Working public transport across the country is a pillar to every minimum standard common sense.
It’s great that this is being highlighted.
To be fair though, it’s not just the people of the north who are being excluded by not being able to access public transport, it’s anyone outside the SE or a handful of major cities.
At least it sounds like there is some transport available around the NE, even if it’s unreliable and infrequent. In many parts of the country, we don’t even get that luxury.
Got to Leeds on Sunday. To be honest I’m fucking surprised at the amount of cars on the road and the state of Public transport here. The UK is more densely populated than the Netherlands, its a massive shame.
Our public transport is expensive and not very good, we have buses only, and they are often late or just don’t turn up. we need cars here in my dormitory town otherwise its a hour and half trip to Newcastle
North? Anywhere outside of London is suffering, have you ever heard arriva.
Buses that are run by private companies will favour profit over service if they are allowed to get away with it.
*A Northumberland schoolchild told researchers: “It takes two or three buses to get to school and it takes ages. It also means I can’t stay on for after-school activities and also reduced my choice for A-levels.”*
I know exactly which school that will be and where abouts in Northumberland. When I was a kid the middle school had a boarding wing for kids who lived in the more remote parts of Northumberland but cuts saw an end to that.
They should go visit Thanet too… Bus services being stripped away as we speak.
[deleted]
You can always tell who grew up with easy access to a car/being given lifts by how long they think it takes to walk places. I’ve seen people assume walking is half or a third as fast as driving (5 min drive is 10 or 15 minute walk). Realistically with the way paths and buildings are arranged at least where I’m from, what would be a 5 min drive can take 20 or 30 minutes, and if your in a rural place getting to town can be an hour walk. Fun if you are walking to work in rain or strong heat.
London-privilege is a real thing and doesn’t get enough attention
Tories are gonna start extolling the virtues of owning a bike next, you watch.
>I grew up in the ’30s with an unemployed father. He didn’t riot. He got on his bike and looked for work, and he kept looking till he found it.
Norman Tebbit. Tory MP.
The public transport infrastructure here in Cumbria is about as bad as it gets. Over-priced, aging and infrequent. Some areas don’t even have a regular or daily service of any sort and as such are outright impossible to get to without a car or motorcycle.
While London gets all its travel spoon fed with constant money pumped in to it, the rest of us are left to rot.
Prices went up in my area despite 12 depos shut, half the bosses sacked, a lot of routes cut.
Where my family lives in the NW the daytime bus service was cancelled about a decade ago and the trains are regularly cancelled. Being stuck in a place like that can make you really depressed.
Cool looking forward to the SW report that will never happen because it seems the SW gets forgotten all the time
And this is how you get disaffected isolated communities vulnerable to fascists who appear to have easy answers.
South of England is really not that much better. Not having a car, I frequently have to go to Woking or Basingstoke just to travel to the next town over.
Public transport is something of a societal litmus.
For folk to use public transport, the key ingredients are (a) that a network exists, (b) that they run reliably, and (c) that they get you there, ideally within 5-60 minutes of needing to be there, connections dependent.
Fare prices are always a factor to individuals reliant on public transport, of course, were it not a factor, after all, they could likely afford to run a car.
And here we hit the first acid test. People are using cars precisely because the network does not exist and/or cannot be relied upon. (irrespective of any laziness quotients) Plus, the fares are tied to profit forecasts, not costs.
Logically, fare prices on single route could only come down when usage is at or near capacity – when the cost per mile comes down, so could the fares, in the simplest economic model, right?
Extending the economics, we can amalgamate costs and incomes against all routes and periods (rush-hour, non-rush hour, Sundays, etc), add zones to simplify combination journeys beyond town-centre shuttles, that sort of thing.
And that was what we had, and more, before the bus routes, just like rail networks and the rest of our infrastructures, were carved up and handed to franchises whose only focus is maximising profits.
So now, instead, we see fare prices increase with demand. Because those off-peak fares aren’t a genuine discount, they instead reflect those minimums generated by the profit forecasts.
Every seat is commodotized. Every seat not surpassing a minimum level of profit, has a question-mark above it, an axe waiting to fall.
There is now hardly a week goes by without one or other services being withdrawn somewhere.
Whilst manpower availability has certainly been a factor for some closures, in most scenarios it’s cited, it’s for other reasons, eg: if a route does not even pay the driver’s salary, where’s the profit?
They’ve got the figures, spreadsheet-pivoted every which way, they know the real costs, they KNOW they *could* keep X, Y and Z routes open, but again, from their perspective: “why should we reduce profits?”.
Other nations have no difficulty with the concept (or costs) of laying on a properly functioning, even partly subsidised, public transport service … why is it we struggle so much with it?
Because other nations don’t treat their citizens as bottom-line cash-cows to be fed to the machine, that’s why.
As I say, public transport is a litmus, and you can increasingly apply its results to largely everything else that has VAT applied.
I’m always amazed when I go to a city with amazing public transport.
Like London. I see a lot of Londoners complain about it but man, it amazes me. If only the rest of the country had enough money for that scale of Public Transport. Man I’d settle for working buses.
Everytime I go have a night out with mates (6-8miles away) I have to stay in a hotel as I cant get there on public transport so it works out cheaper to drive and stay in an airbnb than get taxis both ways.
North west here and the public transport around here is shit and as been for many years
Red wall tories getting left behind. Quelle surprise!
We just dont have the transport to support these 3 meter tall men! Disgraceful, what has this country come to.
The lack of proper night economies in this country is an embarrassment compared to the global norm. It won’t happen until we sort out public transport either.
Privatisation of public services always provides a worse service. These institutions require greater infrastructure which gets neglected when profits instead go to share holders. British rail was cheaper & more efficient before it was sold off. The only private rail franchise which actually ran a profit without need for state subsidies was the GNER – whilst taken back under state management. Because they’re essential services; when they get run into the ground, they have to be subsidised by the state. Essentially: taxpayers propping up share holders. The tories end game is for everything, NHS included, to follow suit. No matter how sacred a cow they pretend to see it as.
Wondering what peoples thoughts are on the extension of the ULEZ into Greater London?
Few weeks ago I wanted to take a train from Cumbria to London so that I can catch my flight. Nope, I can’t, no trains available apparently due to lack of drivers I had to drive and leave my car at the airport.
We want to be left the fuck alone. That’s why we live here.
Does not surprise me at all. I come from Middlesborough and I used to live in Leeds. I had a car at the time, and I can tell you that a car journey from my place in Leeds to my Dad’s house in Middlesborough takes 1hr 15 by car. One day I was planning on going to see him and I decided not to take the car. It took 6 bloody hours. Two trains and a bus. 6 hours. And they wonder why everyone has a car.
Edit to add, at the time the petrol for that journey was roughly 8 quid. It cost 15 on public transport.
It costs me £3.80 to town (Newcastle)less than 2 miles on a bus (I’m in Gateshead), more than one person in a taxi is cheaper! public transport in the provinces is a shambles and they are raping us – why can’t it be like london or Manchester for the rest of us?
My town used to have 4 regular buss routes 2 main to 2 minor stagecoach cutted our minor routes years ago and haven’t brought our remaining routes back to pre pandemic times we used to get 3 busses an hour on one route now we are lucky to get 2 an hour with a completely useless random gap the other route has a lovely gap of over 90 minutes unless it’s a Sunday when it dosent even fucking run
I saw a photo from the late 90s recently that showed my local bus stop (incidentally).
There were 6 different bus numbers and a night bus on it, there is now one bus.
Why doesn’t the UK build a mass transit underground system?
Even poor countries like Thailand and India has very cheap and efficient metros.
When I used to commute to Leeds on the Trans Pennine trains my lord I don’t think there was a day a train wasn’t late, stuck on the line, broken down, cancelled. One day there was a train on fire, people or animals on the line. Flooding or leafs on the line causing delays. Train wheels slipping off. It was just ridiculous how incapable we are are just running a train on time let alone everything else
Its not just the north
My mam gets one local bus a day. Has done for some time after the previous operator didn’t want to renew and a stand in was paid to take it on to give the minimum appearance of operation.
Living in southern USA has really put isolation in perspective. Country dont give a squat about its people when they’re forced to stay in dooors/learn to drive/ buy a car just to feel part of a society
38 comments
Working public transport across the country is a pillar to every minimum standard common sense.
It’s great that this is being highlighted.
To be fair though, it’s not just the people of the north who are being excluded by not being able to access public transport, it’s anyone outside the SE or a handful of major cities.
At least it sounds like there is some transport available around the NE, even if it’s unreliable and infrequent. In many parts of the country, we don’t even get that luxury.
Got to Leeds on Sunday. To be honest I’m fucking surprised at the amount of cars on the road and the state of Public transport here. The UK is more densely populated than the Netherlands, its a massive shame.
Our public transport is expensive and not very good, we have buses only, and they are often late or just don’t turn up. we need cars here in my dormitory town otherwise its a hour and half trip to Newcastle
North? Anywhere outside of London is suffering, have you ever heard arriva.
Buses that are run by private companies will favour profit over service if they are allowed to get away with it.
*A Northumberland schoolchild told researchers: “It takes two or three buses to get to school and it takes ages. It also means I can’t stay on for after-school activities and also reduced my choice for A-levels.”*
I know exactly which school that will be and where abouts in Northumberland. When I was a kid the middle school had a boarding wing for kids who lived in the more remote parts of Northumberland but cuts saw an end to that.
They should go visit Thanet too… Bus services being stripped away as we speak.
[deleted]
You can always tell who grew up with easy access to a car/being given lifts by how long they think it takes to walk places. I’ve seen people assume walking is half or a third as fast as driving (5 min drive is 10 or 15 minute walk). Realistically with the way paths and buildings are arranged at least where I’m from, what would be a 5 min drive can take 20 or 30 minutes, and if your in a rural place getting to town can be an hour walk. Fun if you are walking to work in rain or strong heat.
London-privilege is a real thing and doesn’t get enough attention
Tories are gonna start extolling the virtues of owning a bike next, you watch.
>I grew up in the ’30s with an unemployed father. He didn’t riot. He got on his bike and looked for work, and he kept looking till he found it.
Norman Tebbit. Tory MP.
The public transport infrastructure here in Cumbria is about as bad as it gets. Over-priced, aging and infrequent. Some areas don’t even have a regular or daily service of any sort and as such are outright impossible to get to without a car or motorcycle.
While London gets all its travel spoon fed with constant money pumped in to it, the rest of us are left to rot.
Prices went up in my area despite 12 depos shut, half the bosses sacked, a lot of routes cut.
Now coming to the South too – https://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/local-news/stagecoach-bus-campaign-devastating-cuts-25074117
Where my family lives in the NW the daytime bus service was cancelled about a decade ago and the trains are regularly cancelled. Being stuck in a place like that can make you really depressed.
Cool looking forward to the SW report that will never happen because it seems the SW gets forgotten all the time
And this is how you get disaffected isolated communities vulnerable to fascists who appear to have easy answers.
South of England is really not that much better. Not having a car, I frequently have to go to Woking or Basingstoke just to travel to the next town over.
Public transport is something of a societal litmus.
For folk to use public transport, the key ingredients are (a) that a network exists, (b) that they run reliably, and (c) that they get you there, ideally within 5-60 minutes of needing to be there, connections dependent.
Fare prices are always a factor to individuals reliant on public transport, of course, were it not a factor, after all, they could likely afford to run a car.
And here we hit the first acid test. People are using cars precisely because the network does not exist and/or cannot be relied upon. (irrespective of any laziness quotients) Plus, the fares are tied to profit forecasts, not costs.
Logically, fare prices on single route could only come down when usage is at or near capacity – when the cost per mile comes down, so could the fares, in the simplest economic model, right?
Extending the economics, we can amalgamate costs and incomes against all routes and periods (rush-hour, non-rush hour, Sundays, etc), add zones to simplify combination journeys beyond town-centre shuttles, that sort of thing.
And that was what we had, and more, before the bus routes, just like rail networks and the rest of our infrastructures, were carved up and handed to franchises whose only focus is maximising profits.
So now, instead, we see fare prices increase with demand. Because those off-peak fares aren’t a genuine discount, they instead reflect those minimums generated by the profit forecasts.
Every seat is commodotized. Every seat not surpassing a minimum level of profit, has a question-mark above it, an axe waiting to fall.
There is now hardly a week goes by without one or other services being withdrawn somewhere.
Whilst manpower availability has certainly been a factor for some closures, in most scenarios it’s cited, it’s for other reasons, eg: if a route does not even pay the driver’s salary, where’s the profit?
They’ve got the figures, spreadsheet-pivoted every which way, they know the real costs, they KNOW they *could* keep X, Y and Z routes open, but again, from their perspective: “why should we reduce profits?”.
Other nations have no difficulty with the concept (or costs) of laying on a properly functioning, even partly subsidised, public transport service … why is it we struggle so much with it?
Because other nations don’t treat their citizens as bottom-line cash-cows to be fed to the machine, that’s why.
As I say, public transport is a litmus, and you can increasingly apply its results to largely everything else that has VAT applied.
I’m always amazed when I go to a city with amazing public transport.
Like London. I see a lot of Londoners complain about it but man, it amazes me. If only the rest of the country had enough money for that scale of Public Transport. Man I’d settle for working buses.
Everytime I go have a night out with mates (6-8miles away) I have to stay in a hotel as I cant get there on public transport so it works out cheaper to drive and stay in an airbnb than get taxis both ways.
North west here and the public transport around here is shit and as been for many years
Red wall tories getting left behind. Quelle surprise!
We just dont have the transport to support these 3 meter tall men! Disgraceful, what has this country come to.
The lack of proper night economies in this country is an embarrassment compared to the global norm. It won’t happen until we sort out public transport either.
Privatisation of public services always provides a worse service. These institutions require greater infrastructure which gets neglected when profits instead go to share holders. British rail was cheaper & more efficient before it was sold off. The only private rail franchise which actually ran a profit without need for state subsidies was the GNER – whilst taken back under state management. Because they’re essential services; when they get run into the ground, they have to be subsidised by the state. Essentially: taxpayers propping up share holders. The tories end game is for everything, NHS included, to follow suit. No matter how sacred a cow they pretend to see it as.
Wondering what peoples thoughts are on the extension of the ULEZ into Greater London?
Few weeks ago I wanted to take a train from Cumbria to London so that I can catch my flight. Nope, I can’t, no trains available apparently due to lack of drivers I had to drive and leave my car at the airport.
We want to be left the fuck alone. That’s why we live here.
Does not surprise me at all. I come from Middlesborough and I used to live in Leeds. I had a car at the time, and I can tell you that a car journey from my place in Leeds to my Dad’s house in Middlesborough takes 1hr 15 by car. One day I was planning on going to see him and I decided not to take the car. It took 6 bloody hours. Two trains and a bus. 6 hours. And they wonder why everyone has a car.
Edit to add, at the time the petrol for that journey was roughly 8 quid. It cost 15 on public transport.
It costs me £3.80 to town (Newcastle)less than 2 miles on a bus (I’m in Gateshead), more than one person in a taxi is cheaper! public transport in the provinces is a shambles and they are raping us – why can’t it be like london or Manchester for the rest of us?
My town used to have 4 regular buss routes 2 main to 2 minor stagecoach cutted our minor routes years ago and haven’t brought our remaining routes back to pre pandemic times we used to get 3 busses an hour on one route now we are lucky to get 2 an hour with a completely useless random gap the other route has a lovely gap of over 90 minutes unless it’s a Sunday when it dosent even fucking run
I saw a photo from the late 90s recently that showed my local bus stop (incidentally).
There were 6 different bus numbers and a night bus on it, there is now one bus.
Why doesn’t the UK build a mass transit underground system?
Even poor countries like Thailand and India has very cheap and efficient metros.
When I used to commute to Leeds on the Trans Pennine trains my lord I don’t think there was a day a train wasn’t late, stuck on the line, broken down, cancelled. One day there was a train on fire, people or animals on the line. Flooding or leafs on the line causing delays. Train wheels slipping off. It was just ridiculous how incapable we are are just running a train on time let alone everything else
Its not just the north
My mam gets one local bus a day. Has done for some time after the previous operator didn’t want to renew and a stand in was paid to take it on to give the minimum appearance of operation.
Living in southern USA has really put isolation in perspective. Country dont give a squat about its people when they’re forced to stay in dooors/learn to drive/ buy a car just to feel part of a society