Seems a bit pointless to go out of the way to try and compete with a direct train service.
-
Our booking engine at tickets.railforums.co.uk (powered by TrainSplit) helps support the running of the forum with every ticket purchase! Find out more and ask any questions/give us feedback in this thread!
Hulley's of Baslow
- Thread starter Boo_
- Start date
Seems a bit pointless to go out of the way to try and compete with a direct train service.
Sponsor Post - registered members do not see these adverts; click here to register, or click here to log in
R
RailUK Forums
cnjb8
Established Member
Doesn’t stop most services.
But costs of UK holidays are much higher as a result - so those on a tight budget will struggle to find accomodation they can afford. And those that can afford are more likely to go by car, because a £15 bus fare is neither here nor there.
Depending on timings they are more likely to be targetting the day trip market than those heading away for a week.
£15 is pretty competitive with the train fare, although it will certainly add up for a Family.
traction22
Member
Skegness is awful to get to from South Yorkshire, so I hope this service does well. Not checked recently, but £15 seems to be about region that coach ops charge.
A very quick look on the train fares shows a standard return (no discounts) for an adult to be over £40 and takes just under four hours (from Sheffield). I suspect the bus will be around the same mark so from a value point of view, I'm all for it, particularly as I don't qualify for any rail discounts.
A very quick look on the train fares shows a standard return (no discounts) for an adult to be over £40 and takes just under four hours (from Sheffield). I suspect the bus will be around the same mark so from a value point of view, I'm all for it, particularly as I don't qualify for any rail discounts.
TheGrandWazoo
Veteran Member
Because ENCTS massively skewed things.
Why would pensioners (who were a major if not the major customer group) spend money on a day trip when they can have a day out for nothing?
Last edited:
Llandudno
Established Member
- Joined
- 25 Dec 2014
- Messages
- 2,211
Be interesting to see what vehicles Hulley’s allocate to these services, as I don’t think they have any coaches any more?
Can you book in advance, or reserve seats, if it’s turn up and pay on the day, it’s possible that if you are planning to return a week later with the return half of your ticket the bus maybe full of returning day trippers!
Great initiative though, I wish them well, maybe worth them trying one to Blackpool during the illuminations!
Can you book in advance, or reserve seats, if it’s turn up and pay on the day, it’s possible that if you are planning to return a week later with the return half of your ticket the bus maybe full of returning day trippers!
Great initiative though, I wish them well, maybe worth them trying one to Blackpool during the illuminations!
cnjb8
Established Member
Their last coach left around 2019.
As I said about the X57, hopefully they use their Volvos as catching an E200 or Tempo to Skegness or Scarborough would be awful
lxfe_mxtterz
Member
Looks like they will indeed be using their Volvos, as one of their comments on Facebook suggests:
(Comment reads: "We don't operate coaches. We have a fleet of Volvo heavyweight buses built for long distance/heavy duty work.")
richardderby
Member
- Joined
- 20 Nov 2010
- Messages
- 269
judging by today's EMR rail service to Skegness, (over 50% of trains cancelled due to lack of drivers) total shambles! it is perhaps a good idea there are alternative ways to get to Skeggy! good luck Hulleys, although it really should pass through Nottingham in my opinion..
Robertj21a
On Moderation
- Joined
- 22 Sep 2013
- Messages
- 7,520
Perhaps they'll add a Nottingham variation next year if the experiment this year goes well. They may well feel that a route avoiding Nottingham will pick up the travellers from outlying areas who don't want the added hassle of a Nottingham trip.
TheGrandWazoo
Veteran Member
Depends what you mean. If you're talking about those DP vehicles that were a coach shell on a coach chassis such as Leopards and Tigers with the usual Plaxton or Duple bodies (with a few other offerings) with a few concessions such as express doors, cabs, destination screens, then they were a surprisingly limited enterprise. They were really a product of the new bus grant in the 1970s and into the early 1980s. There are a few routes where they have a niche still, notably with Stagecoach in Scotland though.
Before and since (and even during to an extent) the golden age of the 1970s, it was a case of high backed seats in a bus and that still happens now; the B7RLE Eclipse with high backed seats is really just the modern day RELL DP
In fairness, there do seem to be an increasing number of these excursion type services. Up here, Go North East have begun to run a regular service from Newcastle to Whitby and Scarborough via various towns in the North East (coincidentally, they also charge £15 return). There have been a few days where they've had to add a duplicate run to handle the demand.
I suppose in addition to ENCTS, there may have been a bit of a culture change. The number of people who are prepared to sit on a bus for three hours each way (as opposed to a more expensive but faster train, or their own private car) has fallen dramatically over the last couple of generations. When I read timetables from the 1960s or 1970s which have been archived online, many of the longer distance services that existed back then would seem utterly implausible now.
Andy Pacer
Established Member
Roger French aka Bus and Train user has sampled the extended X57 from Manchester Airport to Sheffield. Sounds like the service is doing well at the weekends.
Peak travel in the Peak is weekends – BusAndTrainUser – journeys around Britain by bus and train
Peak travel in the Peak is weekends – BusAndTrainUser – journeys around Britain by bus and train
Peak travel in the Peak is weekends
Friday 2nd July 2021
I promised myself last October when trying out Hulleys of Baslow’s then brand new Snake X57 bus route across the Peak District’s Snake Pass I’d be back for another ride if, as I dared hoped, it survived the winter and was still running this summer.
Eight months later with summer arrived and finding myself conveniently in Manchester mid morning on Wednesday I was set for a trip across to Sheffield to enjoy the spectacular Peak scenery served up by this splendid bus route once again.
Not only have Hulleys kept the route going, albeit they’ve withdrawn the complimentary route X56 shorts between Manchester and Glossop, but in May they extended the route from central Manchester down to the airport.
This takes the bus along the busy Oxford Road dominated by students facilitating convenient pick ups for travel over to Sheffield.
Hulleys have also done a deal with Thomas Cook with discount travel available to holidaymakers flying off from Manchester Airport.
But of course at the moment both the airport and university markets are pretty dead so these potential travel demands have yet to materialise.
The airport extension has come at a hefty price. A fifty percent increase in resources with the X57 now taking three buses rather than the previous two. Whereas the previous timetable was quite tight this one is the complete opposite with bus and driver scheduled for over an hour’s layover on most journeys at Manchester Airport. One mid morning journey has 95 minutes stand time.
Yet at Sheffield the previous arrangement of just 15 minutes between trips has continued which seems odd, especially as buses can face delays heading into Glossop on the return journey from Manchester.
I caught the 10:55 departure from the airport on Wednesday morning – the one where the bus had arrived from its previous journey at 09:20. No wonder my driver looked refreshed, he’d no doubt been enjoying that nice long break.
The bus arrived on stand at 10:55 and within less than a minute we were off having picked up a father and son travelling into central Manchester. The bus station departure area was deadly quiet so it wasn’t surprising there were few passengers.
Even in normal times it’s not the time of day when bus departures from the airport would be busy.
We had a good run into central Manchester, passing an airport bound bus with one passenger on board, arriving at the bus stop alongside the coach station at 11:23 well ahead of our departure time of 11:35.
Just before 11:35 a female passenger boarded and expectations of this not being a solo journey rose, but it turned out she wanted a National Express coach. Then a college lad boarded with a pass and travelled to Hollingworth (the suburb before Glossop).
We made good progress on the journey to Glossop including a fast run on the M67 enabling us to pass through the town bang on time at 12:15 shortly after which the third bus on the route passed us heading towards Manchester Airport with just one passenger on board.
The journey’s next fifteen minutes is the highlight for me.
The long steady winding climb as the A57 leaves Glossop is truly spectacular …
… as you pass Coldharbour Moor …
… followed by an equally dramatic decent along Snake Pass before reaching the former Snake Inn at 12:30. Where we picked up a passenger.
The next fifteen minutes takes you through Lady Clough Forest before the River Ashop appears along Woodland Valley and then we pass alongside the lovely Ladybower Reservoir, where two more passengers are waiting for us at 12:45.
At the next stop at Ladybower Inn another Hulleys driver is waiting for us in a parked red car and there’s a slick driver changeover and we’re quickly off again.
The next ten minutes see us climbing again with Derwent Moors on our left and Moscar Moor on our right but all too soon we’re on the outskirts of Sheffield and twenty minutes later arrive at the Pond Street interchange spot on time at 13:15.
The journey didn’t disappoint although the number of passengers might. But the good news is weekdays are currently not typical of what happens at the weekend. My driver was telling me on a recent weekend the bus he was driving “was rammed full of passengers” with standing all down the gangway and he had to leave people behind. After ringing the depot the controller took a bus out himself to act as a duplicate.
I’m not surprised to hear this. As word spreads among the walking community there’s no doubt Snake X57 offers a fabulous way of reaching places not easily accessible before. And parking’s a nightmare in that area too. I’ve experienced busy buses leaving Sheffield towards Ladybower and Castleton on Saturdays on previous trips, so it’s good to hear this new route is proving popular eight months on.
Maybe the solution is to increase the frequency to hourly at weekends and not worry about the airport extension and instead concentrate the resources where the proven demand is.
It’ll be interesting to see what happens to the weekday service when Covid Bus Service Support Grant is phased out. Fortunately it looks safe for the summer period, so if you’re able to get to the Peak District in the next few weeks, Snake X57 is definitely worth a ride.
Roger French
Last edited by a moderator:
Please, please, please make sure that when referring to an external source you only quote the relevant bits. If there are images within the source you should:
- Be aware of copyright and consider whether you have permission to post here
- Reduce the size of any images so that they don't take up huge amounts of server space and, more importantly, that you don't end up eating a month's data allowance
- Please remove unnecessary images - do we really need adverts and timetables?
Read that earlier - a great little summary of the route and the experience.
Statto
Established Member
Interesting changes coming up from 5th September
- X1 (Hulleys): New service introduced between Ashbourne and Manchester Airport via Leek, Macclesfield and Manchester Airport Viewing Park. Journeys will continue into Manchester as service X57. One Saturday journey will extend tofrom Alton Towers.
- X57 (Hulleys): Most Monday-Saturday daytime journeys are re-routed to serve Hyde bus station, with some journeys extending to Manchester Airport Viewing Park (these journeys will extend as service X1 to Ashbourne).
markymark2000
On Moderation
What a network they are building up. Wow. I was going to do Hulleys sooner but I will wait I think. Do a round trip haha.
markymark2000
On Moderation
Yes, seems so. Hulleys love a good interworking but this surely can't end well can it? Not without a lot of layover.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
I think the phrase I would use for this is "asking for trouble".
traction22
Member
Do you have a link for the timetable for either the new X1 or the extended X57? The only thing I can find online about the X1 is Derbyshire CC timetable changes and information on that is limited. Hulley's official site tends to put the information up two weeks after the service started (or it did for the X98/9).
markymark2000
On Moderation
Nothing online yet that I know of.
I can't see a journey that long and varied keeping to time. However, I can see it annoying D&G who currently have a monopoly on the Ashbourne-Macclesfield route.
As the Manchester to Sheffield route is not really new any more, I have re-named this thread "Hulley's of Baslow", with a view to keeping discussion about this company in one place. The other recent thread about their new coastal routes has been closed and the posts moved here. The first post from that thread is #236 in this one.
Last edited:
Baxenden Bank
Established Member
- Joined
- 23 Oct 2013
- Messages
- 4,035
The route Derby - Ashbourne - Leek - Macclesfield - Stockport - Manchester, and it's cutbacks to the current 108 and 109, serves very thin territory. Why Hulleys have decided it is worth a go is a mystery.