Local Bus Operators Lead the Way to Free Vaccination Travel

 

Lancaster's local bus operators are leading the way to join an initiative by Lancashire County Council to provide free travel for anyone attending an appointment at an NHS Vaccination Centre, although it appears to have met with a lukewarm response from operators in some parts of the Council's area.

The Bus Users' Group understands that despite "a number of opportunities to confirm their participation" many operators have yet to do so.  The Bus Users' Group is, however, pleased to be able to confirm that both Stagecoach and Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire have agreed to join in. Other operators known to be participating are Blackpool Transport and Coastliner Buses, although the Council is requiring all of its tendered services to be included in the scheme, which will bring in a large number of other bus companies throughout those parts of Lancashire administered by the County Council.

Meanwhile in Furness, the Friends of the X112 have announced that they too will be providing free travel to vaccination centres on services between Coniston, Ulverston and Barrow-in-Furness.

Under the scheme, anyone with a confirmed appointment for a Covid jab can travel free of charge to and from their vaccination centre by showing proof of their appointment to the bus driver.

The initiative is expected to continue "until further notice".

City Centre Bus Stops Closed Next Week

 

Spring Garden Street will be closed and the bus stops in George Street out of use.

Roadworks on Spring Garden Street from Monday to Wednesday next week (6th to 8th December) mean that no buses will be able to serve the city centre stops at George Street.

Here are the alternative arrangements for the affected services:

SOUTHBOUND

1/1A (University)  4/4X (University) 40/41 (Preston) 42 (Blackpool) 100 (University).

These buses will run via Thurnham Street and King Street and WILL serve the Common Garden Street stops.

NORTHBOUND

1/1A (Heysham)  41 (Morecambe)  100 (Morecambe then 2X to Heysham) 

These buses will run direct via King Street and will call at Queen Square. They will NOT call at George Street or Common Garden Street.

OTHER SERVICES

2X (To Lancaster bus station) will operate via Thurnham Street and King Street and call at Queen Square instead of George Street.

7 (Vale) will operate to and from Lancaster bus station only.

9 (Farmdale Road) Buses towards the bus station will be unable to stop in George Street and will call at Queen Square instead.

11 (to Marsh) will operate via Thurnham Street and King Street and call at Queen Square instead of George Street.

18 (to Lancaster Bus Station) will operate via Thurnham Street and King Street and call at Queen Square instead of George Street.

The diversions are likely to cause delays to the services affected.

FREE CHRISTMAS SHOPPING BUSES START ON SUNDAY

 

Sunday, November 28th, sees the start of free buses in Lancaster designed to help people with their Christmas shopping in the city centre.  The normal Sunday bus services on the 7 (Vale); 10 (Ridge); 11 (Marsh) and 18 (East Lancaster) will be free of charge to everyone on every Sunday until 19th December.

Also, to help people take full advantage of late-night opening on THURSDAY nights, LATER buses will run from the City Centre, which will also be free to all passengers. These will run on 2nd, 9th, 16th and 23rd December

Timetables are available to view on this link

The Bus Users' Group has been concerned for some time that whilst Lancaster City Council encouraged people to shop in the city by removing parking charges in its car parks, it did nothing to help people who either do not have a car or who choose not to use one.  The free parking encouraged many more people to bring their car into town, which lead to traffic congestion that delayed the buses as well as adding to pollution and all the other problems associated with car use.

Our Group has therefore been working with the Lancaster Buisness Improvement District (BID) team to develop a way of encouraging people to come into to city over Christmas without bringing a car.  

Here is what the BID team have to say.

THURSDAY EVENINGS

One difficulty has been the early close-down of many bus services following the County Council's withdrawal of supported evening services a few years back. This has now been overcome by providing extra buses on local services after the end of the daytime service until just after the shops close at 9pm.  As an added bonus, these buses will be free of charge to all passengers. They will be operated by Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire and will follow the normal Stagecoach routes except that they will start and end at Common Garden Street in the city centre and will not serve the Bus Station.  Stagecoach will, however, continue to operate its existing evening service on service 7 to Vale and this will also be free of charge after 8pm.

SUNDAYS

Sunday shopping is also popular in the run up to Christmas and therefore the free travel offer has been extended to services 7 10 11 and 18 where the usual Stagecoach Sunday buses will operate but without collecting fares.

Organised by the Lancaster BID team, with help from the Bus Users' Group, the project has received funding from the Government's Welcome Back Fund, Lancaster City Council, Lancaster University's Community Winmd Turbine Fund and, in what must be one of last examples of this source of funding, the European Union's Regional Dvelopment Fund.

CHRISTMAS WEEK

The extra free buses will also run on Monday 20th, Tuesday 21st and Wednesday 22nd December to allow people to enjoy the run up to the festive season without bringing a car into the city centre.

If successful, it is hoped that the pilot project can be extended to other areas in future years.

County Survey Shows Benefits of Bus User Groups

 

During the month of September, Lancashire County Council conducted a survey on the views of bus passengers and non-passengers alike. The purpose was to discover what people thought about the county's bus service, what they liked and didn't like and if they didn't use the buses what would need to change to persuade them to do so. The results were used to inform the development of the Bus Service Improvement Plan, which sets out proposals for major improvements to bus services from next year.

The survey could only be completed online via the County Council's website and, knowing that the site was not widely read by local people, the Bus Users' Group promoted it widely on social media as did those local county councillors who take an interest in buses and the Bus User Group.

Our promotion seems to have paid off.  Out of 2,552 responses  fully one-third came from Lancaster! In contrast Rossendale District produced 2% and Hyndburn just 1% of replies.  Lancaster bus passengers can therefore rest assured that their voices were heard (and hopefully listened to!) at County Hall

Lancaster residents comprise only 12% of the population of the county council's administrative area, so in fairness have been over-represented. Twenty per cent of responses came from NoW card holders, whilst 70% were from the 25 - 64 age group.  Young people, who are major bus users but who only provided 10% of responses, were grossly under-represented, which is disappointing for an online-only exercise.

What Did the Survey Show? 

• 89% of passengers felt safe when travelling by bus.
• 59% of passengers agreed buses were "reliable" (although only 11% "strongly agreed"
• 50% of passengers thought buses affordable (although 20% of respondents were NoW card holders who benefit from free travel)
• 59% of passengers agreed it was easy to get information on buses, although only 15% "strongly agreed" and if the respondents were regular users they were unlikely to need to seek information for most journeys.
• 54% of passengers found bus services did not meet all their needs.

Why people don't use buses.

Respondents who said they didn't use the buses said that was because they:

• "are too expensive" 
• "are too slow"
• "don't go to where I need to travel to"
• "are too difficult to get information on times and routes"

What would make people travel more by bus?

Consistent with these findings, the most frequently-cited attribute to encourage respondents to use bus, or to use bus more frequently, was lower fares, followed by tickets that could be used on other modes, and availability of multi-operator tickets.

Respondents were then asked about the influence of ‘soft’ measures – over half said that the ability to track your bus, and real-time at stops and interchanges would encourage them to travel by bus more often. Only 1 in 5 cited Demand-Responsive Transport (DRT) services or the availability of wifi and USB charging. 

Where do we go from here?

The survey was intended to inform the development of the Lancashire Bus Service Improvement Plan (BSIP), which was published at the end of October and which sets out the measures the County Council and bus operators will implement from next April to improve the bus network, subject to the requested funding being awarded by government.  The Council has asked for £165m over the next three years but, realistically, doesn't expect to get the full amount. How much of the BSIP will be implemented depends on the level of funding received and every other local authority with transport responsibility in England is simultaneously bidding for funds from a limited pot.

The Bus Users' Group will be discussing the BSIP in our meeting on Thursday, 18th November at 14.45hrs in Lancaster Library. The meeting is open to everyone and those attending are asked to wear a face covering.

Lancashire's BSIP (all 224 pages of it) can be read here.

The Fall of the Wall

 The Berlin Wall, which divided that German city, was in place for 27 years and during that time people thought that it would last for ever. Recently, the Bus Users' Group has been feeling the same about the hoardings that have been blocking the pavements at the junction of Damside Street and Wood Street. 

Their removal has been promised many times, but a visit by a BUG reporter today found that the latest promise has been kept and the wall is down!

The wall has fallen! Wood Street today.

The hoardings first appeared over two years ago, when work began to convert the derelict shops and amusement arcade at the junction of Damside Street and Wood Street into another example of Lancaster's latest growth industry - student accommodation.

The hoardings completely blocked the pavement along Wood Street, meaning that Stagecoach had to employ banksmen to ensure that buses reversing away from their stands didn't come into contact with pedestrians trying to use the roadway because the pavement was inaccessible.

A crossing to nowhere on Damside Street

The hoardings also blocked the footway on one side of Damside Street and meant that the safe walking route between the bus station and the city centre, which involved crossing Damside Street on the zebra crossing, couldn't be used.

When it became clear that the obstruction wasn't just a temporary feature, the Bus Users' Group began agitating for something to be done to make it safe for passengers going to and from the station. It soon became clear that the problem had arisen due to a lack of co-ordination and co-operation between Lancaster City Council, which had given planning permission for the building work and Lancashire County Council, which as the Highway Authority was responsible for maintaining safe passage for vehicles and pedestrians. The two authorities had just not been talking to each other!  Piggy-in-the-middle was Stagecoach, who now became lumbered with the task of supervising access to the bus station via Wood Street and managing a safety issue that wasn't of their making.

  In January 2020, with the help of County Councillor and BUG member, Lizzi Collinge, we thought we had solved the safety issue when a set of pedestrian-operated signals appeared. Our success, however, was temporary as three months later they were taken away again, apparently when the County Council realised that they would have to pay the hire charge and operating costs from the contractor that provided them!

The conversion work on the buildings was delayed well past its projected completion date and it became clear to the BUG that neither the City not the County Council would take any responsibility for the safety of pedestrians going to and from the bus station. In November 2020 the County Council told us that "we do not have the authority to take things forward", which as they are responsible for highway safety we found frankly amazing.

The developer promised various dates for removal, which came and went and even when the completed accommodation units had been occupied by students the hoardings were still in place, with the blame for the delay now being foisted on another party - United Utilities - who needed to undertake drainage works at the site!

Throughout the process our member and City Councillor, Tim Hamilton-Cox has been a great help to the BUG keeping us informed and putting pressure on the developer to complete the work. Cllr. Hamilton-Cox had extracted a further promise that the hoardings would be gone by today and, for once, that promise has been kept.

Stagecoach need no longer provide the banksmen, which will save them £1,000 a week and more importantly means they can redeploy the staff concerned to what they should have been doing all along - driving buses to help alleviate the current driver shortage. The Wood Street side of the bus station, which has been closed after 19.00hrs at night to avoid incurring yet more banksman costs, can now re-open and evening buses can return to their normal stands. Most importantly of all, there is now once again a safe walking route between the bus station and the city centre.

Service 755 Suspended as Driver Shortages Continue

Service 755 at Windermere

Driver shortages at Stagecoach continue to bite, with regular short-notice cancellations occurring in Lancaster mainly on services 1/1A and 100, but also on other routes.

Now, having been "suspended" for much of October and having returned briefly for half-term week, the company has announced that service 755 Heysham (Ocean Edge) - Bowness-on-Windermere will not be running between Monday 1st and Saturday 6th November inclusive.

Stagecoach has also announced a raft of  planned service reductions in Carlisle, West Cumbria and the Lakes with numerous individual journeys withdrawn and the trunk X4/X5 Workington-Keswick-Penrith services reduced to an hourly frequency.  Two services in the Keswick area, 77/77A (Buttermere) and 78 (Seatoller) are  completely withdrawn, although this is said to be due to an "emergency road closure".

Although 755 provides a number of bespoke through links, most of its route is duplicated by alternative services and the timetable is geared around leisure and tourist traffic, which is lower at this time of year. The Bus Users' Group would not be surprised to see the service "suspended" again in the coming weeks and wonders whether it might be better to admit defeat and suspend it until the Spring so that the drivers can be employed on busier services and passengers can plan ahead with more certainty.

The full list of cancellations can be seen on this link.

 

Councils Co-operate to Save Lune Valley Buses

Service 81 at Kirkby Lonsdale Market Place

Lancashire and North Yorkshire County Councils have been holding talks to see what can be done following notification from Stagecoach that it is to withdraw services from the Lune Valley.

Coming just days before the County Council published its Bus Service Improvement Plan, which sets out its ideas for improving the county's bus network, Stagecoach says it intends to close its outstation at Ingleton and de-register services 80  Lancaster - Ingleton and 81 Lancaster - Kirkby Lonsdale - Ingleton from the end of December.

Rob Jones, Managing Director for Stagecoach Cumbria & North Lancs told the Bus Users Group

"We advised staff this week that we will be closing our Ingleton outstation at the end of this year, and are working with Lancashire County Council on how this affects customers on those routes.

"Sadly the 80/81 has not made money for some time, and before the pandemic struck the world, so with lower passenger numbers and significantly lower concessionary travellers (across the country not just Ingleton), we have had to take this decision."

Service 80 leaving Ingleton for Lancaster

Cross-Boundary Services

The services were being provided without any financial assistance from either authority.  Whereas Kirkby Lonsdale, (where the 81 terminates) is just within Cumbria County Council's administrative area, responsibility for the service lies almost entirely with Lancashire.  Service 80, however, has a substantial proportion of its route within the area covered by North Yorkshire County Council

A spokesman for Lancashire County Council said:

"We have been in discussion with colleagues at NYCC and we are keen to ensure the cross boundary services are able to continue for residents of both counties.  Ingleton and High Bentham are bigger communities than most of those either side of the river combined and it is likely going to be key to maintain these cross boundary links with them potentially contributing towards to greater sustainability of the network.  Of course LCC would expect that NYCC fund their share of any future service provision through their area."

 The Bus Users Group has been invited to put forward suggestions as to what any replacement services should look like and we have put forward a number of ideas on matters such as regular headways, alteration to departure times, service numbers, fares and ticketing.

Lancashire County Council is keen to secure the replacement services as soon as possible and has undertaken to inform the Bus Users' Group and other interested parties when this has been achieved.

As this post was being written unofficial reports were received that Stagecoach would continue to operate the existing services until April, "to give the councils more time to organise a replacement", something that a council spokesman was unable to confirm or deny.