Bus punctuality down to 69%

Okay, we admit it - we used to look at things like bus punctuality figures in search of a story but they always stayed roughly the same so we gave up. Good job someone else has kept looking. The Manchester Evening News' David Ottewell has perused GMITA documents and found that in the first three months of this year bus punctuality fell by 15% to just 69%.

What's gone wrong? Nothing springs to mind from the start of the year that would have led to such a drop. The current water mains works that are causing big diversions in Manchester city centre must be affecting the current Quarter's punctuality but there was nothing of that scale earlier in the year.

Have you noticed buses being less punctual this year? In our experience punctuality feels to be better this year than last. It will be interesting to see how Q2's figures are affected by the water mains works.

Comments

[JimmyMac]

Weren't there a lot of roadworks in Wigan at the beginning of the year?

It's also not a direct comparison, being one quarter's results compared to yearly averages. If anything, you'd expect punctuality to be better over summer months when there is less school traffic, possibly worse over the winter because of the weather.

Also, how are these details collated? From operators own figures, or from "random" GMPTE surveys?

[Shaun]

First Manchester put up a report of service disruptions encountered over a 7-day period on their website. They usually appear about 1-2 weeks afterwards.

Current link: http://www.firstgroup.com/ukbus/northwest/manchester/service_disruptions/index.php?item=4101&show=1

Or you can scroll through some older ones via Google search by searching for all pages in:
http://www.firstgroup.com/service_disruptions

[Simon, Riverside.]

Great ancoats street Water works. a cut back on layover time, Shortage of manpower due to sackings and no recruitment. Drivers not caring or pulling there finger out. Where shall i start!!It's shocking.. if i got the bus to work everyday i would be disgusted too. This will all change however in July..... GPS tracking is about to start.. training has begun on the new Ticket machines which will allow the Management to see where 4/5 buses are running together or not turning up an dwhere they are getting stuck. It's no trial its the real deal. Rant over. Ta.

[Alex]

This year, bus punctuality for me has been great. Last year, when I travelled on Bullocks buses, not so great.

[Shaun]

If they did the survey on Saturday on Oldham Road, the punctuality would have been down to 0%! Traffic was so bad around Failsworth and Newton Heath, due to the roadworks reducing Oldham Road to one lane and four-way temporary traffic lights slowing traffic down.

This meant services 24, 72, 83, 180, 181, 182 and 184 were very late and also saw the 135c Oasis shuttle buses travelling down from Oldham depot finding alternative routes to get to Lever Street.

It worked out quicker for passengers (as I did this) to get off the bus at the back of the queue, walk down the road and then jump on the first bus that turns up at the front of the queue.

You had several buses from Manchester running dead to get themselves back on time, the 181/182 were running 30 minutes late.

180/184's were even worse. Services on Friday were running late because of Whit Walks in Saddleworth. Caught one 184 running 35 minutes late, leaving Manchester at 9.55pm, followed by the 180 about 15 minutes later.

And it got worse on Saturday due to roadworks. Saw a Huddersfield bus on the 184 stuck at Newton Heath running back to West Yorkshire 50 minutes late, while some 180/184's were running 60 minutes late.

[Simon, Riverside.]

Same in Droylsden this weekend. Every Bus was late or taken off due to the problem of drivers hours overrunning. It doest help when First decided to ram our buses in Ashton, takes 2 buses off lol. 0% between 9am and 6pm without a doubt.

[Danny King]

I have to say I don't have problems with punctuality anymore.

You can't put Service 8 (my regular route) to time, but they *are* "every 10 minutes or better" at the moment, even if it is at 10:04 instead of 10:55.

The JPT routes I use to get to work are so good at the moment I set my watch by them. They used to be shocking this time last year, so good on them.