Stagecoach East (Bedford, Cambridge, Huntingdon and Peterborough)

[RT4038]

If the mayor really believes this is wrong, can't he step in and franchise services?

With the money coming from where?

 

[Bletchleyite]

If the mayor really believes this is wrong, can't he step in and franchise services?

The Council can tender services that commercial operators don't wish to run if they wish, and this has always been an option ever since deregulation started. However, as @RT4038 points out, is the money available?

It is possible, indeed, that Stagecoach are playing a bit of a game in the hope that that will happen and they'll be awarded the contract, it's a risky game though as they may lose it to someone else if they bid lower.

 

[Surreyman]

The Council can tender services that commercial operators don't wish to run if they wish, and this has always been an option ever since deregulation started. However, as @RT4038 points out, is the money available?

It is possible, indeed, that Stagecoach are playing a bit of a game in the hope that that will happen and they'll be awarded the contract, it's a risky game though as they may lose it to someone else if they bid lower.

Surely its a 'win-win' for Stagecoach? - either they get rid of a loss making route or they win the tender (that's assuming they have enough drivers to run it) either way they are financially better off.

 

[RT4038]

Surely its a 'win-win' for Stagecoach? - either they get rid of a loss making route or they win the tender (that's assuming they have enough drivers to run it) either way they are financially better off.

Well yes and no. Fewer buses means that each remaining bus needs to carry a higher burden of overheads, and fewer routes makes network tickets less attractive. But with (probably) 80% of ordinary / 65% Concessionary of pre-covid passengers travelling, plus a debilitating staff shortage requiring substantial wage cost rises to solve, what option do they have which doesn't involve sinking shareholder/owner capital in the business and hoping for sunlit uplands later?

 

[Surreyman]

Well yes and no. Fewer buses means that each remaining bus needs to carry a higher burden of overheads, and fewer routes makes network tickets less attractive. But with (probably) 80% of ordinary / 65% Concessionary of pre-covid passengers travelling, plus a debilitating staff shortage requiring substantial wage cost rises to solve, what option do they have which doesn't involve sinking shareholder/owner capital in the business and hoping for sunlit uplands later?

I get the point about depot overheads (and I haven't studied the details of the proposed route reductions) but if, as some are suggesting, some/all of the outstations in Ely/March/Holbeach Drove were to close that would make savings.

 

[MikeWM]

The more you look at this, the more awful it appears for anywhere in Cambridgeshire outside Cambridge itself.

- No services *at all* for Soham, or Chatteris! I suppose at least Soham has a (poorly-served) railway station now. Chatteris has nothing.
- No service between Cambridge and Newmarket, which seems almost unthinkable. No service between Ely and Newmarket (with no meaningful rail alternative). No service between Ely and March.
- The 2 remains only every 20 minutes, and loses the slightly-bizarre-but-potentially-useful evening trip to Ely, meaning the last bus from Cambridge to Ely is now an hour earlier.
- The removal of the 39 removes all links to the west of Ely.
- The 9 loses about 40% of its services, and is no longer hourly, with two-hour gaps M-F and a 4-hour gap (!) in the afternoon on Saturday. Also they've removed the 'every-two-hours tootling around the outskirts of Ely' part of the 9, which was introduced with much fanfare just a couple of years back. This means once again that large parts of Ely (including where I live) will have no bus service whatever.

Yet the Busway seems to have been a runaway success? So it can be done.

The Busway remains rather ambiguous in my opinion. While I'd agree that the passenger numbers were fairly good pre-Covid, I think there is still a debate to be had about how many of the passengers on there are genuinely *new* and how many are merely displaced from the various withdrawn services that previously took a similar route but along roads. It was supposed to have 4 different operators using it, but it now only has 1. And I note the 'new' timetable still only has a 20-minute frequency, rather than the 15-minute pre-Covid frequency.

I'd also add as a Cambridgeshire taxpayer, that it certainly wasn't a *financial* success - we'll be paying for it for years to come.

 

[David Goddard]

Went through the changes yesterday and its apalling that links between major towns and cities are being withdrawn in the way that they are.
Cambridge to Ely drops to every two hours at off peak times and based on the timetable issued theres a FOUR hour gap on a Saturday.

Seems to suggest that Ely outstation would close, but with two diagrams that appear to start and end their day at Littleport, it remains to be seen whether these will be provided by empty vehicles from and to Cambridge, or as we saw in (dear old) Cambus days, vehicles stabled overnight in a third party location like a farm.
On top of this the Ely route no longer serves half of the villages en route, which see extensions of existing services to connect them to Cambridge only, one of which, at the other end of the crazy scale, sees Landbeach gain a half hourly service to Cambridge seven days per week, as its bolted on to the nearby Park and Ride route.

Stagecoach has made it clear from these changes that its only interested in urban operations.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Stagecoach has made it clear from these changes that its only interested in urban operations.

Stagecoach is only interested in profitable operations, and quite rightly so in the present market structure. An interesting question is if a smaller operator would be able to make the routes pay.

 

[RT4038]

I get the point about depot overheads (and I haven't studied the details of the proposed route reductions) but if, as some are suggesting, some/all of the outstations in Ely/March/Holbeach Drove were to close that would make savings.

Not only depot overheads, but the general overheads of he company as a whole (e.g. website development costs the same whether over 5,000 or 6,000 vehicles). But you are right, these outstation closures should represent savings, unless running vehicles empty out of the main depot eats away at these savings.

Stagecoach has made it clear from these changes that its only interested in urban operations.

Perhaps their current experience is showing that only the urban operations are making any money?

I would expect these proposals to be an opening shot in a negotiation (howsoever conducted) to obtain support following the ending/ reduction of DfT covid support measures.

 

[Surreyman]

Went through the changes yesterday and its apalling that links between major towns and cities are being withdrawn in the way that they are.
Cambridge to Ely drops to every two hours at off peak times and based on the timetable issued theres a FOUR hour gap on a Saturday.

Seems to suggest that Ely outstation would close, but with two diagrams that appear to start and end their day at Littleport, it remains to be seen whether these will be provided by empty vehicles from and to Cambridge, or as we saw in (dear old) Cambus days, vehicles stabled overnight in a third party lcoation like a farm.
On top of this the Ely route no longer serves half of the villages en route, which see extensions of existing services to connect them to Cambridge only, one of which, at the other end of the crazy scale, sees Landbeach gain a half hourly service to Cambridge seven days per week, as its bolted on to the nearby Park and Ride route.

Stagecoach has made it clear from these changes that its only interested in urban operations.

This thread is directly about Stagecoach & Cambridgeshire but the theme of service reductions post covid applies to the rest of the UK.
Your point about Stagecoach only being interested in urban operations is in reality true(they would not in PR terms admit to it) but it applies equally to Arriva/First/Go Ahead/National Express.
Bus operation is rural areas has been in decline since the mid 1950s, Covid has simply accelerated that decline.
Some councils/public bodies may have the resource/political will to fund complete/partial replacement others not.
Brutal fact - the overall UK bus fleet is going to get smaller.

 

[RT4038]

This thread is directly about Stagecoach & Cambridgeshire but the theme of service reductions post covid applies to the rest of the UK.
Your point about Stagecoach only being interested in urban operations is in reality true(they would not in PR terms admit to it) but it applies equally to Arriva/First/Go Ahead/National Express.
Bus operation is rural areas has been in decline since the mid 1950s, Covid has simply accelerated that decline.

Not sure why you are singling out Arriva/First/Go Ahead/National Express? Commercial conventional rural operation by any smaller operators (aside from specialist services e.g. longer distance school services to grammar/private schools) is not exactly plentiful either. In my 'shire' county of residence it is precisely nil.

 

[danielcanning]

it wouldn’t surprise me if in the future the bus network is at least partly renationalised, with the likes of Stagecoach keeping to the urban towns and cities and the unprofitable rural operations being run by the public sector…

 

[RT4038]

it wouldn’t surprise me if in the future the bus network is at least partly renationalised, with the likes of Stagecoach keeping to the urban towns and cities and the unprofitable rural operations being run by the public sector…

Contracted by the public sector, to the private sector - it is certainly going that way; in some areas pretty much there already apart from some main inter-urban connecting routes, and even those dwindling. Can't see the public sector actually running the buses at this point.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Contracted by the public sector, to the private sector - it is certainly going that way; in some areas pretty much there already apart from some main inter-urban connecting routes, and even those dwindling. Can't see the public sector actually running the buses at this point.

You just end up in a position of de facto regulation, like most of Wales outside the cities, because nothing is viable commercially.

 

[RT4038]

You just end up in a position of de facto regulation, like most of Wales outside the cities, because nothing is viable commercially.

But no money for any Authority to actually do anything apart from skeleton. Next will be to convert to DRT.

 

[ashkeba]

But no money for any Authority to actually do anything apart from skeleton. Next will be to convert to DRT.

If Nik Johnson has been given the power to to take control of public transport but not the funding to use that power, why isn't he making lots of noise about that, instead of grumbling futilely about Stagecoach cutting loss routes?

 

[Magdalia]

If the mayor really believes this is wrong, can't he step in and franchise services?

The Council can tender services that commercial operators don't wish to run if they wish, and this has always been an option ever since deregulation started. However, as @RT4038 points out, is the money available?

The Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority applied in the latest round if Department for Transport bus funding, announced in April, but did not get any money.

The Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority can only fund franchised routes from its own resources, hence the congestion charge proposal, with the proceeds used to fund bus services.

 

[camflyer]

He says he will do all he can to fight the cuts. So that will be nothing but talk then? Unless he can somehow convince a minister to make his part of Suffolk part of the Cambs mayoralty and get Johnson to fund services.

Moving Newmarket into Cambridgeshire would make a lot of things easier as the town is virtually surrounded by East Cambs council and only a thin strip of landing connecting it to the rest of Suffolk and it's a long way from the county town of Ipswich. There have been on and off campaigns over the years which have never got anywhere, the latest being when the Boundaries Commission proposed scrapping the West Suffolk constituency and merging Newmarket in with Ely.

 

[Magdalia]

The Busway remains rather ambiguous in my opinion. While I'd agree that the passenger numbers were fairly good pre-Covid, I think there is still a debate to be had about how many of the passengers on there are genuinely *new* and how many are merely displaced from the various withdrawn services that previously took a similar route but along roads. It was supposed to have 4 different operators using it, but it now only has 1. And I note the 'new' timetable still only has a 20-minute frequency, rather than the 15-minute pre-Covid frequency.

I'd also add as a Cambridgeshire taxpayer, that it certainly wasn't a *financial* success - we'll be paying for it for years to come.

The busway is a very expensive piece of infrastructure with a low level of usage. I wouldn't describe it as a success. Between Trumpington and the Railway Station the northbound carriageway has been closed for most of this year, which indicates that as a thoroughfare it is more important for cycles than it is for buses!

Pedantry corner Whippet still run the U on the busway between the Railway Station and Royal Papworth (southbound only), with financial support from the University.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The busway is a very expensive piece of infrastructure with a low level of usage. I wouldn't describe it as a success.

It's hugely better used than what others were campaigning for - a DMU branch line that would have had a 2-car DMU once an hour from 7am to 9pm or so.

Between Trumpington and the Railway Station the northbound carriageway has been closed for most of this year, which indicates that as a thoroughfare it is more important for cycles than it is for buses!

The potential success of an MK Redway standard interurban car-free cycle route in the flatlands of Cambridgeshire was somewhat underestimated - perhaps more of those need building without the busway part!

 

[RELL6L]

I really struggle to understand the depth of these cuts. I took an 11 between Cambridge and Newmarket, via Burwell and the villages, earlier this year and it was well loaded including passengers from Cambridge being dropped off in the endless Newmarket estates. I have also used the routes from Newmarket to Ely and Bury and they were reasonable. I also used a 35 from Chatteris towards Huntingdon this year and that had quite a few passengers. Also a V2 which did not have any other passengers so I can see that's not required. But all these long established hourly services just being cut altogether - surely there is some middle ground?

A cynic would say they are adding to the city services merely to schedule 90% of pre-Covid mileage to qualify for the money but - due to staff shortages - they won't run them. Easier to cut a board or two from a 10-minute city service than an hourly country service. Unless they win any tenders when perhaps they can cut back the city a bit and still keep above the 90%. Never been on the 72/73 from Bedford so can't say but again looks pretty drastic, while the 915 to Royston does duplicate the train.

Interesting that some services are being speeded up, eg the 13. Arriva Yorkshire appear to be doing some of the same, knock out diversions with few passengers to attract back longer distance journeys?

 

[A0wen]

Contracted by the public sector, to the private sector - it is certainly going that way; in some areas pretty much there already apart from some main inter-urban connecting routes, and even those dwindling. Can't see the public sector actually running the buses at this point.

Which is the current situation isn't it - local authorities can provide supported services which operators tender for. It's just that the commercial networks are getting a bit smaller owing to fewer users off the back of the pandemic and increasing costs.

 

[RT4038]

I really struggle to understand the depth of these cuts. I took an 11 between Cambridge and Newmarket, via Burwell and the villages, earlier this year and it was well loaded including passengers from Cambridge being dropped off in the endless Newmarket estates. I have also used the routes from Newmarket to Ely and Bury and they were reasonable. I also used a 35 from Chatteris towards Huntingdon this year and that had quite a few passengers. Also a V2 which did not have any other passengers so I can see that's not required. But all these long established hourly services just being cut altogether - surely there is some middle ground?

A cynic would say they are adding to the city services merely to schedule 90% of pre-Covid mileage to qualify for the money but - due to staff shortages - they won't run them. Easier to cut a board or two from a 10-minute city service than an hourly country service. Unless they win any tenders when perhaps they can cut back the city a bit and still keep above the 90%. Never been on the 72/73 from Bedford so can't say but again looks pretty drastic, while the 915 to Royston does duplicate the train.

Interesting that some services are being speeded up, eg the 13. Arriva Yorkshire appear to be doing some of the same, knock out diversions with few passengers to attract back longer distance journeys?

I would suggest that the problem is the (at least, and probably a bit more in a city like Cambridge) £40 an hour that needs to be earned - £40 per hour every hour that bus is out of the depot on a 12/13 hour day - obviously an average, but this rate has to be earned on the dead journey early in the morning, the contra-flow peak trips, the dead runs back in the early evening etc. £520 per day for each bus. That it is a lot of passengers, esp. with ENCTS reimbursement rates the way they are.

Which is the current situation isn't it - local authorities can provide supported services which operators tender for. It's just that the commercial networks are getting a bit smaller owing to fewer users off the back of the pandemic and increasing costs.

Quite.

 

[M@verick]

I still cannot fathom the cuts to the services between Biggleswade-Sandy and Bedford. A currently 30 min frequency service which links two growing towns with further housing and industrial developments planned in the next few years. Biggleswade has easily doubled in size in the last 25 years.

Bedford has hospitals, large colleges and well attended public schools which have always generated a huge passenger flow into the town from outlying communities and I find it hard to believe that a peak service cannot be provided commercially even if the current 30 min frequency is not sustainable.

Stagecoach East has failed to involve itself with the growth of the town in the last 20 years, with new housing and commercial developments being totally ignored by the company. However buses regularly sit in the marketplace on extended layovers in which they could be extending out to open up new opportunities.

To just sacrifice a service like this seems like the actions of a company which is not interested. Further more when the local authority talked about options to sustain the services Stagecoach have refused to accept subsidy to maintain the current levels, so it isn't even a case of trying to call bluff and secure subsidy.

 

[Bletchleyite]

To just sacrifice a service like this seems like the actions of a company which is not interested. Further more when the local authority talked about options to sustain the services Stagecoach have refused to accept subsidy to maintain the current levels, so it isn't even a case of trying to call bluff and secure subsidy.

If the money is there and Stagecoach aren't interested, then presumably they can just go out to tender for someone else to do it?

 

[M@verick]

If the money is there and Stagecoach aren't interested, then presumably they can just go out to tender for someone else to do it?

The LA's concerned are trying to secure a new operator. The Stagecoach of old would never have welcomed competition into it's territory.

I have had a look at the frankly ridiculous new MK1 service (an amalgamation of the old 81 and 99 services). I can only assume the timetable that is being proposed has been developed by the emperors new scheduling package that is known as Optibus.

The running time for the service is exactly the same throughout the whole day, be the journey at 5am or 8am. Worse than that madness, is that on a Sunday the running time is identical to the weekday service.

I can't frankly believe that anybody who has ever been involved in scheduling buses has come up with such a pile of utter tut.

 

[M803UYA]

I can't frankly believe that anybody who has ever been involved in scheduling buses has come up with such a pile of utter tut.

I can. In the 'modern' bus industry one's ability to do as directed and to toe the line are required qualities, rather than technical ability to do the job. Hence why this former scheduler now resides somewhere cold and Siberian unable to find work in an industry he's been in for 18 years whilst the clueless and incompetent rise to the top.

 

[A0wen]

I still cannot fathom the cuts to the services between Biggleswade-Sandy and Bedford. A currently 30 min frequency service which links two growing towns with further housing and industrial developments planned in the next few years. Biggleswade has easily doubled in size in the last 25 years.

Bedford has hospitals, large colleges and well attended public schools which have always generated a huge passenger flow into the town from outlying communities and I find it hard to believe that a peak service cannot be provided commercially even if the current 30 min frequency is not sustainable.

Just because Bedford has schools, colleges and a hospital it doesn't follow that those fron Sandy or Biggleswade want to go there.

I have family who live just outside Biggleswade - none of their 3 children, 2 of whom are secondary age, go to school in Bedford.

For college does Bedford offer more than North Herts at Hitchin or Stevenage or even Cambridge Regional at Huntingdon.

For hospital, Bedford has A&E, but you might also get sent to Lister at Stevenage, Hinchingbrooke at Huntingdon or even Addenbrooks at Cambridge depending on your reason for admission. People won't travel by bus if they're heading to A&E.

For shopping Bedford has little to offer over Stevenage (which is a direct train ride from Sandy or Biggleswade) or Cambridge.

Just because there was demand to travel to / from Bedford 20 or 30 years ago doesn't mean that demand is still there.

 

[Magdalia]

I still cannot fathom the cuts to the services between Biggleswade-Sandy and Bedford.

BBC Look East were out on the 72/73 today, more details here:

Bus passengers say they may no longer be able to get to college or work after a decision was taken to axe two routes.
Stagecoach East, said the 72 and 73 Bedfordshire services, which run from Bedford to Sandy, via Biggleswade, were "deemed unsustainable".
They are due to stop on 30 October.

News of axed Bedford bus routes leaves passengers feeling 'isolated'

Jackie Warren says the changes in Bedfordshire will be "extremely damaging for the community".

www.bbc.co.uk

They also reported from Comberton on school traffic:

A school principal says he is concerned students may not be able to get to school after a bus company announced plans to axe 18 routes.
Stagecoach East said the changes in Cambridgeshire were to enable "long-term viability of the network".
It said the routes had "significant falls in passenger numbers" and were not covering operational costs.
Peter Law, principal at Comberton Village College near Cambridge, said the cuts were "problematic".

Comberton College principal concerned bus cuts will affect students

Peter Law says routes being axed will prevent some students from being able to get to school.

www.bbc.co.uk

The TV report also interviewed someone from A2B. If I recall correctly, they were looking at one route but currently have 15 vehicles and only 9 drivers.

 

[ACBest]

Tender now out for all of the affected routes…

CPCA - Local Bus Services [Tender Notice]

The Authority is seeking to award services contracts to multiple suppliers for the following 23 Bus ... A Tender Notice by Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority.

bidstats.uk

The [Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined] Authority is seeking to award services contracts to multiple suppliers for the following 23 Bus Routes. The 23 separate routes will be treated as individual Lots. The Supply of Local Bus Services (Contracts 5A, 8A, 9A, 11, 12A, 18, 22A, 23, 25, 29, 30, 31A, 33, 35, 39, 66, 904A, 915, V1, V2, V3, V4 and V5)

Initial contract term 5 months with two 12 month extensions