Manchester Buses

Labour Party Conference adds to Autumn of disruption

Gordon Brown and chums hit Manchester this weekend to hold their two-week-long annual conference at Manchester Central (formerly G-MEX).  The security cordon around the venue means Labour will be inadvertently adding to the Autumn of Disruption already facing Manchester bus users.

This Is Lancashire reports that the number 3 Metroshutte, the 33 (Manchester - Wigan), 63 (Manchester - Brookhouse), 258 (Manchester - Flixton), X40 (Manchester - Great Harwood), X41 (Manchester - Blackburn) and X43/X44 (Manchester  - Nelson), along with the 8, 17, 39, 67 and 135 night buses have been diverted from today.

From tomorrow the 42A (Manchester - Reddish) 46/47 (Manchester - Southern Cemetery), 50 (Manchester - East Disdbury), 191 (Manchester - Middleton) and 197 (Manchester - Stockport) will also be diverted.  In addition various demonstrations are expected to cause delays and more diversions sporadically over the Conference fortnight.

Interesting, the information isn't on GMPTE's website and has only been reported by This Is Lancashire.

[Image credit: tj.blackwell on Flickr]

Autumn of disruption beckons

There's a brand new dance in fashion for the autumn.  It's called 'Disrupt the Transport' and you may well be learning it soon.

Yes, an autumn of delays and diversions is on the cards for Manchester's public transport users.  Heading up the trouble is the first phase of Metrolink track replacement in the city centre.  This will see Piccadilly Gardens and Piccadilly Metrolink stations closed and the entire spur of track from Piccadilly Gardens to Piccadilly Station out of use.  Replacement bus services will be introduced, running between Fairfield Street and Market Street.  The disruption begins from the 27th of September for eight weeks.

This work is part of a programme to replace most of the city centre track.  We reckon this means Moseley Street will be closed at some point in the future.  That will most definitely not be fun.  Damage to a window in the Beetham Tower caused afternoon peak hour delays in Manchester city centre today as roads around Deansgate were closed.  We hate to think how the closure of such a major bus thoroughfare as Moseley Street will affect city centre traffic over a much longer period.

Meanwhile, this Monday (15th September) sees the beginning of three weeks of gas main works on Oldham Street.  Buses that usually run from Stand B will be moved to start from/run to Stevenson Square.

Outside Manchester, Wigan is joining the disruption party as Wallgate Bridge closes for five weekend in a row from this Sunday.  Many by services will be affected by the work.  See GMPTE for more information.

Saddleworth gets in on the action with the temporary closure of Dobcross New Road.  Major diversions will be in place for local bus services.  Check here to see if your service is affected.

Hopefully there'll be nothing more to add to that list and we can have a winter of smoothly running services (ha!).

Crimefighting on the Buses

One of the main reasons many car drivers won't change over to taking buses is fear of crime.  It's encouraging, then, to hear a couple of stories of how anti-social behaviour is being tackled on Greater Manchester's bus routes.

The Manchester Evening News reports that a bus driver in Manchester took one miscreant to an unexpected terminus - Wythenshawe Police Station.  Spotting an incident on the top deck of the 43 (Manchester - Manchester Airport) service, Stagecoach's very own Batman radioed ahead to arrange cops to board the bus at the police station, off the service's normal route.  It's not quite Dark Knight-league crimefighting, but Stagecoach are famously innovative so you never know, maybe an anti-crime 'Batbus' isn't out of the question.

Meanwhile, The Bolton News reports that GMPTA and the Greater Manchester Bus Operators Association are investing £150,000 in the Patrol & Response Unit over the next year.  This team of security guards help fight trouble at bus stations, boarding buses and removing offenders where required.  It's good to hear that their work will continue.

[Image credit: Gene Hunt on Flickr]

Congestion Charge descision day announced

It seems like the question of whether Manchester will get a congestion charge (and £3 billion of public transport improvements) or not has been hanging in the air for ever.  It's not quite that long, but finally an answer is on the horizon.

The postal referendum that was recently announced will take place in early December, the Manchester Evening News reports.  The deadline for returns will be the 11th of December.  That means there's still nearly three months of campaigning for us to endure from both sides of the argument before this whole thing is finally over.

As beguiling as the war of words between the two sides is, we feel we have to point out something that the anti-charge campaigners usually fail to mention.  If the plan is approved by the people of Greater Manchester there will be vast improvements to the bus, train and tram in the region before a charge is introduced in around five years' time.  The charge will affect only those driving towards the city in the morning peak and away from it in the afternoon peak.

[Image credit: Binary Ape on Flickr]

The future of bus transport hits Manchester... well, Ringway

The future of bus transport is undoubtedly GPS tracking and real-time information.  While certain parts of the UK are on the way to achieving this, it's limited to certain routes rather than a whole-network or even whole-operator approach.

Manchester is way behind when it comes to these technologies.  There have been signals that there will soon be progress but meanwhile it's taken Manchester Airport (of all places) to bring some technological progress to Manchester's buses.  You just won't see it unless you're taking a flight.

FHR reports that the Aiport has installed software that keeps track of where its fleet of air-side passenger buses are at all times.  This should help improve the reliability of the bus service.  That said, the system runs on Windows XP so the Airport should probably expect vehicles to 'disappear' mid-journey as the on-board computers inexplicably crash.

[Image credit: Ron Layters on Flickr]

Newsbites: Our readers know their stuff

When it comes to interesting tidbits of news, our readers certainly know their onions (if by onions you mean buses, anyway).  In case you don't make a habit of reading the comments left on our posts, here's some of what you've missed.

Stuart Vallantine has spotted that there's been an unpublicised change on the 345 (Denton - Ashton-under-Lyne) route.  Early morning journeys previously run by First Manchester have begun beng run by Checkmate Coaches of Mossley.  Does anyone know the story behind this?

Meanwhile, 'DLC' has been in touch to let us know that he's heard there's been a resolution to the problem of forthcoming Stagecoach changes leaving two different services numbered 147 on the Wilmslow Road corridor.  It seems Stagecoach have decided to leave the soon-to-be-Magic-Bus-ified Southern Cemetery circulars as the 46 and 47 rather than renumbering them 146 and 147.  Good to know that an amicable solution was found in time!

Stagecoach fares change from today

If you're a regular Stagecoach Manchester passenger, don't forget that from today many of their fares have changed.

While most single fares are rising by between 10p and 30p, some are actually falling. Who'd have thought it? Additionally, the weekly Magic Rider is up to £6 and the Smart Rider rises to £7.

Perhaps reflecting reduced competition on the corridor, the Wilmslow Road night bus ticket is up to £2. If you get a Stagecoach night bus elsewhere there's no change at £2.50.

Of course, because Stagecoach split their fare changes over two points in the year, they get to proudly proclaim that the Dayrider and Megarider tickets haven't gone up in price. Just wait 'til early next year if you're a fan of paying more for those tickets. We're sure you can't wait.

Storm over 'Pilates' on the X41

If you're waiting for Transdev's X41 Manchester - Blackburn service and the people around you are wiggling their feet and holding strange poses then there's a perfectly reasonable explanation.  'Every Stop Helps' is a new publicly-funded scheme run by the University of Central Lancashire and the University of Salford.  The scheme encourages passengers on the X41 to work on their posture and circulation by doing simple excercises like rotating their ankles and rolling their necks.

It's a simple, slightly silly initiative with a strong pubic health message.  That's not how everyone sees it though.  The Mail Online calls it another example of "The Nanny State" and quotes Conservative MP Philip Davies as saying "‘Is this April 1st? The Government is virtually bankrupt and yet it is spending its last few pounds encouraging people to do Pilates at bus stops".

The fact that this is a university initiative funded by The Higher Education Funding Council For England, a government department set up by the Conservatives in 1992 that is designed to fund exactly this kind of thing seems to have been ignored by Mr Davies!  Controversy over nothing?  Yes - but it certainly makes a good story

We're Manchester Evening News 'Blog of the Week'

The Mancunian Way is the Manchester Evening News' blog about Manchester's "Life on the web".  Run by Paul Robinson and Sarah Hartley, it's well worth sticking in your RSS reader if you have an interest in the city's online activities. 

They've recently started a 'Blog of the Week' feature and Manchester Buses has the honour of being this weeks' recipient of a nice little write-up!

Take a read of their post here.

GMPTE are cool, are you?

Okay, writing a blog about buses probably relegates us from any kind of position of coolness for life but it's hard to keep a straight face when some of the stuffiest organisations in the region try to tell local youths what's cool.  GMPTE, Greater Manchester Police, Greater Manchester Against Crime and Manchester City Council have got together to fund a poster campaign aimed at discouraging vandalism.

It reads: "The Cool Test: Are you street wise enough to know you are being watched?  Do you: Know it's not cool to be captured on camera damaging bus shelters. Know it's not cool to be nicked on a bus, tram or train for not buying a ticket? Know it's not col to be excluded from bus stations for being a nuisance.  Know it is cool to understand your actions may be captured on CCTV.  All actions carry consequences".

While the poster definitely carries an important message for the region's youth, preaching 'coolness' isn't the way to go about it.

Here's our Cool Test:
Do you know it isn't cool to pretend to be 'down with the kids'?
Do you know that kids will probably laugh at the poster?
Do you know it'll probably have little effect on the kinds of kids involved in vandalism and fare dodging?

We don't pretend to have the answers when it comes to reducing youth crime on public transport, preaching 'coolness' definitely isn't the way to go about it.  Still, we'd rather be preached to than be called a pig.