How much will the country have go deteriorate before people stop believing the lies perpetuated by the Tories and Daily Mail right wing media. They care nothing for us or the state of the country. Only a select wealthy few.
Classic tactic used over and over – make something more and more unreliable, wait until people stop using it and be forced to use alternatives, claim it’s no longer value for moneyprofitable as ‘no-one is using it’ and then axe it.
Eugh buses.
Im from Hertfordshire. It’s a 10 minute drive from my parents house to the town centre. The local bus not only takes half an hour due to the route / stops, but it is FOUR POUNDS for a one way fare. To put that into perspective, a day travel card to London, including the overground journey there and back, is 15 quid from the station. Utter robbery.
Every morning the missus takes over an hour (if the bus is on time) to go 3m I can drive it in 10mins. Ordinarily they don’t turn up, thankfully her boss uses the buses as well & accepts she’ll be late.
Recently I wanted to visit my lad in Oxford, I thought I’d do the decent thing and take the train £160 for the 2 of us, it cost £35 in fuel.
Not to excuse the cuts but I used to bus everyday before covid, now I work from home and never catch it, I expect there’s a significant number like me.
I have to check twitter every morning 2 hours before leaving, to make sure that the bus company hasn’t cancelled my usual bus. Have also been stranded a number of times because the company decided to repeatedly send a single decker bus on their busiest route of the day.
The local authority are trying to put in place a congestion charge in order to promote and pay for better public transport, but my employer has said that can only happen AFTER they have significantly improved current public transport.
I’ve read that rural services suffer the most. Urban areas seems pretty well covered in my area, the West Midlands, but frequency drops off after around 6 p.m. which is a problem for workers, a 15 minute frequency changing to 30 can see you getting home pretty late, especially if you have to get two, you can be waiting for up to an hour.
On the other hand, not only is there the official NX site, but others offering plenty of information. You can download schedules and search nearest bus to… and providing you have the time, and not everybody does I know, pretty much get anywhere round the area. Ticket prices are pretty reasonable, £4 off peak all day, all buses daysaver and you can, or could, apply for a free travel pass based on disability.
Got the bus for the first time in over a year last week and it was fine, however it is the busiest and most profitable route in town. Those that are less profitable have all had their routes trimmed down and the number of buses per hour is much poorer. The largest bus company in town even managed to go into administration last year, partly due to fewer customers (poor management didn’t help), people are just put off by the poor service and increasing prices. You pay more to access a constantly deteriorating service.
8 comments
How much will the country have go deteriorate before people stop believing the lies perpetuated by the Tories and Daily Mail right wing media. They care nothing for us or the state of the country. Only a select wealthy few.
Classic tactic used over and over – make something more and more unreliable, wait until people stop using it and be forced to use alternatives, claim it’s no longer value for moneyprofitable as ‘no-one is using it’ and then axe it.
Eugh buses.
Im from Hertfordshire. It’s a 10 minute drive from my parents house to the town centre. The local bus not only takes half an hour due to the route / stops, but it is FOUR POUNDS for a one way fare. To put that into perspective, a day travel card to London, including the overground journey there and back, is 15 quid from the station. Utter robbery.
Every morning the missus takes over an hour (if the bus is on time) to go 3m I can drive it in 10mins. Ordinarily they don’t turn up, thankfully her boss uses the buses as well & accepts she’ll be late.
Recently I wanted to visit my lad in Oxford, I thought I’d do the decent thing and take the train £160 for the 2 of us, it cost £35 in fuel.
Not to excuse the cuts but I used to bus everyday before covid, now I work from home and never catch it, I expect there’s a significant number like me.
I have to check twitter every morning 2 hours before leaving, to make sure that the bus company hasn’t cancelled my usual bus. Have also been stranded a number of times because the company decided to repeatedly send a single decker bus on their busiest route of the day.
The local authority are trying to put in place a congestion charge in order to promote and pay for better public transport, but my employer has said that can only happen AFTER they have significantly improved current public transport.
I’ve read that rural services suffer the most. Urban areas seems pretty well covered in my area, the West Midlands, but frequency drops off after around 6 p.m. which is a problem for workers, a 15 minute frequency changing to 30 can see you getting home pretty late, especially if you have to get two, you can be waiting for up to an hour.
On the other hand, not only is there the official NX site, but others offering plenty of information. You can download schedules and search nearest bus to… and providing you have the time, and not everybody does I know, pretty much get anywhere round the area. Ticket prices are pretty reasonable, £4 off peak all day, all buses daysaver and you can, or could, apply for a free travel pass based on disability.
Got the bus for the first time in over a year last week and it was fine, however it is the busiest and most profitable route in town. Those that are less profitable have all had their routes trimmed down and the number of buses per hour is much poorer. The largest bus company in town even managed to go into administration last year, partly due to fewer customers (poor management didn’t help), people are just put off by the poor service and increasing prices. You pay more to access a constantly deteriorating service.