The complex world of Buses ... some answers!

[whole diary]

[grahame]

{{To the extent that I've found myself on the recently form First Bus Customer Panel for Bath!}}

... what they were being told did not equate to what we as drivers saw & knew. Take comments with caution in mind ...

Oh yes, of course.  What's said by the staff on the ground differs from what the managers say. And then what they say will be "tidied up" for what's in the public minutes. Then on the other side of the coin, the people who are actually on the panel aren't going to be the typical Bath bus user, and you have a further degree of question as to how they we communicate with the typical bus user.   All of which is a very long chain.

Perhaps we should dream of a scenario where old Mrs Brown on her bus pass, Darren Jones on his school run, and Mira Udin on her way to work get a chance to sit down with a room of drivers, cleaners and the odd scheduler or two and talk the services through.  With good ideas passed though to management and local councils who's main role should be as enablers to help their team on the ground provide the best possible service for their customers.

I used to have a deep suspision of the First Great Western customer panel, after seeing member reports about all the various "jollies" that members were taken on, and how certain of the members took on a role which appeared to be towing the company line to the extent of being part of their PR^▸ (Public Relations) team.  I do value the interaction with First bus.  Yes, you can fool some of the people some of the time at events like this (and I know one answer, from a localgovernment representative, was incorrect the other week) - but at least we're talking and in our area that's so much of an improvement on what's happened prior.  Achievements?   Early days, but after some intros were made, there are a couple of much more regular bus users on the panel now - good people who will look after the whole, and not their pet journey, too.

[Scott]

Scott, would your meeting with planners involve one from Plymouth (covering Cornwall)?  Or was he/she moved to Southampton/Bristol?  Unfortunately, totally devoid from reality, just someone who looks at TomTom route planner{other route planners are available} & plans as per their mileage/time.

I^m not aware of any collaboration with Plymouth, other than to say that they have the same Senior Management as part of the South West & Wales division, but I^ve heard similar stories from some of the Bath drivers. One told me that they ^use a magnetic pen to see how far it is^ (and base the times on that alone); needless to say, if I get in management, this practice will change. And speaking of which:

I believe a copy of their idea for rotue times is sent to each depot a few months before start date, but comments seem mostly to be ignored.  Unlikely, but it would be good if that planner would travel every route during early morning, midday & evening to see how it actually runs & what changes should/could be made.

Wouldn^t surprise me, and they do the same with the University routes too; back in January last year, the University sent me the beta copy and I may as well have torn it to pieces it was so poor! (Partly as a consequence of this, they listened to me very carefully when planning this academic year^s timetable.)

As for travelling the routes, if I was in the planning department I would insist on it being part of the job - and if the company refused, I would do it in my spare time (which is usually spent either trawling the Internet or travelling anyway) instead!

{{To the extent that I've found myself on the recently form First Bus Customer Panel for Bath!}}
In internet casual looking, I came across the minutes from one of our County panels, & (no suprise), what they were being told did not equate to what we as drivers saw & knew.  Very sad that the real truth was not being fully given.
Take comments with caution in mind............

Oh, believe me, I know all of this. I also have to put up with what the University say and do, so when it comes to Bath^s 15 - which, realistically speaking, may well count me as its most frequent passenger - it's a case of the old clich^ stuck between a rock and a hard place. Which is really annoying when it is the one route I can influence the most effectively...

A clear example was that I was advised that we had six Step Entrance buses running around at one point; I counted nine in service literally the next day!