Select Committee on Transport Memoranda



Memorandum submitted by Rosamund Weatherall

Transport Select Committee inquiry into Bus Services across the UK

I moved to Oxford 6 years ago, from London. The city of Oxford is small enough to cycle across within a half hour, but has major congestion, due to overuse of cars for personal transport, and possibly to the high numbers of enormous buses clogging the city centre. Oxford has a reputation for increasing its bus patronage, maybe because the Park and Ride buses are so well used. Other buses seem to be running about half empty.

The city's cyclists feel the bus companies are driving them off the road - certainly one meets many people who used to ride bikes but find it 'too dangerous', many cite the buses. Modern buses are huge, too wide and too long for narrow streets, especially in a historic city like Oxford.

  • Has deregulation worked?

Not in Oxford. There are two bus companies running most of the routes: Oxford Bus Company and Stagecoach. They tell us they are not allowed by competition law to co-operate in almost any way, resulting in the following deterrents to ordinary people:

1.  Both run services along the popular routes but don't co-ordinate timetables so this means, for example, you get two buses each half hour rather than a quarterly hourly service.

2.  Tickets (eg return tickets and multiride tickets) are not valid on other companies' buses. There is a one day pass that covers all bus companies but it is too expensive for a simple return trip.

3.  There is no overall map of bus routes in Oxford. It is very difficult for visitors and newcomers to Oxford to learn about the bus network.

4.  The 'bus enquiry office' in the centre of town has one desk for each company, who won't tell you of the other company's services, nor about minor bus company services eg Thames Travel who run a few routes. Another example of non co-operation: notices appeared last week on lamp posts locally informing us of a route's 'withdrawal' but informing us that the rival company would run a service instead, but giving us no detail about timetable, instead inviting us to contact that company.

5.  The bus companies appear to be able to change a route or withdraw a service at very short notice. This is offputting to occasional bus users and undermines confidence.

6.  Each bus company appears to decide where it runs services. It means they prefer the busy routes, and no-one is making sure the gaps are filled, As a result not enough services run across the city, and not enough services meet each other, co-ordinate with services going out of Oxford or reach the railway station. The transport network is not integrated.

  • Concessionary fares - problems with the current approach? Does the Government's proposal to introduce free local bus travel across the UK for disabled people and the over 60s stand up to scrutiny?

Because each district council makes its own rules about concessionary travel, in Oxford this is confined to within the city boundary, while residents of the other districts can travel free into and sometimes within Oxford, eg to the hospitals. So Oxford residents can't use free travel to go to Kidlington, but Kidlington residents can travel free into central Oxford. Each of the five Oxfordshire districts has a different set of rules. I am not sure how the bus drivers of routes crossing district boundaries cope. It has created a strong sense of unfairness.

Public transport is expensive, compared with a car. A nationwide Senior Rail and Bus card would be easy to use. It would make sense to have a single scheme covering all public transport, easy to understand, easy to use if one card covers it all, and it would probably raise the profile of bus travel, which is an essential link in the transport network for those not driving cars.

  • Is London a sound model?

Yes. Most bus users don't care who runs the buses, but want an easily understood network, where one can use any bus, with frequent services, into the evening and at weekends. London has integrated ticketing, comprehensive bus maps, and a clear image.

  • What is the future for the bus?

1.  Bus services need to be much better organised. What happened to the notion of 'intergrated' transport? Why do so many Oxford buses not go to the railway station? Why do so many services stop in the early evening or on Sunday? Bus companies need to work together, or the local authority needs the power to tell them what to do, or to franchise out the routes as in London. We, the passengers, don't benefit at all from the type of competition we now have.

2.  The design of buses must be passenger friendly. Most buses in use in Britain accelerate and brake so sharply that you are in danger if you haven't found a seat quickly. Driver training may be partly to blame, and as there is reputedly a very fast turnover of drivers, training presumably is skimpy. City buses must be driven with empathy for passengers - especially those who are slow to move or carrying children or shopping and find it difficult to get seated or move within the bus without being thrown about. The Routemaster bus was far from perfect but at least one wasn't thrown about inside.

3.  Modern buses are far too large for city use. They are too wide -squeezing people on bikes into the gutter or off the road altogether, and intimidating people on foot as the bus sides come so close to the pavement. They now have rear engines which means that people on bikes can't hear the bus coming - a student was killed by a bus in Oxford recently, possibly she didn't hear it come up behind. The speed at which buses travel in towns, combined with the size, displaces a great rush of air, which is also people-unfriendly. They are also too long: both major bus companies here run extra long buses to London which have difficulty turning corners in central Oxford. Yet the bus companies are hoping to introduce these super buses on city services as well. Why are the Europeans able to run much smaller buses on some routes?

4.  Bus stops should meet an acceptable modern standard. All stops need current timetables; seats; shelter; lighting at night if the bus is to be an acceptable equivalent to car travel. Many people don't have the choice of a car (too young, no longer able or confident to drive, banned from driving, etc) - why should they not be treated with the respect given by the nation to motorists?

But the bus is adaptable, can be comfortable and friendly and easy to use, and the status of bus travel could be raised considerably.

The bus is an essential link in the public transport network, but only if such transport is properly integrated and respected.

16 May 2006


 
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