Pretty much my experience yesterday. It turned up a bit later and came from different road than usual, I checked my bus stop timetable on Journey Planner and few trips had status cancelled.
Number 4 bus is worst for this. Then you get two pulling up to the same stop at the same time. Like fucking space out your times.
Tip: Call 01 873 4222 go through the short message and you’ll get an agent and just ask about if your bus is coming. They’ll check with the dispatcher or whatever they are called and tell you if it is late or not running because understaffed etc. Overall it just takes about 3 mins.
Admittedly not so useful to those who can just grab a few buses or there’ll be another one of their number along soon. But if you need a bus and it doesn’t come often it saves so much needless waiting and you can go back home or wait in a costa or something for the next. Seen a lot of people just wait ages and ages before walking away unsure if they should or not
The 75 route is fuckin atrocious for that. I’ll get to a stop like 20 minutes before one shows up, only for it it “disappear” on the radar, and skip to the next one in an hour’s time.
18 moment
I remember hearing a random podcast about the best bus routes in the world.
The story goes, this one country were originally awful about buses turning up or being on time. It was inevitable that later buses would leap-over each other, or be stuck crawling behind another earlier bus as it picked up all the passengers ahead, slowing the entire route down. Then some hotshot planner came in changed things up.
They timed how long it takes a bus across all times of day to go through each part of the routes. The routes were perfectly timed for every stop at all times of the day, but with extra few minutes in the route added. Every bus driver was taught to not go from Stop 1-100 as fast as possible. Instead they were now given down to the minute times on how long they have to get between specific stops. If they were early, they would wait at a stop for a few seconds to a minute. Enough extra time was factored into every route at all times per day, including traffic. This stopped buses getting stuck behind each others on narrow roads. Buses also always turned up at stops on time, and if they were early they waited until their set “take off” time before moving, so passengers never experienced their bus drive off early. Passengers were also happier as they could turn up 5 minutes before and be guaranteed to get their bus at the set arrival time.
I wish I remember where this transport overhaul took place.
6 comments
Pretty much my experience yesterday. It turned up a bit later and came from different road than usual, I checked my bus stop timetable on Journey Planner and few trips had status cancelled.
Number 4 bus is worst for this. Then you get two pulling up to the same stop at the same time. Like fucking space out your times.
Tip: Call 01 873 4222 go through the short message and you’ll get an agent and just ask about if your bus is coming. They’ll check with the dispatcher or whatever they are called and tell you if it is late or not running because understaffed etc. Overall it just takes about 3 mins.
Admittedly not so useful to those who can just grab a few buses or there’ll be another one of their number along soon. But if you need a bus and it doesn’t come often it saves so much needless waiting and you can go back home or wait in a costa or something for the next. Seen a lot of people just wait ages and ages before walking away unsure if they should or not
The 75 route is fuckin atrocious for that. I’ll get to a stop like 20 minutes before one shows up, only for it it “disappear” on the radar, and skip to the next one in an hour’s time.
18 moment
I remember hearing a random podcast about the best bus routes in the world.
The story goes, this one country were originally awful about buses turning up or being on time. It was inevitable that later buses would leap-over each other, or be stuck crawling behind another earlier bus as it picked up all the passengers ahead, slowing the entire route down. Then some hotshot planner came in changed things up.
They timed how long it takes a bus across all times of day to go through each part of the routes. The routes were perfectly timed for every stop at all times of the day, but with extra few minutes in the route added. Every bus driver was taught to not go from Stop 1-100 as fast as possible. Instead they were now given down to the minute times on how long they have to get between specific stops. If they were early, they would wait at a stop for a few seconds to a minute. Enough extra time was factored into every route at all times per day, including traffic. This stopped buses getting stuck behind each others on narrow roads. Buses also always turned up at stops on time, and if they were early they waited until their set “take off” time before moving, so passengers never experienced their bus drive off early. Passengers were also happier as they could turn up 5 minutes before and be guaranteed to get their bus at the set arrival time.
I wish I remember where this transport overhaul took place.