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Post by towerman on Nov 6, 2015 14:17:14 GMT
Why are provincial operators so anti exit doors?Any ex London bus that ends up somewhere else immediately has the centre doors removed or disengaged.Would've thought it would speeded up boarding instesd of a long wait for a heavily laden bus to disembark.
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Post by snowman on Nov 6, 2015 14:43:32 GMT
Why are provincial operators so anti exit doors?Any ex London bus that ends up somewhere else immediately has the centre doors removed or disengaged.Would've thought it would speeded up boarding instesd of a long wait for a heavily laden bus to disembark. Most provincial routes serve somewhere specific (example passengers board at many stops, but all get off at another serving the shops) so get few stops where bus empties and refils. Costs money to maintain extra door, and generally extra 2 pairs of seats is better for generating revenue so why have the second door. Last December LU put about 8 deckers on 371 and in Ham (middle of the route) the single decks would always catch them up. The traffic was same so it proves deckers dwell at stops longer. If dwell times are a problem stick to single decks (many provincial routes do). The reality is twin doors and a single staircase when 2/3 seats upstairs isnt much better than one door and one staircase. Any queuing for stairs negates the extra door.
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Post by snoggle on Nov 6, 2015 15:52:27 GMT
Why are provincial operators so anti exit doors? Any ex London bus that ends up somewhere else immediately has the centre doors removed or disengaged.Would've thought it would speeded up boarding instesd of a long wait for a heavily laden bus to disembark. Snowman has given some good reasons but there have also been a couple of other factors. 1. Several operators have had bad accidents with centre doors and people being caught and dragged. Tyne and Wear PTE (and its predecessors) had dual door buses for many years on the busiest cross town routes in Newcastle, Sunderland and South Shields. A particularly nasty accident in Newcastle, IIRC, caused a very quick change of policy with centre doors being taken out of use and eventually removed. A particular quirk on Newcastle buses was that they had nearside staircases where the bottom of the stairs aligned with the exit doors. This, of course, also put a huge obstacle in the line of sight of drivers. The nearside staircase design was also abandoned. I think Lothian Buses also had safety issues which explains their move to single door vehicles. 2. It's a sad fact that few operators have to deal with the massive volumes that London does. Deregulation has seen to that in many previously busy networks with flows tending to be more "end to end" that constantly on and off as London gets. Before anyone pipes up then yes there are some exceptions to this and it is noteworthy that Metrobus have dual door single decks in Crawley and I believe Brighton and Hove are contemplating buying dual door deckers for one its very busiest routes. You could argue that it is perverse that so much of the rest of the UK is seemingly dependent on London's second hand buses in order to equip their bus fleets. It's changed a bit for some groups in recent years where they've preferred to buy new vehicles to a preferred provincial spec with no compromises.
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Post by vjaska on Nov 6, 2015 16:34:28 GMT
Why are provincial operators so anti exit doors? Any ex London bus that ends up somewhere else immediately has the centre doors removed or disengaged.Would've thought it would speeded up boarding instesd of a long wait for a heavily laden bus to disembark. Snowman has given some good reasons but there have also been a couple of other factors. 1. Several operators have had bad accidents with centre doors and people being caught and dragged. Tyne and Wear PTE (and its predecessors) had dual door buses for many years on the busiest cross town routes in Newcastle, Sunderland and South Shields. A particularly nasty accident in Newcastle, IIRC, caused a very quick change of policy with centre doors being taken out of use and eventually removed. A particular quirk on Newcastle buses was that they had nearside staircases where the bottom of the stairs aligned with the exit doors. This, of course, also put a huge obstacle in the line of sight of drivers. The nearside staircase design was also abandoned. I think Lothian Buses also had safety issues which explains their move to single door vehicles. 2. It's a sad fact that few operators have to deal with the massive volumes that London does. Deregulation has seen to that in many previously busy networks with flows tending to be more "end to end" that constantly on and off as London gets. Before anyone pipes up then yes there are some exceptions to this and it is noteworthy that Metrobus have dual door single decks in Crawley and I believe Brighton and Hove are contemplating buying dual door deckers for one its very busiest routes. You could argue that it is perverse that so much of the rest of the UK is seemingly dependent on London's second hand buses in order to equip their bus fleets. It's changed a bit for some groups in recent years where they've preferred to buy new vehicles to a preferred provincial spec with no compromises. In regards to Metrobus and 2 door buses, I spoke to someone very senior at C about the then recent cascade of the 466 Omnidekkas and 10.7m Pointer Darts and why they remained dual door (they still do to this day). They said it was down to cost of removing the doors and electrical equipment associated and the fact that it helps with busy periods on the Crawley network. In recent years, they've seemed to moved away from this with all new non fastway vehicles being single door.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 6, 2015 16:53:53 GMT
Why are provincial operators so anti exit doors? Any ex London bus that ends up somewhere else immediately has the centre doors removed or disengaged.Would've thought it would speeded up boarding instesd of a long wait for a heavily laden bus to disembark. Snowman has given some good reasons but there have also been a couple of other factors. 1. Several operators have had bad accidents with centre doors and people being caught and dragged. Tyne and Wear PTE (and its predecessors) had dual door buses for many years on the busiest cross town routes in Newcastle, Sunderland and South Shields. A particularly nasty accident in Newcastle, IIRC, caused a very quick change of policy with centre doors being taken out of use and eventually removed. A particular quirk on Newcastle buses was that they had nearside staircases where the bottom of the stairs aligned with the exit doors. This, of course, also put a huge obstacle in the line of sight of drivers. The nearside staircase design was also abandoned. I think Lothian Buses also had safety issues which explains their move to single door vehicles. 2. It's a sad fact that few operators have to deal with the massive volumes that London does. Deregulation has seen to that in many previously busy networks with flows tending to be more "end to end" that constantly on and off as London gets. Before anyone pipes up then yes there are some exceptions to this and it is noteworthy that Metrobus have dual door single decks in Crawley and I believe Brighton and Hove are contemplating buying dual door deckers for one its very busiest routes. You could argue that it is perverse that so much of the rest of the UK is seemingly dependent on London's second hand buses in order to equip their bus fleets. It's changed a bit for some groups in recent years where they've preferred to buy new vehicles to a preferred provincial spec with no compromises. Another point is that most provincial operators don't offer flat fares as is done in London - therefore checking where people get off the bus could be important.
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Post by snowman on Nov 6, 2015 18:46:03 GMT
Why are provincial operators so anti exit doors? Any ex London bus that ends up somewhere else immediately has the centre doors removed or disengaged.Would've thought it would speeded up boarding instesd of a long wait for a heavily laden bus to disembark. You could argue that it is perverse that so much of the rest of the UK is seemingly dependent on London's second hand buses in order to equip their bus fleets. It's changed a bit for some groups in recent years where they've preferred to buy new vehicles to a preferred provincial spec with no compromises. Snoggle has raised a good point, a few years ago London buses often came onto the second hand market quite young, 5-7 years. There was a huge modernisation of the London fleet, out went anything that wasn't low floor, centre located staircases went, curved staircases went, single door buses (except those under 9m) went. All these buses had plenty of life in them. What has happened in recent years is TfL spec has become miles away from provincial spec so conversion costs are now huge, and London keeps many of its buses to 12-14 years. This means the cost of converting is now disproportionate to its secondhand value. Provincial Operators fall into 2 camps, those chasing premium inter urban passengers where quality is important and those running a basic cheap as possible service. The first batch will buy new, the second want a basic cheap to maintain bus and London no longer has those. The cheap basic brigade will not want extras to maintain, more to breakdown, extra servicing and repairs. That means either isolating or removing centre door, powered ramp, cab air con, air cooling units, fancy emissions upgrades, power blind units, saloon matrix displays, GPS tracking, public address systems. Having got rid of all this, need to instal a manual ramp, basic blinds, seats where door was. Can't really change the stairs for compact design. Then you have to repaint it. By this stage probably thinking would have been better buying a cast off from Lothian or Dublin etc. Even Arriva thinks it isn't worth it anymore so vast numbers of DLAs went for scrap. Going back to your original question, evidence shows about 25-30% of passengers can't or won't go upstairs, so unless you have a really busy route the provincial Operator is better off with a single door, single deck. Even in London the second door is not as useful as it once was, as you do not get boarding queues whilst driver issues change anymore. Single door buses tend to have much faster door shutting as driver can check it's clear with quick glance in fraction of a second, but centre doors need cameras or mirrors to check clear, touch sensitive edges and interlocks so the time to check and close partly offsets time waiting to use one door.
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Post by northken on Nov 6, 2015 19:42:38 GMT
It might not be the biggest issue, but you will always get chancers trying to fare evade in whatever way they can. You don't want to make it easier for them, especially if your only source of income is passenger fares.
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Post by snoggle on Nov 6, 2015 20:59:26 GMT
It might not be the biggest issue, but you will always get chancers trying to fare evade in whatever way they can. You don't want to make it easier for them, especially if your only source of income is passenger fares. Understand the point but buses are commercially run in Hong Kong and Singapore but almost all buses are dual door there. The need to handle high volumes outweighs the need to protect revenue although cultural factors may come into play too.
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Post by northken on Nov 6, 2015 21:06:25 GMT
It might not be the biggest issue, but you will always get chancers trying to fare evade in whatever way they can. You don't want to make it easier for them, especially if your only source of income is passenger fares. Understand the point but buses are commercially run in Hong Kong and Singapore but almost all buses are dual door there. The need to handle high volumes outweighs the need to protect revenue although cultural factors may come into play too. Oh, yes of course.
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Post by smiler52 on Nov 6, 2015 21:11:47 GMT
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Post by stubag on Nov 6, 2015 22:58:29 GMT
Also stops the buses serve are taken into account. Not all stops are suitable for double door operation. This was a case in point when first Berkshire to initially had the London TNs. dual doors couldn't be opened due to trees and street furniture being in the way.
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Post by moz on Nov 20, 2015 11:44:51 GMT
Exit doors take up valuable passenger capacity and cannot always be used at provincial bus stops owing to street furniture or lack of pavement. You'll also find that the majority of operators prefer long wheelbase vehicles as opposed to the short ones used in London.
Moz
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Post by sid on Nov 20, 2015 13:52:31 GMT
Generally speaking there are far more negatives than positives about dual doored operation, no great surprise to me that most provincial operators, including those in big cities, aren't interested
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Post by towerman on Nov 20, 2015 14:06:05 GMT
Personally I find it frustrating,when an X4 arrives in Church St Wellingborough it's always heavily loaded and you have to wait ages for everyone to get off.
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Post by snoggle on Nov 20, 2015 21:45:34 GMT
Exit doors take up valuable passenger capacity and cannot always be used at provincial bus stops owing to street furniture or lack of pavement. You'll also find that the majority of operators prefer long wheelbase vehicles as opposed to the short ones used in London. Let's face it most operators don't have crowds of people to deal with. There are exceptions, of course, but operators are perfectly happy to tolerate ludicrous dwell times at stops because they insist largely on cash payment or have slow ITSO spec smartcard readers which still require the passenger to conduct a discussion with the driver rather than just beeping and going. The operator is in charge of their own destiny in terms of setting a timetable they think they can run and which will still mean people turn up to catch the bus. There is no one looking over their shoulder to measure their performance in the way TfL do and there is no direct financial consequence from poor operation. Yes the traffic commissioners and VOSA might eventually catch up with the worst offenders / purveyors of mobile scrap heaps but that's it. The simple fact is that the people who carry the cost of long stop dwell times and prehistoric ticketing are passengers - through longer journey times, long dwell times and poorer services because frequencies are pared back to the level that matches the max number of vehicles an operator believes is financially viable. There may be a load of things wrong with London's regime - we can all list them - but at least there is some focus on dwell times and trying to make operation efficient by having fast boarding and off vehicle sales / use of bank cards. London's problem is handling overwhelming demand and needing to be much more "fleet of foot" in responding to changing circumstances. Imagine how much more efficient provincial operators would be if they could harness some of the gains that TfL have secured?
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