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| New Lune Valley services: Nice buses - shame about the publicity! |
Although the new services represented an improvement for many passengers, at least those within Lancashire, their introduction was marred by confusion over timetables and a lack of information about when buses actually ran. We wrote about it here: (Click to read again).
The sources of information available to passengers - or more importantly, would-be passengers - are: printed timetable leaflets; roadside timetable displays; bus company websites; council websites and third party services, such as Traveline, Google Transit and various apps such as Catch that Bus or Moovit.
In the Beginning:
At the start of the new timetables the information available to the public was as follows:
Printed timetables: None available
Roadside timetable displays in Lancashire were up to date on 4th April. Cumbria's display in Kirkby Lonsdale had not been updated and as North Yorkshire County Council no longer update their cases in Ingleton and Bentham these had been done by the Bus Users' Group and the Friends of Dales Bus on a voluntary basis, using timetable displays compiled by Dales Bus.
Stagecoach website: Former services 80 and 81 were still being shown on the "Timetables" section and in the Journey Planner.
Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire website: No details of the new times and the old 582 timetable still shown. No indication of any changes having taken place.
Lancashire's website: New 81 and 82 timetables available, but former 80, 81 and 582 times still being shown as well.
Cumbria's website: Former 81 and 82 timetables on view with a note to say that changes were expected from 1st April (which was the wrong date).
North Yorkshire's website: Former service 80 removed, but only an out-of-date version of the 581 available and no mention of the new 583 even in the "Forthcoming Changes" section. (NYCC actually pays for the 583!)
Traveline and Third-Party websites: The new 81 and 82 times were on the sites, but so were former services 80 and 582. The 581 was out-of-date and there waa no mention of the 583.
Three Weeks Later
So, after three weeks of the new times and routes being in operation how are the various parties performing the vital task of keeping passengers informed?
Printed Timetables: Still no sign. Normaly, for a supprted service Lancashire County Council would have produced leaflets for the 81 and 82, but as Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire was supposedly keen to promote the through services to Settle and Skipton it was agreed that they should produce something. We await the finished product with interest!
Roadside Displays: Lancashire's displays show the contracted times rather than those actually being operated by Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire (see below). The electronic departure board at Lancaster bus station has also not been updated, other than to remove the old Stagecoach services, so does not show times for the 81 and 82, but continues to show the 582!
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| The bus station board continues to show a 582 at 1715, but not the 82 at 1735. |
Stagecoach website: Following a tip-off from the Bus Users' Group, Stagecoach removed the 80 and 81 timetables from its website sometime during the first week of the new times.
Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire website: Around the 21st April a timetable for all the new services appeared here. However, it differs from that produced by Lancashire County Council in at least two respects: An early morning Saturday journey, which KLCH say is an 81, but LCC say is an 82 running five minutes later and the 1420 service 81 from Lancaster, which KLCH, but not LCC, say goes at that time only in school holidays and on Schooldays leaves at 1400.
Cumbria has updated the 81 and 82 and removed the 582 after the Bus Users' Group sent them a copy of Lancashire's timetable, but they still don't have the current 581 or the new 583 on their site.
North Yorkshire have not made any changes to their website over what was being shown at the start of the timetables. Neither have the Traveline or other third-party services been corrected and further investigation has shown that, incredibly, Traveline still shows the 2021 Summer Sunday service on the 580/581 which finished for the winter last October!
So where should I look for the correct times?
As ever, the best and most reliable source of information is this website! Admittedly, the existance of competing versions of the 81/82 timetable has left us in somewhat of a dilemma, but we have decided to link to the Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire site, partly because it is more likely to show what is actually happening, rather that what the contract requires, and partly because personal observation has shown that on schooldays the 1420 from Lancaster does in fact leave at 1400 and does, in fact, leave people behind who were expecting it to run 20 minutes later! We also link to one of the excellent timetables on the Dales Bus website, as this shows the through journeys between Lancaster, Settle and Skipton in a way that confirms they are through buses (and have through fares) in a way that the operator's timetable doesn't.
Nul Points!
Quite frankly, the whole thing is a shambles. Passengers first became aware that changes were afoot in the Lune Valley as long ago as last Autumn, when Stagecoach gave notice that they wished to withdraw at the end of the year. This was subsequently delayed until April to allow time for a proper look at what was needed by way of replacement and to conduct a tendering excercise, which had been done by mid-February. The situation was then complicated by North Yorkshire County Council wishing to do its own thing in the Bentham area, which resulted in the 583 rather than a direct replacement for service 80 but even so there should have been plenty of time for all concerned to get things right.
Bus operators are required to register details of all their services and any changes to them with a body known as the Traffic Commissioners, to whom they must give 70 days' notice of any changes. Part of the reason for this is to ensure that the public are kept informed. Interestingly, the Bus Users' Group has been unable to find any record of an application being processed by the Commissiooner's office. Could it be that the National Traveline database has not been fully updated, which is why the various other information sources have failed to pick up on the changes?
But for whatever reason, the system has clearly failed, and after three weeks of operation, incorrect information is still widespread in the public domain (from one party or the other) and PEOPLE ARE STILL MISSING THEIR BUS! And this is not a trivial matter. The six passengers that a BUG reporter witnessed at 14.20 in Lancaster bus station, hoping to catch a bus that had left at 14.00 had an hour-and-a-half to wait for the next one; whilst anyone wishing to catch the 82 from Lancaster at 0655 on a Saturday morning will not be amused to find that it left at 0650 and was an 81 anyway!
The Bus Service Improvement Plan for Lancashire promised "improvements in information and publicity" and on this eveidence these can't come soon enough.
