New Bus Stops on the Marsh

A bus stop.

Most passengers have probably never given a thought as to where bus stops come from and who decides where they are positioned.  In many cases the answer will be that bus stops are where they are because they have always been there, having been created in the very early days of bus travel. Only in relatively recent times has a central record of bus stops been created and before this even local councils had no record of where the bus stops were.

Things are a little more formal nowadays and bus companies are required to include a list of stopping places on a route when they register a bus service with the Traffic Commissioners. Each stop also has a unique identifier within the National Public Transport Access Node (NaPTAN) database, something that allows Traveline, Google Maps and others to include them on their maps together with the services that call there and the times that they do so.

Creating new stops is usually dealt with at a high level between bus companies and Lancashire County Council with ordinary passengers not getting much of a say, but recently the BUG has managed to extend its influence over bus matters in Lancaster to participating in the creation of new bus stops - hopefully to the advantage of local passengers.

The section of route where buses were not supposed to stop

It began back in January when we received a request for assistance from our member County Councillor Gina Dowding who, together with City Councillors, had been asked by local people to help get a new bus stop established on Willow Lane, Marsh.  Several years ago, service 11 to Marsh was re-routed to serve the Abraham Heights development, but few, if any, new stops appear to have been provided at that time, with nothing between Coolidge Avenue and the former Marsh terminus at Denmark Street, a distance of three-qaurters of a mile (1.2km).

Our assumption was that the "new" section of route must be being operated under "Hail and Ride" provisions, whereby buses can stop at any safe place to pick up and set down passengers away from main roads, but we were in some doubt as to how far along Willow Lane this would apply. Imagine our surprise, therefore, when we learnt from Stagecoach that NONE of the route of service 11 was registered as "hail and ride" and that legally buses should not stop between Coolidge Avenue and Denmark Street!

Fortunately, over the years drivers and passengers had taken a more common-sense approach and a series of unofficial stopping places had become established, where drivers expected passengers to wait and passengers expected buses to stop. This was all very well for regular users but not much good for new or would-be passengers, or new drivers for that matter. In any case the position had to be regularised so that buses were not stopping illegally and so that the official stopping points could be shown on Traveline, Google Maps and Stagecoach's own website.

"Let's put it over there...." (Westbourne Road)

So a "bus stop site meeting" was called. Such events usually involve the bus company, the county council and perhaps local City councillors if they have been involved in the request. Bus passengers are not usually invited!  The Bus Users Group was therefore very pleased to be asked to attend the meeting and to represent passengers  -a  first for this group and welcome recognition of our growing expertise in all matters relating to bus transport in Lancaster.  Not only that, but on the day, as the County Council  officer was unable to attend, we ended up conducting the meeting and producing the official minutes!

Of course, it helped that, unlike the other parties concerned, we had taken the trouble to go over the route in advance, timing our visit so that we could speak to waiting passengers along the route. 

 Stagecoach brought a bus and we visited each potential site in turn. In placing the stops we took account of convenience for passengers, ease of use by drivers, road safety and privacy and amenity concerns of householders.  We ended up with proposed new stops on Westbourne Road, Leighton Drive and Willow Lane (two). When the county council had had the chance to look over our proposals it approved almost all of them, merely combining our proposed two stops on Leighton Drive to one on a different location. Ironically it is only this compromise site that seems to have attracted any opposition from a nearby householder.

The site of the new stop on Willow Lane

Shortly afterwards, the County Council began the work of erecting new bus stop signs, including one for the established stop at Coolidge Avenue, which never seems to have had one!

The BUG is pleased to have been invited to contribute to the exercise and would like to thank Councillor Dowding and also new Marsh councillor Mandy Bannon for the invitation to help in the project. Also thanks to Stagecoach and Lancashire County Council for allowing us to get involved.  As a precedent has now been established we will be happy to assist anyone else seeking to establish new stops that make things easier for the travelling public.

EU Regulations Mean Cleaner Buses for Lancaster

Efforts to reduce harmful emissions and clean up buses - and other road vehicles - in the UK began in 1992 when the European Union introduced new standards for all vehicles in member states. The first Europe-wide euro emissions standards were introduced in July 1992 and the regulations weren’t anywhere near as stringent as they are today. That said, the fitment of catalytic converters became compulsory on all new cars, and Euro I required the switch to unleaded petrol. Back then, only hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxide were tested, along with particulate matter in the case of diesel engines. Over the years, the regulations have become stricter and the limits lowered.

Further standards, known as "Euro II", "Euro III" and "Euro IV" were introduced over the following thirteen years each of which meant stricter controls on the emission of carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxide.  Euro V regulations, introduced in 2011 were a great step forward with the introduction of particulate filters (DPFs) for diesel vehicles, along with lower limits across the board. Cars meeting Euro 5 standards emit the equivalent of one grain of sand per kilometre driven.

The current standards, Euro VI, introduced in 2015, identified nitrogen oxide emissions as a major contributory factor in respiratory diseases and concentrated on reducing them, slashing the permitted limits from 0.18 grammes per kilometre to just 0.09gm/km

So how has this affected Lancaster's buses?  Before last January, the majority of Stagecoach buses in the city were designed to only Euro IV or Euro V standards. 

But this one only meets Euro IV

This bus meets Euro V standards

Because of high pollution levels, Lancaster city centre is an Air Quality Management Area and the City Council is required to come up with ways to reduce them. In 2015, in conjunction with Lancashire County Council, a successful bid was made to the Clean Bus Technology Fund and a sum of £288,000 was awarded, which would have retro-fitted Selective Catalytic Technology to seventeen double-deck buses similar to those in the photo above to reduce emission levels to the lower, Euro VI, limits.

This was a new project for both Stagecoach and the council and both organisations would concede that the procurement process took much longer than planned, not helped by a potential supplier going bankrupt in the middle of it. Earlier this year the whole project got overtaken by events when Stagecoach invested £3.8M of its own money to purchase a fleet of eighteen new double-deckers (shown below) that were fitted with the latest Euro VI engines as well as stop-start technology, thereby achieving a greater reduction in pollution than was hoped for from the Clean Air Funding.

One of Stagecoach's new double-decks with Euro VI engines

The new buses were put to work on Service 1 between Heysham and the University with the older Euro V-engined buses moving to Service 100.

Next September, following investment of a further £3M, Stagecoach will receive another 14 new double-deckers for use on service 100, with the older Euro V-engined vehicles that were to be the subject of the original Clean Bus Fund project moving elsewhere in the Stagecoach empire. When these new buses are in service 49% of all Stagecoach journeys in the city will be operated by Euro VI engined buses and a further 28% by buses meeting Euro V regulations meaning that 77% of journeys will be Euro V or better.

A new use for the funding?

A bus meeting Euro IV standards that could be converted?

But what about that £288,000 that was never spent?  After discussions between the parties concerned a plan has been agreed that will further reduce emissions from buses, not just in Lancaster but also in Carnforth, where the town centre also has Air Quality Management issues. Stagecoach's older buses, which meet only Euro IV regulations, which were current between 2005 and 2011, cannot be fitted with Selective Catalytic Technology as was originally proposed for the double-deck fleet. Instead it is proposed to fit a smaller number, possibly seven, of them with brand new Euro VI  engines manufactured by Cummins. The cost of this is such that Stagecoach would not normally consider it a commercial proposition, but the grant funding makes all the difference.  The proportion of bus journeys operated by Euro VI engined buses would increase from 49% to 61% with a massive 89% of journeys being operated by Euro V or better engined-vehicles. Euro VI journeys in Carnforth will more than double from 30%  to 63%.

Euro VI is unlikely to be the end of the matter and stricter emissions standards can be expected from the EU in the coming years. Whether or not we will see the benefits of these here in the UK is, of course, unknown but we would hope that nobody would see "dirtier air" as a benefit of leaving the Union!

The Bus Users Group would like to acknowledge the help of the RAC website in compiling this article and there is much more information on Euro standards available by clicking this link.

Short-notice Change to Service 81 School Bus

Stagecoach has just given notice, via the "Service Changes" section of its website, of the following change on service 81 Lancaster - Kirkby Lonsdale. 

Stagecoach service 81 at Kirkby Lonsdale Market Place

To aid punctuality from Monday 3rd June the 07:45 departure from Lancaster to Kirkby Lonsdale QES via Gressingham will depart 10 minutes earlier at 07:35 and operate 10 minutes earlier throughout

Lancaster bus station     07:35

Lancaster Holiday Inn     07:42

Caton War Memorial        07:48

Brookhouse Black Bull      07:51

Hornby Wenning Stores    08:01

Hornby Lunesdale Sch      08:02

Gessingham Church         08:08

Arkholme Bay Horse         08:14

Whittington                        08:20

Kirkby Lonsdale QES        08:30

Kirkby Lonsdale Booths    08:33 

ENDS

 "QES", for the uninitiated, is "Queen Elizabeth School", an educational establishment in Kirkby Lonsdale that is popular enough with people from Lancaster and the Lune Valley to justify no fewer than three buses each morning from Lancaster. Stagecoach operates two of these: one via Wray, Wennington and Melling and the other, as shown above, up the other side of the valley through Gressingham and Arkholme.  The third bus, also via Gressingham and Arkholme, is provided by Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire.  The majority of the passengers will have been on their half-term holiday this week so it is hoped that they were told of the change beforehand, otherwise some of them might be in for a shock on Monday morning!

Nevertheless, the BUG hopes that the change will indeed "improve punctuality", although as the overall running time is unchanged at 55 minutes between Lancaster and the School it is hard to see how. The "other" 81, up the other side of the valley, has an identical overall running time and this, apparently, doesn't need its punctuality improving.  Nor does it seem that Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire see the need to change its service 582 bus, which has only 53 minutes for an identical journey.

Of course, Stagecoach's 81 will now run ten minutes in front of Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire's 582, but when one is carrying children to school that's not necessarily a competitive advantage!