Seriously? They will cancel the train and then refuse to let me bring my bike on?
A lot of buses just aren't equipped to carry bicycles.Seriously? They will cancel the train and then refuse to let me bring my bike on?
Ridiculous imo
Probably easier if the railways just refused to carry all bikes.Seriously? They will cancel the train and then refuse to let me bring my bike on?
Ridiculous imo
The usual things not carried on rail replacement services are cycles, prams that don,t fold and animals, usually dogs except guide or service dogs is the ones referred to in the conditions of travel. Often been the case a word by the owner of the cycle or dog with the coach driver and maybe they will be travelling on the coach complete with cycle or dog but not always guaranteed . Its all part of the conditions of travel regulations.Network Rail are doing some repairs this weekend and it is seriously messing up my journey. My question is thus: Is it possible to take a bike on a replacement bus?
FIRST Bike bus 43907 T12GWR
Seriously? They will cancel the train and then refuse to let me bring my bike on?
Ridiculous imo
It's simply not possible for buses to safely carry bikes. So what do you expect from the rail operator?The answer is no, and it is immensely infuriating.
Once I showed up with a bike at Manchester Victoria and found 'bus' on the departure board. I'd arrived earlier that day on a train with my bike and Northern's only notice of the RRB, it transpired, was buried deep in their poorly designed website and took serious effort to find, and all that is there is a chart full of internal acronyms with no key, that is almost impossible to decipher for a layman.
Further to this, there was no publication of the RRB visible at either end station (possibly as one of them was TPE managed).
Having been confronted with a Stagecoach double decker (Stagecoach flat refuse bikes), Northern staff genuinely suggested to me that I lock my bike up in central Manchester, and board the RRB without it, then return at some other point to retrieve it - they failed to see how this was at all an issue?! I very politely told them that wouldn't be happening. Mercifully there was also a coach running with a nice driver so I got home anyway.
IMO as the train would have had a cycle space (all Northern trains do, right?), I believe that any replacement service should be of equal quality and alternative transport and/or a refund should be offered if the railway is unable to carry you. They say bikes are carried on a discretionary basis - well I'd argue that said discretion is the provision of a freely available cycle space on the train? If I pay for a level of service that includes a provision to carry cycles, then any alternative transport should also have such provisions.
It's simply not possible for buses to safely carry bikes. So what do you expect from the rail operator?
Presumably this is a small number of specially equipped buses rather than the whole routine fleet?Ironically in Brighton we have buses on which you can take bikes, but if the same vehicle is operating a rail replacement, you can't take the bikes on board!
Both are Go-Ahead/Govia as well, so they can't even agree internally!
Yes, operating on specific routes. There was previously a much larger fleet of the vehicle type, but as the fleet was renewed and dual-doors became popular, the operator and council lost interest, and is now weekend only I think.Presumably this is a small number of specially equipped buses rather than the whole routine fleet?
I already pay £3k for an Annual Gold Card, and because of engineering work, usually on Sundays, I have to take a bicycle with me as there is no direct tube or rail replacement bus provided, otherwise I would be late for my shift.Maybe bikes should be charged for in order to cover the cost of providing for them when RRB's are operating, to expect provision to be taken out of fares is unreasonable to non cyclists.
Is carrying a bike a right or a privilege.
All cyclists know that travelling with a bike requires that they reserve* a space on most TOCs- particularly if they are inflexible in their travel plans.I think in the particular situation @BurtonM describes, where the bike was carried on the outward journey, and the customer wasn't informed before buying a ticket/travelling that their bike wouldn't be permitted on the return journey, then as a minimum I'd expect them to provide somewhere reasonably safe to store the bike, and a ticket for me to return to pick it up again at my convenience on a day when the trains are running (Either that or for them to arrange to put the bike on a train to my home station under the supervision of the guard as soon as there is an available train - I suspect that is much harder for the TOC to organise today than it would have been 30 or so years ago though).
(To be fair, that's probably an unusual situation)
It's simply not possible for buses to safely carry bikes.
So what do you expect from the rail operator?
Nowadays all is solved by a Brompton in a bag.
Earlier I explained what I did before I shrank and was poor.If you are rich and not too big for one.
Somewhat pedantic I feel but, yes, anything at all can in theory be modified to carry bikes. What we are talking about in practice, however, is those buses hired in by TOCs to run in place of their trains, sometimes at short notice. In future years, fully accessible coaches, with luggage capacity, should be provided to cover all eventualities, but that appears to still be some way off (due largely to insufficient vehicles being available at present). Are you assuming that bus operators will modify some of their vehicles so that they might (on rare occasions) be called upon to carry a bike if they do rail replacement work ? - do you consider that reasonable ? - and likely to happen?False. It is possible to make provision.
An alternative, e.g. a van following the bus? An accessible coach where they fit underneath?
False. It is possible to make provision.
An alternative, e.g. a van following the bus? An accessible coach where they fit underneath?
Presumably, a separate van to meet every train, at every station ?It's certainly possible in principle to make provision, but that probably lies more in the hands of the Government, as it would require large-scale conversion of quite a lot of buses, with implications for how many passengers they could carry and the level of support required from the Government for public transport. When hiring rail replacement buses, the TOCs' hands are going to be largely tied by, what vehicles are actually available to hire so it's not going to be within their control to find buses that can carry bikes.
A separate van is an interesting idea, though I'm not sure how economic it would be - given that most of the time it'd be running around empty.