Manchester Buses

Stagecoach go 'Barbie' for a week

If you live in the southern reaches of Greater Manchester you may have spotted something unusual about some of Stagecoach Manchester's buses over the past couple of days.  Maybe you noticed that the front left wheelnut guards on 50 of their vehicles have been painted pink.  You might have even spotted some drivers wearing pink too.

No, they aren't trying to outdo First's 'Barbie' livery, they're actually pledging their support to a local cancer charity.  The Genesis Appeal, based at Wythenshawe Hospital, is dedicated to the prevention of Breast Cancer and this week is their 'Pink Pinkie Week'.

Mark Threapleton, managing director of Stagecoach Manchester, explained “Genesis is a local charity that we really wanted to support – with figures such as 1 in 10 women developing breast cancer at some point, this is a topic that will have some impact on many of our staff and customers in the course of their lifetime. We thought what better way to show our support and raise awareness of the campaign than to paint our buses’ wheel nut guards in pink".

The company has also donated £500 from its coffers and staff will be raising more money through the week.  You can see the pink wheel nuts on service 11 (Stockport - Altrincham) among others between now and Sunday.  We'd be interested to find out how many drivers opt to wear pink though!

Just 3 weeks from a TIF descision?

Greater Manchester's bid for £3bn of money to improve public transport and introduce peak-time congestion charging seems to have been up in the air forever.  However, it looks like we won't have to wait much longer to find out that mixture of a grant and a loan is coming our way or not.  The Manchester Evening News reports today that a decision could be announced as soon as the 15th of May.

The West Midlands recently pulled out of the running for the Transport Innovation Fund (TIF) money, leaving just Cambridge and Greater Manchester as hopefuls.  Some people have seen the decision to delay the announcement of the winner of the controversial 'prize' of congestion charging as a conspiracy to keep the councilors responsible for Manchester's bid safe in next week's council elections.  Whether that's true or not, if the Department for Transport does give Greater Manchester the go-ahead in the next few weeks it still may not be a smooth ride for the plans.

Stockport, Trafford and Bury councils have rejected the current proposals, while Bolton plans to give its residents a referendum on whether to accept them.  If Bolton rejects the plans, that would leave just six of Greater Manchester's councils in favour, one less than required for the scheme to go ahead under the rules agreed by the Association of Greater Manchester Authorities (AGMA).

So, there's a long way to go yet but at least it looks like we'll be one step closer to an end to all this uncertainty by the middle of May.

Videoshow Part 3: Bus Jammin'

Time for the latest in our series looking at Manchester bus footage on the internet.  Now, we've heard of 'bus jams' at Piccadilly Gardens, but this brings a whole new meaning to the concept!

Fun with maps

We like:
a) Maps
b) The idea of an expanded Metrolink network

So thanks to the MEN's David Ottewell for drawing our attention to this fantastic vision of what the Metrolink network could look like by 2030.  Click on the map for a better look.  The map includes made-up lines, including one from the Airport to Manchester city centre via Wilmslow Road/Oxford Road as well as all the proposed 'big bang' lines.

Of course, the chances of this all happening in the next 22 years are slim-to-none, but we can dream!

GMPTE's poster talks pork

It's understandable for people who work in public transport to think of faredodgers as lowlife scum, but would they go out and say it in public?  Apparently so.  James of the Virtual Nostril blog got in touch to let us know about this poster he spotted at a bus stop in Burnage.

In addition to 'Faredodger', 'Scally' and 'Criminal', this wordsearch also reveals that those who skip paying for transport are apparently 'pigs'!  This, of course, follows the recent controversy over the 'impossible cogs' poster.

Don't hold back on our account, GMPTE!

Indies cut back in May, while Citysmart revives an old service

Some of Greater Manchester's independent operators will be on the road less from next month following a round of service changes announced by GMPTE.

Vale of Manchester made a brave move when they launched service 66 in November.  A commercial service running from Clifton Junction to Hope Hospital, it competed with existing subsidised service 70 (albeit via a different route). Well, just 6 months on, the service is set to be withdrawn from the 24th of May.  The change was spotted by a keen-eyed Manchester Buses reader in GMPTA documentation (since removed from the internet) a couple of weeks ago, but it's now been confirmed.

Speedwellbus, meanwhile, lose the contract for the 307/308 Stockport-Brahmall circular, with Stagecoach Manchester taking over from the 12th of May.  It looks like they'll be losing the 390 (Stockport - Bramhall) too, although GMPTE's notes simply say 'operator changed'.

Public holiday journeys on Bluebird-operated service 78 (Manchester - Oldham) are to be withdrawn, while the public holiday times on their 77 service (Manchester - Moston) are changed.  These changes won't be too much of a problem in the Beswick and Newton Heath areas as Stagecoach run commercial service 76 between Manchester and Failsworth on public holidays.  Passengers further along the routes of service 77 and 78 may be affected though.  Bluebird will also cut their commerical service 75 back from Chadderton to Moston, following its trial extension a few months back.

Rossendale Transport's Citysmart brand launched the X46 service between Manchester and Weir late last year.  In January they extended the service, which currently runs hourly every day (with extra journeys between Bacup and Manchester through most of the day creating a roughly half hour frequency Monday to Saturday).  We're guessing the most business they've been doing has been between Rochdale and Manchester, as from the 4th of May they're withdrawing the X46 and replacing it with service 16 along that section of route only.

You may remember First used to run a peak-only, limited stop service 16 between Manchester and Rochdale a few years ago to complement their standard stopping service 17.  First since replaced their 16 with service 20, which follows the route of service 24 via Chadderton instead of Middleton.  City Smart's 16 will run every 30 minutes, Monday to Saturday, and X46 passengers further north than Rochdale can connect with the new service via service 464, which has revised times.  Just try not to get Arriva's 16 by mistake and end up in Altrincham!

Speaking of Arriva, May sees them altering peak period times on services 360 (Wigan - Warrington) and 365 (Wigan - Leigh).

After 700 miles Manju's back early!

Back at the start of the month we told you about Manju Ghosh, the 60 year-old woman from Bolton who was bussing it across England to celebrate the launch of National Free Travel.  Well, after 700 miles and 37 bus journeys she's completed her journey two days quicker than expected!

Although it was supposed to take 12 days to travel from Berwick-on-Tweed to Land's End, she managed it in just 10.  On her return to Manchester she was gushing with praise for the nation's bus network.  "It was the perfect journey. Travelling by bus is great because you can just sit back and relax. We didn't have any problems at all - the buses were clean and modern and the drivers were all very friendly".

Where does Manju think is the best place for bus travel in the country?  Well, nowhere on her route apparently; she much prefers the buses back home.  "I still think that Greater Manchester is the best place for bus travel and I'd encourage everyone to use public transport when they can because it really is good - and I'm not just saying that because I have a free pass!".

Okay, that's a quote from a GMPTE press release so you might think it was bound to say that.  However, though we may like to moan about the buses in Greater Manchester they're a whole lot better here than many other parts of the country.  We're sure, if we bump into her on the bus one day, Manju will agree.

Oldham West Street reopens

A few months back, some hooligan with nothing but crime on his mind set fire to a bus at Oldham's West Street bus station.  While people were on it.  Luckily, everyone got off safely, but the bus and adjacent stand didn't fare so well (see the photo here).

Well, it's taken a while (as these things do, what with surveyors and insurance and whatnot) but finally the main bulk of the work to repair the stand is complete and West Street bus station reopens tomorrow.  This means that all bus services that used to use West Street until the fire will do so again, albeit with some stand changes.  There's still a few final bits of work to complete, but these will apparently be done during quiet periods.

Videoshow Part 2: A driver's downtime

What do bus drivers do when they park up, set the display to 'Sorry Not In Service' and wait for their next departure?  They shoot videos, apparently.

Yes it's time for part two of our weekly look at Manchester bus-related videos online.  This week we have a video shot by a driver on his downtime at (as far as we can make out) Stockport bus station.  Okay, this won't win any awards but it's good to know some drivers like to use their spare time creatively.

TIF bid gets a boost... and so do its opponents

Manchester's TIF bid got a boost yesterday when it was revealed that the West Midlands had withdrawn its application for the money.  Only Cambridge and Manchester now remain in the race.  Manchester is the favourite to win funding from the scheme that will see huge improvements to Greater Manchester's public transport along with the introduction of congestion charging at peak times.

The congestion charge is, of course, massively unpopular among drivers in the area.  Here at Manchester Buses we'd love to see the improvements planned for Greater Manchester at any cost (no surprise, we don't have a car!) but if things happen here the way they have in New York they'll remain just a pipe dream.

Sean Corker from Machester Against Road Tolls has jumped on this as a victory for the anti C-charge camp, but is it?  New York is a very different place to Manchester.  Sure, it's probably more congested than Manchester but Americans also love their cars more than many other nations.  In America you're pretty much a low-life if you regularly use buses to get around so it's no surprise that there wasn't much support for the bill to go through.

Here we have a chance to do something solid and long-term about congestion.  It'd be better, for sure, if it didn't involve congestion charging, but that's the only option we have right now.  Oh and don't say we don't have a growing congestion problem - it took the 109 bus 90 minutes to do a journey that's supposed to take 50 minutes.  Plus the  bus was 20 minutes late leaving Piccadilly, meaning it arrived at Wythenshawe Hospital an hour later than it should have done!