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Post by Eastlondoner62 on Dec 1, 2020 13:47:31 GMT
Timetables are not overly padded out on purpose. The fact is that we live in a city with highly variable traffic conditions, and you can't timetable for all eventualities. If any operator overly padded out their schedule it would lead to extra buses being required - in short it would put them at a significant disadvantage on the tender. TFL also have to evaluate the schedule to ensure it reflects real world conditions. Schedules are based on real world running times. All data on running times is recorded through iBus and average running times over a certain period can be reviewed through Hyperion. This is the data that company schedulers will use to formulate running times - and as I said if running times are overly padded out this will lead to additional buses being required on the schedule leading to a higher cost on the tender (cost of the vehicle, additional staff required to drive it, cost of operating the vehicle etc.). You can't schedule for all conditions - on quiet days you will have service regulation as buses need to run somewhere close to their time (even on high frequency routes factors like live changeovers and limited stand space availability require many high frequency routes to run close to their scheduled time rather than their headway). You need to make up your mind. You moan when buses are curtailed due to late running, and you moan about when buses are regulated. You can't schedule for all conditions so both are necessary. One day the schedule will be insufficient and you'll be moaning about buses being turned, and then on a quiet day you'll moan about buses being regulated. You just seem to enjoy picking faults in everything... Traffic conditions are variable. Nothing is going to run perfectly! There are some routes that are over padded whether there was roadworks etc and operators tend to be very reluctant to reduce the service for obvious reasons. Additional buses on a route can gain better QSI's so that extra bus can actually pull serious amounts of money in for certain companies. Worst on very high frequency routes. I think the 5 and 115 are the worst examples of this. The amount of regulation on those routes is ridiculous ever since Go Ahead took them on. Don't get me wrong, Go Ahead stick to the timetable like clockwork better than Stagecoach ever did, but the amount of regulation is just ridiculous. It really shouldn't be taking a 5 longer to get to East Ham than it takes a 474 to get to Beckton from Canning Town but here we are. As you say the routes are huge so the bonuses Go Ahead are getting must be ridiculous, and looking at those graphs the 115 and 5 are certainly heading for a contract extension too giving Go Ahead a further 2 years of raking in the money. While padded schedules are a total headache for a consumer, when the A13 and A406 go bottoms up the 5 at least tends to be the last route that'll fall apart in most cases due to the excessively padded schedule.
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Post by busman on Dec 7, 2020 10:34:41 GMT
Passing PD earlier today, it seems there are some hidden treasures inside. I’ve often noticed original Routemasters inside PD and at the moment they have a lovely looking example blinded for the 6. That’s pretty standard for PD, but much to my surprise they also have a DMS! I think it was a vehicle from the 1974 batch, but couldn’t be sure as I could only see the offside at an odd angle and wasn’t close enough to read the fleet code, and front was covered by a wall. Made me wonder what are these vehicles there for and what other preserved vehicles are hidden inside London’s bus garages?
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Post by cl54 on Dec 8, 2020 9:14:14 GMT
Passing PD earlier today, it seems there are some hidden treasures inside. I’ve often noticed original Routemasters inside PD and at the moment they have a lovely looking example blinded for the 6. That’s pretty standard for PD, but much to my surprise they also have a DMS! I think it was a vehicle from the 1974 batch, but couldn’t be sure as I could only see the offside at an odd angle and wasn’t close enough to read the fleet code, and front was covered by a wall. Made me wonder what are these vehicles there for and what other preserved vehicles are hidden inside London’s bus garages? The DMS has been hired as a rest area for drivers in Woolwich. Parked in Thomas Street when in use.
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Post by bustavane on Dec 8, 2020 9:32:26 GMT
Passing PD earlier today, it seems there are some hidden treasures inside. I’ve often noticed original Routemasters inside PD and at the moment they have a lovely looking example blinded for the 6. That’s pretty standard for PD, but much to my surprise they also have a DMS! I think it was a vehicle from the 1974 batch, but couldn’t be sure as I could only see the offside at an odd angle and wasn’t close enough to read the fleet code, and front was covered by a wall. Made me wonder what are these vehicles there for and what other preserved vehicles are hidden inside London’s bus garages? The DMS has been hired as a rest area for drivers in Woolwich. Parked in Thomas Street when in use. Isn't that DMS1868(GHM868M)?
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Post by cl54 on Dec 8, 2020 14:56:40 GMT
The DMS has been hired as a rest area for drivers in Woolwich. Parked in Thomas Street when in use. Isn't that DMS1868(GHM868M)? Yes. Hasn't been on the street recently.
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Post by beaver14uk on Dec 8, 2020 15:44:29 GMT
the owever works there. q uote author=" bustavane" source="/post/607799/thread" timestamp="1607419946"] The DMS has been hired as a rest area for drivers in Woolwich. Parked in Thomas Street when in use. Isn't that DMS1868(GHM868M)?[/quote]
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Post by Deleted on Dec 15, 2020 20:15:45 GMT
Following a discussion elsewhere about the 135 tender got me thinking about garage locations and tender awards. Sometimes you see too different views here about garage locations.
Do garages need to be close to a terminal?
Dead running is usually at the start and end of a day so shouldn't have too much impact?
I remember talk about garages at southern or northern end not always working if TfL scheduled most journeys from the opposite end (Lke the 19 for example) Would TfL every consider adjusting this if a tender is more competitive from the north say?
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Post by Deleted on Dec 15, 2020 20:33:54 GMT
Following a discussion elsewhere about the 135 tender got me thinking about garage locations and tender awards. Sometimes you see too different views here about garage locations.
Do garages need to be close to a terminal?
Dead running is usually at the start and end of a day so shouldn't have too much impact?
I remember talk about garages at southern or northern end not always working if TfL scheduled most journeys from the opposite end (Lke the 19 for example) Would TfL every consider adjusting this if a tender is more competitive from the north say?
Yeah it's an interesting one. One of the major factors used to be whether the garage was near to the planned relief point as drivers were paid travel time to get from the garage to the relief point - this was quite a large cost if the garage was far from the point - however with remote sign on becoming more mainstream now this is not always a factor anymore. Dead runs are also an interesting issue. On routes where the service frequencies are bulked towards a certain direction leading to dead runs to predominantly one end it does tip the balance in favour of a garage at that end of the route. Long dead runs can add quite a bit of cost onto the schedule - it is time drivers are being paid to sit behind the wheel whilst not in service (and it does add up particularly on routes with high PVRs with lots of dead runs) - so a garage at the end of the route favoured by the service frequencies would be more strategic. The service frequencies (which decides the balance of dead runs) are based on passenger demand so are unlikely to be negotiable with TFL. Recently, other costs have become more prevalent and we have seen a lot of routes being taken by garages which aren't really near the route at all - but have short dead runs/ferry car movements due to arterial roads such as Arriva Dartford garage for example. Garage location is also far from the only factor when it comes to tendering. Schedule efficiency does make quite a difference though and garage location plays into this - as a more efficient schedule with less travelling time and less dead running time results in less money spent on driver's wages - which is the biggest cost on the tender.
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Post by capitalomnibus on Dec 19, 2020 23:26:21 GMT
Following a discussion elsewhere about the 135 tender got me thinking about garage locations and tender awards. Sometimes you see too different views here about garage locations.
Do garages need to be close to a terminal?
Dead running is usually at the start and end of a day so shouldn't have too much impact?
I remember talk about garages at southern or northern end not always working if TfL scheduled most journeys from the opposite end (Lke the 19 for example) Would TfL every consider adjusting this if a tender is more competitive from the north say?
Garages do not need to be close to terminal. This is something that stemmed from LT days and then enthusiasts seem to be hung up on this. There is no obvious need for this. Most dead mileage doesn't take long whether on or off route. Also dead running would not have a bus doing start/stop so would be increased mpg on this front. Also as dead running is done mainly at the start and end of the day there is not as much traffic to contend with. Although crew changes being further from the garage during the day could pose a problem, whether using ferry vehicles, buses, trains etc especially if there is traffic etc. Garages at both ends of the route is not a problem for TfL as long as it doesn't pose operational problems to the service.
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Post by Catford94 on Dec 21, 2020 16:39:33 GMT
Another strand to garage locations is what works for sensible driver duties.
If the garage is close to one end of the route, but the round trip time for most / all of the day is such that a driver can't do more than one round trip in a spell of work, then this can make for poor efficiency if (for example) most driver duties end up as 6 and a bit hours' productive work in a day but drivers are on a guaranteed 40 hour week.
I understand that many duties on the 36 from New Cross Garage do one half on the 36 and the other on the 171, presumably for this reason.
LT's traditional approach was of course in an era before two way radio, mobile phones, GPS and so on, and certainly before the concept of remote sign on / off was thought of (although not sure if crew drivers finishing remotely had to go back to the garage to book off) and when there was usually an inspector at any point where crew changes happened (at least for some of the working day.)
Although there were at times some quite remote routes in LT days, some for historic reasons which didn't get tidied up until during or after the 1939 war (e.g. Catford had an allocation on the 12, Old Kent Road on the 159, Bromley on the 36) and there were some in to the 60s and beyond (e.g. Old Kent Road and later Rye Lane had an allocation on the 13 when the southern terminus was London Bridge.)
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Post by greenboy on Dec 21, 2020 17:31:11 GMT
Another strand to garage locations is what works for sensible driver duties. If the garage is close to one end of the route, but the round trip time for most / all of the day is such that a driver can't do more than one round trip in a spell of work, then this can make for poor efficiency if (for example) most driver duties end up as 6 and a bit hours' productive work in a day but drivers are on a guaranteed 40 hour week. I understand that many duties on the 36 from New Cross Garage do one half on the 36 and the other on the 171, presumably for this reason. LT's traditional approach was of course in an era before two way radio, mobile phones, GPS and so on, and certainly before the concept of remote sign on / off was thought of (although not sure if crew drivers finishing remotely had to go back to the garage to book off) and when there was usually an inspector at any point where crew changes happened (at least for some of the working day.) Although there were at times some quite remote routes in LT days, some for historic reasons which didn't get tidied up until during or after the 1939 war (e.g. Catford had an allocation on the 12, Old Kent Road on the 159, Bromley on the 36) and there were some in to the 60s and beyond (e.g. Old Kent Road and later Rye Lane had an allocation on the 13 when the southern terminus was London Bridge.) Up until 1978 the 194B, now the 198, operated from the erstwhile Elmers End Garage which was somewhat remote.
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Post by Catford94 on Dec 22, 2020 17:21:17 GMT
Up until 1978 the 194B, now the 198, operated from the erstwhile Elmers End Garage which was somewhat remote.
I'd forgotten about that one.
While there are always going to be some routes that are never quite convenient for garages that one does seem odd, especially with it going past the door / turning round at Thornton Heath...
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Post by greenboy on Dec 22, 2020 18:03:44 GMT
Up until 1978 the 194B, now the 198, operated from the erstwhile Elmers End Garage which was somewhat remote.
I'd forgotten about that one.
While there are always going to be some routes that are never quite convenient for garages that one does seem odd, especially with it going past the door / turning round at Thornton Heath...
Yes the 194B moved to TH in 1978 with the 289 moving the other way, quite why it wasn't done before 1978 I don't know.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 23, 2020 22:02:16 GMT
What are companies / TfL doing to provide staff appropriate places to rest, if their break point formerly relied upon using public venues for places to sit down, drink, eat and use welfare facilities ?
We could be in a situation in a few days where no take aways will be open together with hardly any welfare facilities.
An hour sat on a cold bus in Harrow Bus Station is far from ideal as a break.
Coupled with tier 4, I hope TfL will allow companies to reschedule their routes to allow all drivers a proper break somewhere warm and safe. Even if it means reducing frequencies or putting more buses out overall ( to allow drivers to take their bus to the garage for relief)
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Post by beaver14uk on Dec 23, 2020 22:49:59 GMT
Lots of extra temporary accommodation has been added at say Romford and Hammersmith and spare buses are all over the network to assist. In my area Greenwich, Bexleyheath and Welling to name a few places. At Brent Cross TfL are actually renting a former shop which has been turned into facilities.
quote author="@rob" source="/post/610259/thread" timestamp="1608760936"]What are companies / TfL doing to provide staff appropriate places to rest, if their break point formerly relied upon using public venues for places to sit down, drink, eat and use welfare facilities ?
We could be in a situation in a few days where no take aways will be open together with hardly any welfare facilities.
An hour sat on a cold bus in Harrow Bus Station is far from ideal as a break.
Coupled with tier 4, I hope TfL will allow companies to reschedule their routes to allow all drivers a proper break somewhere warm and safe. Even if it means reducing frequencies or putting more buses out overall ( to allow drivers to take their bus to the garage for relief)
[/quote]
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