it was just after that they got banned.
 

WestCoast

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Most of their drivers in the latter years were from Eastern Europe (driving on EU licenses) and many didn't really have a sufficient command of English. A bit of a necessity when you have to read road signs and deal with tickets!
 

kylemore

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Certain of the operators in the Greenock area get my vote - however probably best not to mention names as they might send the boys round to give me a quick knee-capping!:lol:
 

Schnellzug

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Certain of the operators in the Greenock area get my vote - however probably best not to mention names as they might send the boys round to give me a quick knee-capping!:lol:

Heavens, yes, it's like something out of Chicago during the prohibition era, reading some of the stories in Buses about some of them ...
 

deltic1989

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I'd certainly not describe Stagecoach East Midlands as the worst operator. They have some horrible vehicles in Lincoln and Skegness, but their services have been enhanced since RoadCar days and they're fairly reliable. Some drivers let the side down but most are ok.

I would agree with that statement they have some pretty terrible buses as we both have already detailed, but as far as I can see they are in the process of a fleet update and phasing out the buses they inherited from Road Car. I'll also agree that some of the drivers in Lincoln can be miserable little so n so's at times, we seem to always get them on the 66 and 44 but the 27 is no stranger to a stone faced old bark too.
 

Anon Mouse

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we've had some preety bad cowboy outfits in the North East, anyone remember HMB who used to run in Newcastle and Sunderland in competition with Stagecoach?
 

BuhSnarf

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Arriva Midlands. Their R reg Olympians. Constantly breaking down.

Sent with Tapatalk from my Galaxy S II
 

causton

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Arriva are the worst in an area where all of them are pretty good to be honest. The only bad thing I can say about Arriva is that their services are really poor at timekeeping - not unusual to see 2 or even 3 buses bunched up on a 15 min frequency service! Don't blame them though, as it goes through St Albans, which is on a par with Central London at rush hour throughout most of the week!
 
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