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Post by Deleted on Jan 30, 2018 21:04:22 GMT
Not from my observations - I seen busy 160’s on Saturdays though granted I’m not always a regular in that area. The fact a school route shadows and yet the 160 still is specified deckers seems to suggest it’s fine as it is. Wasn’t you one of the people who wasn’t happy with Arriva throwing single deckers out? Well Arriva shouldn't have been putting single deckers on the route because obviously double deckers are specified, whether they are really needed is another matter. The Catford to Eltham section tends to be a bit busier but Eltham to Sidcup is pretty dead. It's because the 321 and 286 are so much more direct and frequent between Sidcup and Eltham. Even the 233 is more direct which includes a hail and ride round the houses section. The only part of the 160 between those areas that is useful is the Sidcup to Chislehurst High Street section. The rest is nearly all covered by the 162. |
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Post by SILENCED on Jan 31, 2018 1:04:43 GMT
Put a couple of extra buses on there and you probably negate any savings ... hence self-defeating. Yes. Your probably right! Some school routes have a very high PVR it would probably be more cost effective to just make them permanent routes! At least then they'd be more profitable! Take the 601. PVR of 7. That's 7 buses which are sitting in the garage for the most part of the day when they could be out making some money. The money saved from those 7 buses could extend the 401 to Dartford Heath again instead of sitting in the garage all day. OK I do not know the answer to this one ... but would it be money saved, or the cost of operation (staff costs extra maintenance) exceed the savings? |
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Post by RandomBusesGirl on Jan 31, 2018 11:24:36 GMT
E1 - very dependent on train loads - in the peak if the bus is timed just in time for the central line kick-outs it'll be very busy trust me Whats with the hate to the E1 in this thread XD I've seen this bus standing room only on a Sunday afternoon, let alone in the peaks. The route runs entirely in residential areas with a number of schools. Plus it shuttles people both towards Greenford and Ealing, not just towards Ealing. I vote the E9 should go back to single deck, with the DD's going to the E7. That's a longer route with more delays which leads to higher passenger loads No, I am pro DD on E1 actually  As for the E9 thing, I disagree, it parallels a lot of E2 which is DD and a fairly busy route, and gets nicely loaded in the peaks. This conversion was not random at all. E7 I think is kinda borderline. If running with good headways it does just fine. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 1, 2018 0:33:56 GMT
375 seems to have been converted to DD bit by bit. One vehicle only route, it has been using a mix of single deckers and DD's for some time. Recently though DD's are the norm. Four times in the last week I've seen DD on the route.
One certainty though ,it doesn't need DD, extremely rare to see it even half full. Picks up a bit on school journeys at Chase Cross.
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Post by vjaska on Feb 1, 2018 1:19:29 GMT
375 seems to have been converted to DD bit by bit. One vehicle only route, it has been using a mix of single deckers and DD's for some time. Recently though DD's are the norm. Four times in the last week I've seen DD on the route. One certainty though ,it doesn't need DD, extremely rare to see it even half full. Picks up a bit on school journeys at Chase Cross. It's probably down to the fact that GY has only two single deckers - ENL3 for the 347 & ENL90 for the 375. I guess it's not always practical to loan single deckers in from DT so a double decker goes out instead. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 1, 2018 16:18:02 GMT
I think the most likely scenario would be to thin out the service on some double deck routes off peak Mon - Fri. School day traffic on many of these suggested routes prohibit single deck operation. Notwithstanding some operators inability to put double decks on the right routes in the first place !
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Post by l1group on Feb 1, 2018 18:32:49 GMT
Nearly every route into Heathrow is full with workers in the morning - really interesting to see Harlington Corner, Heathrow Central, Terminal 5 in the early mornings. Full, standing and no space N9s in the morning are definitely interesting to see, certainly. 805 I presume was operated by single deckers because of the excessive cost/benefit ratio at the time. 435 was, as far as I know, operated with the available buses First had at the time, which were the TNs. With the opening of Heathrow Terminal 5, demand has shot up as even more workers work at the airport now. The 805 was not a TfL contract route. Bharat Travel ran with with Darts IIRC. It was adjusted to run to the T5 construction site during its final iteration. The Timetable for it is in the Timetable Graveyard. I can't imagine Bharat Travel would have wanted to run double deckers given they were (are?) a coach operator at the time. I assume the successor firm is New Bharat Coaches who still run Southall to West / East Midlands & W Yorks daily coaches with rather posh Van Hool double deck coaches. It was one of the few LLSA routes that ever existed. Yup, it was Darts, and they were a coach operator. It would've costed too much for Bharat Travel to run it if they leased deckers, is what I meant. I'm unsure how related New Bharat Travel and Bharat Travel are, but they definitely don't use the double decker coaches on the Southall-Wolverhampton/Bradford service. I see it stop at Coventry, and I have been tempted to go on their coach to Southall as it's easy to get home from Southall....but Virgin are still cheaper! |
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Post by redexpress on Feb 2, 2018 1:06:20 GMT
The 805 was not a TfL contract route. Bharat Travel ran with with Darts IIRC. It was adjusted to run to the T5 construction site during its final iteration. The Timetable for it is in the Timetable Graveyard. I can't imagine Bharat Travel would have wanted to run double deckers given they were (are?) a coach operator at the time. I assume the successor firm is New Bharat Coaches who still run Southall to West / East Midlands & W Yorks daily coaches with rather posh Van Hool double deck coaches. It was one of the few LLSA routes that ever existed. Yup, it was Darts, and they were a coach operator. It would've costed too much for Bharat Travel to run it if they leased deckers, is what I meant. When the 805 number was first introduced (2001?) it consisted only of a handful of journeys, using one bus - a Volvo B6BLE / East Lancs Spryte pictured here (not my pic). Prior to that I think it had been an unnumbered service. In 2003 it was upgraded to a regular half-hourly service, at which point a number of Darts (including some Super Pointer Darts that had previously worked in Ireland) were obtained via Dawsonrentals to work alongside the Volvo. |
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Post by DE20106 on Feb 2, 2018 21:21:36 GMT
Interestingly a lot of routes have been brought up, that I thought about mentioning to be single decked, but instead thought better of. In particular 492, 160, 269, E9 and 357.
492, 160 and 269 all definitely have school demand and at least somewhat peak demand but not much more than that. 492 in particular I’ve definitely seen busy before.
401 is very well loaded a lot of the time, I’d say the usage figures for this route are deceivingly low, maybe not so when you take into consideration its low PVR and frequency, and short route length.
I definitely agree with the D7 being very superfluous outside peaks.
467 I would like to mention, but can’t really comment as I’ve never seen the route in real life, but my impression of it is that it was made for specifically for ferrying school kids around. Maybe should be renumbered to 667 (if there’s not one already) and have it’s off-peak workings taken away?
I did also consider the E9 but I’ve seen it absolutely horrendous during the peak, particularly when the E2 is playing up.
I have to confess I am also a person who is a 357 sceptic. I know there are people here who disagree, but I do think if the 357 was single decked it would at the very least be able to cope.
I’m still sticking to my guns about the 241 being okay with singles though, particularly when it’s rerouted after its contract change. I think I will turn out to be a disastrous mistake on TfL’s part. The 412 I still remain sceptical over, obviously apart from school times” the route is pretty much empty!! Forgetting about cost here, but surely it’s less environmentally-friendly to use double deckers all the time on a route which - outside of the peak times - would probably cope perfectly fine with those old tiny 17-seater Solo’s of the R8?😂 Cost effective certainly, but looking after the planet should not be compromised by a bit of money. The 241 and 412 were definitely the biggest culprits on my list. (obviously excluding the blatantly obvious D8, obviously the D in this case stands for ‘dunce’ addressing whoever thought decking it was a good idea😂).
PS after all your comments about the lunacy of single decking the 175, 496 and 498 I decided to go and see them for myself in the peak times (where I haven’t seen them before, only in the off peak times), and I now completely agree that single decking them is a stupid idea. They were horrendous😂
Another route which I completely forgot to mention and am very surprised hasn’t been mentioned at all yet is the 215. I swear it’s only double decker operation to provide relief for the 97? It’s in the middle of nowhere most of the time I just can’t see the demand for it.
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Post by snoggle on Feb 2, 2018 22:22:44 GMT
I have to confess I am also a person who is a 357 sceptic. I know there are people here who disagree, but I do think if the 357 was single decked it would at the very least be able to cope. Another route which I completely forgot to mention and am very surprised hasn’t been mentioned at all yet is the 215. I swear it’s only double decker operation to provide relief for the 97? It’s in the middle of nowhere most of the time I just can’t see the demand for it. Those of us who are long term residents of Waltham Forest know why the 215 and 357 are double deckers. As ever it is because there is immensely strong peak demand, large crowds for school and college traffic (a factor on the 275 too) and the need to be able to cope if the 97 is screwed. The 215 also has unusual seasonal flows to and from the Lea Valley Campsite. A lot of European visitors stay at the Camp Site and use the 215. It is not at all unusual to see 215s full to the brim on shoulder peaks and evenings when the tourists are going to and from the Campsite. I've seen loads of full 215s at around 10am on a Sunday morning in Spring, Summer and Autumn. And I'll just bore everyone stupid (again!) by saying that you can't have an effective transport network if every single bus route is specced so that buses run full to the brim on each departure. You have to have some which give some flexibility. If you move away from that then you might as well shut half the TfL network down immediately as a "lost cause". It's called "deregulation" and not recognising the wider societal benefits of public transport. |
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Post by southlondonbus on Feb 2, 2018 22:25:07 GMT
The 467 was going to be replaced with a school only route numbered 605 around 2004/05 but survived as a SD route before being coverted to DD in 2011.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 2, 2018 22:37:57 GMT
Created this thread as I haven’t seen any other discussion on it. There’s a lot of talk about single-deck routes that should be double-decked, but what about the other way round? I feel there are quite a few routes where deckers just aren’t needed. I’d also be very interested to know about times when they are needed. I’d like to put forward the following: D8 (obviously!) 241 - I’ve never seen it busy, may be a different story in the peaks/school periods 412 - I think they should run it like the 200, double deck school workings only. I feel it just doesn’t need them. 496 498 317 406/418 - (I’ve seen RATP use the 411/465 Versa’s on these anyway!) 175 415 61 482 17 - could be controversial. I have honestly never seen it with more than 3 people on the top deck, I’ve never even seen a half full bus on this route. Route 412 is to be reduced in frequency to x20mins Mon-Sat daytimes, x30mins evenings and Sundays according to londonbusroutes.net |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 3, 2018 12:04:37 GMT
365 doesn't need deckers, and I'd like the vehicles used swapped with the 165, which certainty does.
My other problem with the 365 is its 24 hour status which should go.
I'd have a new night route combining 365 and 165 to provide a service at night to central Hornchurch and Rainham.
From Havering Park to Queens Hospital as now, no change, then to Hornchurch town centre , then as 165 back to Abbs Cross Lane and as 165 to Rainham Abbey Wood Lane.
Towards Rainham via Orchard Village, and returning via Orchard too if possible.
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Post by ThinLizzy on Feb 3, 2018 17:43:53 GMT
365 doesn't need deckers, and I'd like the vehicles used swapped with the 165, which certainty does. My other problem with the 365 is its 24 hour status which should go. I'd have a new night route combining 365 and 165 to provide a service at night to central Hornchurch and Rainham. From Havering Park to Queens Hospital as now, no change, then to Hornchurch town centre , then as 165 back to Abbs Cross Lane and as 165 to Rainham Abbey Wood Lane. Towards Rainham via Orchard Village, and returning via Orchard too if possible. as a semi-regular traveller on the 365, I would suggest that it does indeed need deckers. Your N165/N365 proposal would need the route to go up to Hornchurch then come back on itself to get to Abbs Cross Lane |
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Post by DE20106 on Feb 3, 2018 17:56:50 GMT
365 doesn't need deckers, and I'd like the vehicles used swapped with the 165, which certainty does. My other problem with the 365 is its 24 hour status which should go. I'd have a new night route combining 365 and 165 to provide a service at night to central Hornchurch and Rainham. From Havering Park to Queens Hospital as now, no change, then to Hornchurch town centre , then as 165 back to Abbs Cross Lane and as 165 to Rainham Abbey Wood Lane. Towards Rainham via Orchard Village, and returning via Orchard too if possible. as a semi-regular traveller on the 365, I would suggest that it does indeed need deckers. Your N165/N365 proposal would need the route to go up to Hornchurch then come back on itself to get to Abbs Cross Lane Forgive me I know next to nothing about the 365 (apart from it shares its number with the amount of days in the year  ). Have you ever seen any journeys rammed full on that route? |
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). Have you ever seen any journeys rammed full on that route?