|
Post by riverside on Aug 18, 2014 20:33:19 GMT
My own answer is I think the 270 should return to Putney Bridge but the 265 should be re-routed to Wandsworth permanently as it provides a potential useful link to Wandsworth from the Kingston Vale & New Malden areas which the route serves/passes near. I like this idea, when i used to be in the Kingston area a lot, coming from Putney the 265 has always been a useful alternative, the 170 is useful from Clapham junction but only goes as far as Roehampton Danebury Avenue, the 265 however runs via New Malden which is a place a lot of people like going as well. I wonder how many users of the 265 will want the route to continue serving Wandsworth. I don't think many will be too inconvieneced if the 265 did not return to Putney Bridge Permanently rerouting the 265 to Wandsworth would be detrimental to the 485. This route already has light loadings and could become unviable if the 265 extracted traffic between Putney Common and Wandsworth.
|
|
|
Post by riverside on Mar 26, 2014 14:56:11 GMT
In all honesty Paul, to how many people would it occur to them at Gatwick Airport they need to buy an Oyster Card ... not many I doubt ... it probably would not occur to me and I come from London. I was merely suggesting that improved availability of Oyster facilities at Gatwick may result in more overt publicity which urges people to sort out their Oyster needs at Gatwick to save them any problems on arrival in central London or anywhere else on the route into town. I understand the London Assembly have agitated about Gatwick and Oyster in order to relieve the enormous queues at Victoria. Any benefit at East Croydon would be incidental to this main objective. To be frank there are probably hundreds of similar examples around London - people wanting to catch a bus at Baker St having stepped off the Green Line 757 or Easybus from Luton or at Tottenham Hale having got off Stansted Express. Golders Green may also be interesting given the National Express coaches using the bus station including the A6 from Stansted. Once LU closes all the ticket offices they may be in a worse position than people at Gatwick or East Croydon! You have to hope some clever people inside TfL are considering all these issues and ensuring that existing off system sales for Oyster Cards are much more strongly promoted (e.g. at Airports or from National Express outlets away from London). At Norton Street National Express Coach Station in Liverpool regular announcements are made encouraging people to purchase Oyster cards before commencing their journey to London
|
|
|
Post by riverside on Mar 13, 2014 10:56:03 GMT
Thanks for that information. I agree that an extension of the 70 just to Chiswick Business Park would probably not generate too much traffic. Your suggested extension of the R68 sounds good but would probably be rejected because the congestion on the Kew Bridge section of the South Circular Road could lead to reliability problems at the Hampton Court end of the route. When the 27 was extended to the Business Park it was linked to a scheme to reduce the number of buses running round the residential parts of Turnham Green(a slight rerouting of the E3 was implemented as part of this scheme). If the 27 was removed from the Business Park then it would probably have to run down to the 440 stand at Power Road. This would probably be marginally more useful for passengers than the present service. Although Wellesey Road has had a bus service for many years (the original 91) and I am usually reluctant to see roads abandoned by buses, if the 440 abandoned the section between Power Road and Turnham Green people would not have too far to walk to Chiswick High Road. By returning to terminate at Turnham Green the 440 would not be altering the number of buses traversing the roads around the Green. An alternative way of serving Wellesey Road would be to extend the 440 to Kew Retail Park, thus offering a wider choice of destinations to intending passengers. The downfall of this is that the 440 would become even more circuitous than it is at the moment. Another possibility would be to swop the southern terminals of the 272 and 440 so that the 440 ran Stonebridge Park to Chiswick(Grove Park) and the 272 after Turnham Green ran via Wellesey Road and onto Kew Retail Park. In these tight financial times the onward extension to Kew Retail Park could be partly financed by withdrawing the 272 between White City Bus Station and Shepherds Bush Green. The direct 72 and indirect 283 provide enough capacity between Shepherds Bush Green and Du Cane Road.
|
|
|
Post by riverside on Mar 12, 2014 16:01:55 GMT
March 2014 and still no progress on providing some sort of bus link to Chiswick Business Park via the specially built bus only access road from Bollo Lane. I know that Ealng Council failed to support the E10 extension but then there were rumours that the 70 would be extended to this point. It seems a crying shame that money is spent to enable improvements to public transport and then just wasted. The extension of the 27 has not been particularly successful with most buses carrying fresh air.What is probably needed is a route that runs right through the business park, but how you would do this, I don't know.
The extension of the 440 from Turnham Green to Chiswick(Power Road) via the former H91 route has also not been successful, with very few passengers carried. At the time the preferred option of many residents was a diversion of the 391, but TfL understandably thought that too many through passengers would be inconvenienced. It seems as if TfL need to look again at bus service provision in Chiswick as a certain amount of tidying up is required. A link from this direction to Kew Retail Park would also be useful.
|
|
|
Post by riverside on Mar 5, 2014 10:08:27 GMT
What is the point of consultation when TFL are determined to press on with their proposals regardless? Better not to go through a charade and waste public money. It seems to me that TFL were going to curtail the 159 come what may.
|
|
|
Post by riverside on Jan 19, 2014 18:12:43 GMT
Hampton Station, the stand on Ashley Road (on the Waterloo platform side), the one on the Shepperton side I think is used slightly more (for both rail replacement services and the occasional turn at Hampton Station Brook Green was the stand for 266/267/H91 before the lower bus station was opened. Also in Hammersmith, there is a stand on Hammersmith Broadway roundabout which is right in one of the busiest sections of the roundabout, opposite the entrance for the Lower bus station and entrance/exit for northbound/eastbound buses. Routes 266/267 and H91 used the Hammersmith Grove stand not Brook Green Hotel. The latter stand used to be very busy. At various times in the 1960s during the week it would have the 9(mainly Dalston scheduled short workings from the east but with a few Mortlake ones from the west); scheduled short workings on the 11(in the days when it still ran to Shepherds Bush), Brook Green to Hounslow workings on the 33, route 71(replaced on Sundays by the 90C), short workings on the 72 heading south to Roehampton/Esher and rush hour workings on the 116. In 1965 when the 255 was reallocated to Riverside all evening journeys terminated at Brook Green. In the late evenings when Riverside garage was at the peak of its run in and parking up buses for the night then Brook Green also played host to short working journeys from the north on the 27 and terminating buses on the 73 and 74B. As you can see it was a very busy stand and had a point inspector allocated from 7am till midnight. From 9pm the stand used to get even busier and there could often be chaos because of parked cars on both sides of the entrance approach. These cars belonged to people going to both the famous Hammersmith Palais and the the Garryowen Dance Hall both on Shepherds Bush Road. Despite Hammersmith Police Station being a few minutes away, the police did not seem to think bus services being disrupted was a priority. Buses would often get stuck and so following buses would travel further along Shepherds Bush Road and then reverse onto the stand via the 'exit'. As no solution was forthcoming and severe disruption was being caused to some services London Transport diverted the services that normally terminated in Riverside Garage to a new stand on Hammersmith Bridge Road facing west. There was no actual marked stand, buses merely pulled up at the side of the road, but it at least meant that the 27. 73 and 74B were no longer affected by the parked cars at Brook Green. Sadly the 11 and 33 suffered this late night congestion for many years. Eventually the Hammersmith Palais and Garryowen closed down. Ironically if Brook Green was still being used as a stand regularly today, such a situation would soon be dealt with because the entrance to the new Hammersmith Fire Station is by the entrance to the stand. The last regular use of the stand I can recall was when Hounslow ran the Sunday service on the 9. Their drivers tended to run down to Brook Green to take their meal reliefs. When the 71 was withdrawn north of Richmond in 1967 and the the 90C introduced daily, the latter was withdrawn from Brook Green and instead scheduled to terminate at the new stand in the Met. station forecourt. The 116 also migrated to the Met station. In September 1968 the 90C was withdrawn and the new 90A(Sun afternoons) and the new 290 used the Met. station. The Sunday service on the 267 was moved from the Grove to the Met. station so that on this day of the week it served Butterwick. This was to help tourists who wished to go to Hampton Court but found it difficult to negotiate the subways of Hammersmith Broadway to get to the Grove. Between 1970 and 1973 the 72 was an alternative between Hammersmith and Hampton Court but it went the long way round, had more expensive 'out county' fares and a half hourly frequency.
|
|
|
Post by riverside on Jan 7, 2014 16:46:51 GMT
Withdrawing the 485 would sever useful links between Wandsworth, Putney and Barnes. The alternative for people without cars would be a lonely walk across parts of Barnes Common. Maybe it would be better to keep the 485. Savings could be made by a slight thinning of frequency on the 209 or the withdrawal of the 283 south of Hammersmith. If the latter suggestion was taken up then the 485 could serve the Barnes Wetlands Centre as an on route bifurcation.
|
|
|
Post by riverside on Dec 20, 2013 16:42:11 GMT
If the bridge is completely closed could there be a possibility of temporarily reviving the old C4 Putney Pier stand and allowing say the 39 and 85 to terminate there?
|
|
|
Post by riverside on Oct 11, 2013 10:43:14 GMT
I think the 255 has a good claim to the title. Between 1960 and 1972 it was operated first by Hanwell and then Riverside. In Hanwell days it ran at its fullest extent from Acton Vale(Bromyard Avenue) to Clapham Junction but as far as I am aware was always operated in sections. When Riverside gained the 255 in 1965 it was the same route but it now concentrated on its eastern end running between Clapham Junction and Hanwell Broadway(later Gunnersbury Roundabout). As a boy when running out of Riverside it was my favourite route and I can well remember the Saturday in 1967 when brand new RMLs appeared on the route. After its withdrawal( caused by constant punching up of 220s from Shepherds Bush on the Hammersmith to Wandsworth section), the 255 has had several reincarnations. It has appeared running in the Hackney/Walthamstow area. A 255 has also visited Buckhurst Hill. For a short while in the 1980s it replaced most of the western end of the 12 running between Harlesden(Willesden Junction and Shepherds Bush Green). This short lived version was replaced by a diversion of the 260 to Shepherds Bush instead of Hammersmith and a rerouting via Park Royal. As has already been mentioned the 255 appeared in the Beddington area. The present day 255 in South London appears to be the longest lived, but in my humble opinion nothing will ever beat riding on a virtually empty Riverside RM/RML carefully trailing a Shepherds Bush 220. If the powers that be had stepped in and properly regulated the service then the 255 could have remained in West London. The end came in June 1972 and until recently the 255 has had a gypsy existence in the London Transport/TfL area. The 255 now appears quite settled(with an extension to Balham pending), but who knows what the route planners might have in store in the future!
|
|
|
Post by riverside on Apr 28, 2013 11:37:43 GMT
There's definitely plenty of space on the 485 between Putney and Wandsworth to absorb any displaced passengers from the loss of the 270. The 220 has always struggled. Choosing it to be one of the first one man operated double decker routes was a disaster for such a busy service. Compared to the 1970s/1980s, the 220 appears to run better nowadays. In my childhood at weekends the Riverside crews on the 255 would wait for an already busy southbound 220 come along the Shepherds Bush Road. They would give it a minute and then depart. By the time the 255 pulled into Butterwick, the RM on the 220 was pulling away packed to the roof. The virtually new RML on the 255 would leave Butterwick virtually empty and then punch up the 220 all the way to Wandsworth. The 220 would continue to struggle to Tooting, while the 255 carried on the short distance to Clapham Junction. So the 220 struggling is nothing new. Great memories of rides on the 255 but obviously the punching up is what caused the withdrawal of the route and the loss of several round the corner links.
|
|