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Bus Provision for the Commonwealth Games 2022

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Old Yard Dog

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I went to the athletics at the Alexander Stadium last night and left my car at the P&R at Bescot Stadium (Walsall FC). This was a brilliant choice of venue, just round the corner from M6 J9 and an easy drive down the A34 for the buses.

I was absolutely gobsmacked by the sheer number of double decker buses allocated to the route - it was literally an endless stream of vehicles, many bussed in from other parts of the country. I had no trouble at all getting on a bus after the event, the airport style zigzig queueing barriers seeming unnecessarily long as there was no waiting. I saw even more buses allocated to the JLR Kingsbury and Birmingham city centre routes. Superb organization - I just wish football clubs could do as well.

I was also gobsmacked by the sheer number of airport style scanners. I reckon there must have been about 100 inside the 5 temporary marquees. I joined a long queue at 4 pm waiting for the gates to open at 4.30. When they did, I was inside within 6 minutes, despite having to go through 4 times as I'd forgotten the coins in my pocket.

If the games can do this at the Alexander stadium, and a dozen other sites, what excuse have our airports got for the endless queues to pass through airport security?
 
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WM Bus

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I was absolutely gobsmacked by the sheer number of double decker buses allocated to the route - it was literally an endless stream of vehicles, many bussed in from other parts of the country.
No local buses are being used on those shuttles. National Express are running some duplicates on their normal services.
 

chiltern trev

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We attended 4 sessions of the Rugby 7s at the Coventry Stadium:
  • Friday morning, attendance 10k-15k
  • Friday evening, attendance
  • Saturday morning attendance 20k
  • Saturday evening, attendance 30k (i.e. full)
There were various park and ride options:
  • JLR in Coventry south east – morning and evening sessions – own P&R service
  • UNI MCP – city centre east – morning and evening sessions – Pool Meadow service
  • Gosford Street – near to UNI MCP – evening sessions – Pool Meadow service
  • Grove Street – near to UNI MCP – evening sessions – Pool Meadow service
  • Old/closed IKEA site Croft Road – city centre west – one session per day – own P&R service.
We used the UNI MCP on all occasions which was a short walk to Pool Meadow.

At Pool Meadow there were 3 bus stands allocated, these being the other side of the coach island. Whenever we required a bus from Pool Meadow there were always 2 on stand and sometimes 3. The front bus loading one at a time was adequate for the flow of passengers – so generally walk up, get on and go – maximum waiting time being the 5 minutes of so it takes to load 80 (approx) passengers.

The route to the stadium was past the National Express Coventry bus depot, round part of the inner ring road and then out along the A444 dual carriageway. The A444 being used by all the P&R mentioned above. Between Pool Meadow and the Nat Ex depot, a further car park was in use as a bus park and holding area, capacity 30 buses parked in a circle railway roundhouse style.

At the Coventry Stadium, the 3 regular stadium car parks were taken over for Commonwealth Games use and thus not available for car parking.

Car park C, to the west of the A444, was a big bus station/bus park – being used for the above P&Rs and maybe another shuttle service. In the car park bus station, there were 6-8 bus stops on east side with ziz-zag queues allowing multiple loadings/unloadings and each with a P&R label so each bus top only served one P&R. Passengers unloaded at the east side stops went through the A444 underpass to the south side stadium entry. Near the west side, was a island with 3 bus stops which was mainly for unloading in which case passengers were sent over the footbridge to the north side gates of the stadium.

On arrival at car park C, each bus had to pass through a normal car park barrier (just wide enough) – there was one for in and one for out - and then just one (for in and out) second heavy steel security barrier gate (Westminster style?) again just wide enough which would inflict severe damage to your bus if hit.

The space in the centre of this bus station was reserved for parking, say 6-8 rows each with 6-8 buses so nominally 40-50 – this was full of buses at the end of each session ready for a mass exodus.

After each session, there was minimal queuing for buses due to well signed bus stops, multiple loading points per destination and good stewarding.

However, at one point on the first evening exit, there was a queue of maybe 12 buses waiting to gain the A444 city centre bound as the traffic lights seemed to be on a normal setting which only allowed 2 buses out at a time – but this was promptly overcome by someone somewhere taking control of the traffic light system and keeping the green on long enough for all the waiting buses to leave – there were 15 queued at this point.

In addition to the above P&R, there was also a separate shuttle from the Coventry Rail Station to/from the Stadium, also arriving via the A444, then into the Arena shopping park, round the north end (by the Stadium rail station) with space for 2-3 buses at a time. The return route was round the back of the shopping mall, past the shopping mall mini bus station (used by Nat Ex Cov service 5), then Foleshill Road to A444.

Passenger counting appeared to be under the control of each driver – as every passenger passed the driver, the driver would click the ticket machine.

I did also notice some buses appearing to the north of the stadium, Winding House Lane roundabout but do not know what they were deployed on – another P&R service that did not venture to the south side of the stadium.

We also noticed after each evening session, there was a steady stream on empty buses coming from Birmingham along the M6 to J3 for the A444 for the stadium – extra buses having finished elsewhere being drafted in for the mass exodus?

So basically, there were double deckers everywhere in abundance. And if you drove along the A444 before or after a session, you would see a stream of double deckers going the other way.

Where from? We saw route ELEVEN (Ardossan), Cambridge P&R, Exeter P&R, Route 1 Lancaster Uni (Morecambe), Peterborough, HOP12 (Torquay), X17 Gold (Chesterfield) and more.
 

43055

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I went to the athletics at the Alexander Stadium last night and left my car at the P&R at Bescot Stadium (Walsall FC). This was a brilliant choice of venue, just round the corner from M6 J9 and an easy drive down the A34 for the buses.

I was absolutely gobsmacked by the sheer number of double decker buses allocated to the route - it was literally an endless stream of vehicles, many bussed in from other parts of the country. I had no trouble at all getting on a bus after the event, the airport style zigzig queueing barriers seeming unnecessarily long as there was no waiting. I saw even more buses allocated to the JLR Kingsbury and Birmingham city centre routes. Superb organization - I just wish football clubs could do as well.

I was also gobsmacked by the sheer number of airport style scanners. I reckon there must have been about 100 inside the 5 temporary marquees. I joined a long queue at 4 pm waiting for the gates to open at 4.30. When they did, I was inside within 6 minutes, despite having to go through 4 times as I'd forgotten the coins in my pocket.

If the games can do this at the Alexander stadium, and a dozen other sites, what excuse have our airports got for the endless queues to pass through airport security?
I went to the athletics this morning and used the shuttle bus from Birmingham City Centre found it very well organized both two and from the venue with I think 8 loading points for going back to the city! Going to the stadium there was a steady flow from New Street to the stop on the A34 and was directed into one of two queueing systems with no waiting and with very little waiting to get in we were in the seats in 60 minuets after stopping off at Greggs on the way.

After the event was when the queueing system came in due to everyone leaving at the same time. The area that we went in had 4 loading points from one entrance and two queues which at times did stop but never for long and the queues went right back to the security tents. At this time buses were probably leaving at least every minute with around 15-20 waiting to entre the stadium from the road outside. After a trouble free run into the city we then had to queue for the drop off around a one way system to get back to the stop due to the number of shuttle buses. When we joined the back there was probably about 10 other buses in front and was getting longer. The PVR for the shuttle must of been in the region of 50 decker's.
 

WM Bus

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I caught 6838 on the 94 into the City Centre this morning, its first trip the 07.22 ex-Chelmsley departure. All the Stagecoach Alexander Stadium shuttle buses were parked up, stretching from James Watt Queensway all the way back down to the island at the other end of Nechells Parkway by Goodrick Way. There must have been about 50 or maybe more.
 
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gc4946

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Did anyone see Stagecoach branded buses for Portsmouth area services and/or 700 Coastliner because I didn't see any in Birmingham city centre or to/from Alexander Stadium?
 

gka472l

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Did anyone see Stagecoach branded buses for Portsmouth area services and/or 700 Coastliner because I didn't see any in Birmingham city centre or to/from Alexander Stadium?

There are two Coastliner MMC's in Birmingham at the moment, 10951 & 10955

HTH
 

158756

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The shuttle buses seemed very well organised when I was there, don't know how many people they were moving at the end of the athletics sessions but it was a lot. Loads of buses on the park and ride service as well. Saw buses from Newcastle, Teeside, and Gloucester as well as those already mentioned, plus single deckers from the Margate Loop route running the accessible shuttle route directly to New Street.

The one thing that wasn't ideal was on a normal local bus to the stadium at Perry Barr, it filled up a few miles from the stadium and sailed past at least another bus load waiting at the remaining stops. Maybe there should have been extra buses on the busiest sections but I suppose National Express would have had to find the drivers for that rather than the shuttle buses presumably being sourced by the organising committee at a not inconsiderable cost.
 

WM Bus

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Maybe there should have been extra buses on the busiest sections
Birmingham Central, Perry Barr, West Bromwich were running duplicates on some services I believe. Probably can only run so many I guess.
4809 on the 51 for instance on Sunday was in the city centre on a duplicate extra.
 

geoffk

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I was told 40 buses and drivers had gone from Exeter. This has not gone down well with passengers already used to cancellations, or in the local press. As has been said above, Stagecoach would have had to tender for this work a couple of years ago when the driver situation was not so bad. Presumably they are all back now! Seems that the organisation of transport for the Games went well.
 

WM Bus

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Stagecoach Gold bus heading into Birmingham on the M6 early this afternoon.
 
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