London Buses Discussion

[PGAT]

New S2 and S4 tiles spotted in Sutton

 

[H&I]

Andy Lord, Transport Commissioner, mentioned it to the GLA Transport Committee last month. The full transcript will be on the GLA website in due course.

It would be interesting to see what express bus routes are planned once the actual proposals come out. There was talk of an express bus along Old Kent Road as a temporary or permanent substitute for the Bakerloo line extension a while back.

From that report, fascinating to see how the post-pandemic recovery during the weekday peaks is trailing recovery of the weekend loadings:

Even the pre-pandemic weekday peak passenger numbers seem small for me, especially compared to Hong Kong, where I am from. But it makes sense given how peak-oriented commuter express bus routes are practically nonexistent in London (the SL6, formerly known as the X68, being the only known example) and how rail dominates for the nine to five commuting journeys.

 

[Goldfish62]

Even the pre-pandemic weekday peak passenger numbers seem small for me, especially compared to Hong Kong, where I am from. But it makes sense given how peak-oriented commuter express bus routes are practically nonexistent in London (the SL6, formerly known as the X68, being the only known example) and how rail dominates for the nine to five commuting journeys.

Commuting is right down on National Rail, with the likes of SWR around 50-60% of pre-Covid levels. This is inevitably having a knock-on effect to the number of bus onward journeys from central London station journeys.

In respect of the interpeak my guess is that it reflects outside London, ie the majority of loss of passengers is down to the elderly. Seems that many are still so traumatised by Covid that they're not leaving their homes.

Weekday evenings reflect my experience. While passenger journeys are essentially back to pre-Covid levels the central London bus network is much reduced and in my experience many buses are getting grossly overcrowded in the evenings.

 

[H&I]

While passenger journeys are essentially back to pre-Covid levels the central London bus network is much reduced and in my experience many buses are getting grossly overcrowded in the evenings.

The overcrowding issue could be addressed with tri-axle buses. Go-Ahead London already have one such bus, TA1, LX18 DGF, which was used on the 12. The real crowd-busters are the Enviro500s. A 12-metre Enviro500 MMC can carry 137 passengers, whilst a 12.8-metre version can carry as many as 151 passengers.

 

[Goldfish62]

The overcrowding issue could be addressed with tri-axle buses. Go-Ahead London already have one such bus, TA1, LX18 DGF, which was used on the 12. The real crowd-busters are the Enviro500s. A 12-metre Enviro500 MMC can carry 137 passengers, whilst a 12.8-metre version can carry as many as 151 passengers.

TA1 is a complete heap.

But yes, larger buses or increasing frequencies, or both, are the two solutions to overcrowding. I favour the latter as frequency is key to making bus services attractive.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Weekday evenings reflect my experience. While passenger journeys are essentially back to pre-Covid levels the central London bus network is much reduced and in my experience many buses are getting grossly overcrowded in the evenings.

Wasn't one of the arguments for reducing the central bus network that, in places (notably, Oxford Street) there were previously so many buses that it was arguably the buses that were causing congestion, thereby slowing bus journeys.

A bit unfortunate if it's now gone too far and we have overcrowded buses though.

 

[dmncf]

TA1 is a complete heap.

But yes, larger buses or increasing frequencies, or both, are the two solutions to overcrowding. I favour the latter as frequency is key to making bus services attractive.

The overcrowding issue could be addressed with tri-axle buses. Go-Ahead London already have one such bus, TA1, LX18 DGF, which was used on the 12. The real crowd-busters are the Enviro500s. A 12-metre Enviro500 MMC can carry 137 passengers, whilst a 12.8-metre version can carry as many as 151 passengers.

Even staying with two-axle buses, I never understand why London doesn't order the longer wheelbase versions that are commonplace outside London. Something for users of bus route 18 to ponder while the bus drives away without picking them up.

 

[Busaholic]

TA1 is a complete heap.

But yes, larger buses or increasing frequencies, or both, are the two solutions to overcrowding. I favour the latter as frequency is key to making bus services attractive.

Absolutely.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Even staying with two-axle buses, I never understand why London doesn't order the longer wheelbase versions that are commonplace outside London. Something for users of bus route 18 to ponder while the bus drives away without picking them up.

Could it be because longer wheelbases must make it more difficult to turn in a confined space? London has plenty of places where buses need to turn at junctions etc. on narrow-ish streets.

 

[CBlue]

Could it be because longer wheelbases must make it more difficult to turn in a confined space? London has plenty of places where buses need to turn at junctions etc. on narrow-ish streets.

Edinburgh for example seems to manage just fine with long-wheelbase deckers and the far longer E400XLB's.
London definitely isn't a special case in terms of road layouts.

 

[Snow1964]

Superloop continues its trend of using mixed fleet of whatever is spare
SL2 has commenced with Arriva HA type (66reg E400 hybrids)

Other changes are :
312 is now Arriva with 13-14 year old ENLs (enviro200s)
325 is GoAhead, with mix of 8 &12 year old SE (enviro200)

Looks like S1 has seen return of the Optare Metrocities

London Vehicle Finder

Search current and historic bus routes and locations in London, Reading, Edinburgh. Created to help photographers track down ellusive vehicles.

lvf.io

 

[H&I]

I was on the very first SL2 bus from Walthamstow Bus Station to North Woolwich Ferry at 05:00 this morning!

The bus arrived at the bus station from the depot 12 minutes after it was meant to leave. It departed on the inaugural journey around 15 minutes late.

Now that the loop itself is complete, is anyone going to do the challenge of travelling from North Woolwich to Thamesmead the long way around?

 

[dmncf]

Could it be because longer wheelbases must make it more difficult to turn in a confined space? London has plenty of places where buses need to turn at junctions etc. on narrow-ish streets.

London definitely has some double deck routes that would be unsuitable for longer wheelbase buses, and some routes that would be suitable for longer wheelbase buses. The double deck routes that are suitable for longer wheelbase buses may even be a minority and hence longer wheelbase double deck buses would be a minority in London fleets, but they wouldn't be as novel (and hence as difficult to cascade) as articulated buses or New Routemasters, and I can't believe that it isn't viable to use longer wheelbase buses on at least some routes such as route 18.
It has only just dawned on me that there's a contradiction in London having 11.2m-long New Routemasters, but ordering the short wheelbase version of other double deck buses.

 

[Goldfish62]

It has only just dawned on me that there's a contradiction in London having 11.2m-long New Routemasters, but ordering the short wheelbase version of other double deck buses.

There's a lot of routes that the Borismaster can't be used on, same with the 10.9m BYD E400.

 

[H&I]

I recorded the full uncut video of the inaugural SL2 bus from Walthamstow Central to North Woolwich.

 

[MotCO]

I note from London Vehicle Finder that route 200 is mostly single deck E200s rather than the scheduled Optare Metrodeckers following the fire in mid January when they were stood down. Is there any news when the Optares will return or what the root cause of the fire was?

 

[Edvid]

No underlying reason for the Wimbledon fire has emerged yet, but the continued absence of Metrodeckers on the 200 was noted on Tangytango a few weeks ago:

So from a Facebook post on a group called Route 200 SW LONDON posted 2 days ago says the Me’s won’t be back for 6-8 weeks whilst the fault is currently being rectified. Doesn’t say what the fault was. Source appears to be a 200 driver

Speaking of withdrawn battery-electrics, Arriva took their nearly decade-old Metrocities off the newly-extended 312 overnight (replaced by E200s from the 325) and transferred them to Sidney House outstation for storage.

 

[Whiggism]

I managed to complete the orbital route today going clockwise from Thamesmead and ending at North Woolwich with an overall journey time of 9 hours and 39 minutes

 

[Busaholic]

I managed to complete the orbital route today going clockwise from Thamesmead and ending at North Woolwich with an overall journey time of 9 hours and 39 minutes

That would seem a more realistic time than some of those speculated on earlier, which might only be possible if everything went entirely according to schedule and with a degree of luck with the connections. I suspect most Monday to Friday trips might be longer still.

I wonder if anti-clockwise is significantly different.

 

[Whiggism]

That would seem a more realistic time than some of those speculated on earlier, which might only be possible if everything went entirely according to schedule and with a degree of luck with the connections. I suspect most Monday to Friday trips might be longer still.

I wonder if anti-clockwise is significantly different.

The time can definitely be shorter as I did encounter heavy traffic at Worcester Park on the Sl7 and a problem with my SL5 bus which broke down, thankfully there was another one right behind it.

 

[talldave]

The time can definitely be shorter as I did encounter heavy traffic at Worcester Park on the Sl7 and a problem with my SL5 bus which broke down, thankfully there was another one right behind it.

Another good reason for no "regulation" of Superloops !!

Do you know how many Hopper "hits" you got (ie: what did it cost)?

 

[Whiggism]

Do you know how many Hopper "hits" you got (ie: what did it cost)?

It was all free for me as I used my 16+ zip card but I suspect there would only be the one hopper fare since all the buses I took except the SL5 took over (even with a broken down bus) an hour, with a lucky timing for SL7.

 

[PGAT]

Did your journey include the SL6

 

[DynamicSpirit]

It was all free for me as I used my 16+ zip card but I suspect there would only be the one hopper fare since all the buses I took except the SL5 took over (even with a broken down bus) an hour, with a lucky timing for SL7.

I believe the daily cap for Oyster/contactless is £5.25 if you are only using bus/tram: That's the cost of 3 bus journeys, so even without the zip card I can't see that you'd pay more than that, unless you're using trains to get to the start an end of the Superloop journey.

 

[trivran]

Did a journey today starting at Walthamstow and doing the whole thing clockwise (under the Thames in the Woolwich Foot Tunnel and traipsing across to Thamesmead on the 472). Full journey time 7 hours 15 minutes. Definitely quicker with the empty roads at 0530 on a Sunday. Only significant traffic encountered at temporary traffic lights and through Kingsbury at lunchtime.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Wow, that's a good total journey - especially since getting from North Woolwich to Thamesmead must have taken a while.

At this rate, after being (I think) the first to post to say I wanted to try doing the entire trip, I'm going to end up being the practically the last person here to actually do it (I still intend to but it's not a super-high priority so it's not likely to happen for at least a couple of weeks or months...)

 

[Busaholic]

Wow, that's a good total journey - especially since getting from North Woolwich to Thamesmead must have taken a while.

At this rate, after being (I think) the first to post to say I wanted to try doing the entire trip, I'm going to end up being the practically the last person here to actually do it (I still intend to but it's not a super-high priority so it's not likely to happen for at least a couple of weeks or months...)

Maybe wait for the Silvertown Tunnel to open? Does anyone believe, by the way, that route will terminate at Grove Park ( never historically a turning point, let alone terminus, from the North) rather than the much more obvious Bromley? If necessary, I daresay a small decrease in frequency on a parallel route could be made.

 

[Whiggism]

Wow, that's a good total journey - especially since getting from North Woolwich to Thamesmead must have taken a while.

At this rate, after being (I think) the first to post to say I wanted to try doing the entire trip, I'm going to end up being the practically the last person here to actually do it (I still intend to but it's not a super-high priority so it's not likely to happen for at least a couple of weeks or months...)I would have chose a day when none of the routes have to go through temporary traffic lights as those on can cause havoc on traffic

I would choose a day when there are no temporary traffic lights (which are becoming increasingly common these days) on any of the routes as the traffic they can cause on normally quiet roads can make you want to give up and turn back home.

 

[MotCO]

I would choose a day when there are no temporary traffic lights (which are becoming increasingly common these days) on any of the routes as the traffic they can cause on normally quiet roads can make you want to give up and turn back home.

Good luck with that - temporary traffic lights seem to be popping up everwhere!

 

[Mikey C]

There's a separate thread for this, but the ADL/BYD electric buses being taken out of service for checks will have serious effects in London

Alexander Dennis/BYD Recall

Mod note: originally posted here - https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/first-greater-glasgow.164437/ Please remember to provide links to your sources, as well as quoting the relevant points. Thanks :) I have seen articles in online newspapers, eg. Mail o line saying that ADL/BYD vehicles...

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