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Post by paulsw2 on May 24, 2021 17:44:19 GMT
Reading through many many posts on this forum it seems that a lot of members ( not all I hasten to add) are constantly speculating on some weird and wonderful route changes withdrawals and cuts to services.
What everyone has to understand is that TfL/mayor is not solely responsible for the financial situation that TfL is in at the present time.The world has been ( some places still are) in the grip of a nasty pandemic. TfL have been placed in the situation where they rely on fare revenue to operate NO OTHER transport authority has this problem.
What I believe needs to happen is a period of stability so that public confidence in the network grows to allow greater use ( plus revenue) of the bus tube and overground services allowing TfL finances to stabilise.
Constant cuts do the exact opposite and drive people away.the vast majority of Londoners don’t need branding nor WiFi they just want a frequent reliable service to get from A-B not changinging en route.
I may have just lit the blue touchpaper so I am gonna stand well back
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Post by vjaska on May 24, 2021 17:49:03 GMT
Reading through many many posts on this forum it seems that a lot of members ( not all I hasten to add) are constantly speculating on some weird and wonderful route changes withdrawals and cuts to services. What everyone has to understand is that TfL/mayor is not solely responsible for the financial situation that TfL is in at the present time.The world has been ( some places still are) in the grip of a nasty pandemic. TfL have been placed in the situation where they rely on fare revenue to operate NO OTHER transport authority has this problem. What I believe needs to happen is a period of stability so that public confidence in the network grows to allow greater use ( plus revenue) of the bus tube and overground services allowing TfL finances to stabilise. Constant cuts do the exact opposite and drive people away.the vast majority of Londoners don’t need branding nor WiFi they just want a frequent reliable service to get from A-B not changinging en route. I may have just lit the blue touchpaper so I am gonna stand well back I agree with this entirely and I’ll say no more on the matter for obvious reasons. |
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Post by southlondonbus on May 24, 2021 18:10:53 GMT
Reading through many many posts on this forum it seems that a lot of members ( not all I hasten to add) are constantly speculating on some weird and wonderful route changes withdrawals and cuts to services. What everyone has to understand is that TfL/mayor is not solely responsible for the financial situation that TfL is in at the present time.The world has been ( some places still are) in the grip of a nasty pandemic. TfL have been placed in the situation where they rely on fare revenue to operate NO OTHER transport authority has this problem. What I believe needs to happen is a period of stability so that public confidence in the network grows to allow greater use ( plus revenue) of the bus tube and overground services allowing TfL finances to stabilise. Constant cuts do the exact opposite and drive people away.the vast majority of Londoners don’t need branding nor WiFi they just want a frequent reliable service to get from A-B not changinging en route. I may have just lit the blue touchpaper so I am gonna stand well back Throw in that they want routes which aren't so regulated that they constantly waiting at stops or driving so slow through the City (25) and that they can just get to their destinations. |
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Post by greenboy on May 24, 2021 18:20:37 GMT
Reading through many many posts on this forum it seems that a lot of members ( not all I hasten to add) are constantly speculating on some weird and wonderful route changes withdrawals and cuts to services. What everyone has to understand is that TfL/mayor is not solely responsible for the financial situation that TfL is in at the present time.The world has been ( some places still are) in the grip of a nasty pandemic. TfL have been placed in the situation where they rely on fare revenue to operate NO OTHER transport authority has this problem. What I believe needs to happen is a period of stability so that public confidence in the network grows to allow greater use ( plus revenue) of the bus tube and overground services allowing TfL finances to stabilise. Constant cuts do the exact opposite and drive people away.the vast majority of Londoners don’t need branding nor WiFi they just want a frequent reliable service to get from A-B not changinging en route. I may have just lit the blue touchpaper so I am gonna stand well back Just as you're speculating, whilst covid has obviously exacerbated the situation routes like the 24 have been in steady decline for some years now and TfL have made little or no effort to stem the loss of passengers. And why do so many bus operators apply route branding? They don't so just because they think it looks nice, they do it because it advertises the service and brings in more customers and they include free WiFi because that's what many people expect nowadays. How you have concluded that Londoners don't need such 'luxuries' I don't know but train and coach operators clearly haven't got the message. |
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Post by paulsw2 on May 24, 2021 18:44:12 GMT
Reading through many many posts on this forum it seems that a lot of members ( not all I hasten to add) are constantly speculating on some weird and wonderful route changes withdrawals and cuts to services. What everyone has to understand is that TfL/mayor is not solely responsible for the financial situation that TfL is in at the present time.The world has been ( some places still are) in the grip of a nasty pandemic. TfL have been placed in the situation where they rely on fare revenue to operate NO OTHER transport authority has this problem. What I believe needs to happen is a period of stability so that public confidence in the network grows to allow greater use ( plus revenue) of the bus tube and overground services allowing TfL finances to stabilise. Constant cuts do the exact opposite and drive people away.the vast majority of Londoners don’t need branding nor WiFi they just want a frequent reliable service to get from A-B not changinging en route. I may have just lit the blue touchpaper so I am gonna stand well back Just as you're speculating, whilst covid has obviously exacerbated the situation routes like the 24 have been in steady decline for some years now and TfL have made little or no effort to stem the loss of passengers. And why do so many bus operators apply route branding? They don't so just because they think it looks nice, they do it because it advertises the service and brings in more customers and they include free WiFi because that's what many people expect nowadays. How you have concluded that Londoners don't need such 'luxuries' I don't know but train and coach operators clearly haven't got the message. I will reply to this as the most of the country has deregulated bus services which HAS decimated services. I remember the political mantra when deregulation took place “ more services more choice cheaper travel” look where that ended up.Regarding WiFi and branding remember London has relatively frequent / regulated fares and services unlike other areas where You have skeleton service and super premium fares |
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Post by greenboy on May 24, 2021 18:53:53 GMT
Just as you're speculating, whilst covid has obviously exacerbated the situation routes like the 24 have been in steady decline for some years now and TfL have made little or no effort to stem the loss of passengers. And why do so many bus operators apply route branding? They don't so just because they think it looks nice, they do it because it advertises the service and brings in more customers and they include free WiFi because that's what many people expect nowadays. How you have concluded that Londoners don't need such 'luxuries' I don't know but train and coach operators clearly haven't got the message. I will reply to this as the most of the country has deregulated bus services which HAS decimated services. I remember the political mantra when deregulation took place “ more services more choice cheaper travel” look where that ended up.Regarding WiFi and branding remember London has relatively frequent / regulated fares and services unlike other areas where You have skeleton service and super premium fares Obviously there are good and bad examples but certainly places like Brighton, Reading, Oxford and Nottingham have a far more vibrant bus network than what we have in London. |
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Post by LondonNorthern on May 24, 2021 19:05:00 GMT
I will reply to this as the most of the country has deregulated bus services which HAS decimated services. I remember the political mantra when deregulation took place “ more services more choice cheaper travel” look where that ended up.Regarding WiFi and branding remember London has relatively frequent / regulated fares and services unlike other areas where You have skeleton service and super premium fares Obviously there are good and bad examples but certainly places like Brighton, Reading, Oxford and Nottingham have a far more vibrant bus network than what we have in London. But what may also have to be considered is 2 of those companies being Oxford and Brighton are under the Go Ahead Group which have many other companies across the UK such as East Yorkshire Motor Services and Go North East and the infamous Go Ahead London which are major profit drivers. However what might also need to be considered is TFLs rules about bus standards (so for example narrow staircase & all red) whereas if we see groups like the Go Ahead Group which put this much effort into national services then their standard of buses could potentially attract lots of people whilst also having attractive frequencies set by TFL. However, some large corporations like First have definitely not been doing so well with their sell off of First London entirely by 2013, First Manchester sell off in June 2019 and then the possibility of Hadleigh (First Essex) having been up for sale round late 2020. I guess this is another public versus private sector argument that we will unfortunately never find any conclusive answer to |
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Post by LondonNorthern on May 24, 2021 19:12:59 GMT
Just as you're speculating, whilst covid has obviously exacerbated the situation routes like the 24 have been in steady decline for some years now and TfL have made little or no effort to stem the loss of passengers. And why do so many bus operators apply route branding? They don't so just because they think it looks nice, they do it because it advertises the service and brings in more customers and they include free WiFi because that's what many people expect nowadays. How you have concluded that Londoners don't need such 'luxuries' I don't know but train and coach operators clearly haven't got the message. I will reply to this as the most of the country has deregulated bus services which HAS decimated services. I remember the political mantra when deregulation took place “ more services more choice cheaper travel” look where that ended up.Regarding WiFi and branding remember London has relatively frequent / regulated fares and services unlike other areas where You have skeleton service and super premium fares However a lot of what has happened across the country (particularly in rural areas) is where smaller companies do not run attractive buses nor attractive frequencies for many people to consider using, and why a lot of services have gone down is down to the demographic that use them. In the countryside if say a service runs from a few local villages to a local town centre, very well a lot of the demographic will be elderly people with freedom passes and unfortunately services cannot stay alive just off of that which is really unfortunate. Though I did explain some of Firsts downfalls in the previous post I made, definitely one of the really good things they did during the pandemic was look at ways of introducing new services across their Cornwall operations whilst using older buses but yet refurbishing them up to a reasonably good standard - such examples that pop to the top of my head are the introductions of the Falmouth Coaster, the Lizard and new services in Newquay. |
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Post by Busboy105 on May 24, 2021 20:35:42 GMT
What if TFL made profit? Surely they wouldn’t be in the situation they are in now
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Post by Eastlondoner62 on May 24, 2021 20:47:19 GMT
What if TFL made profit? Surely they wouldn’t be in the situation they are in now This is true, although even if they were there could have been potential that the pandemic would have still run them dry. It's no easy task to get TfL profitable, you'd need to cut routes in different places and only run things which don't lose money. I could well imagine this would mean lines like the Metropolitan and Bakerloo stopping right after the PM peak and many routes that are "round the houses" such as the H2 and 399 just culled completely. We'd get a profitable service, but is it worth it for a worse service? |
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Post by LondonNorthern on May 25, 2021 6:24:03 GMT
What if TFL made profit? Surely they wouldn’t be in the situation they are in now This is true, although even if they were there could have been potential that the pandemic would have still run them dry. It's no easy task to get TfL profitable, you'd need to cut routes in different places and only run things which don't lose money. I could well imagine this would mean lines like the Metropolitan and Bakerloo stopping right after the PM peak and many routes that are "round the houses" such as the H2 and 399 just culled completely. We'd get a profitable service, but is it worth it for a worse service? Perhaps the round the houses routes would be subsidised by other bus routes that are more profitable |
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