Bus Links, Value for Money and the environmental dynamic appeal challenge to get more people to use them.

Buses tend to convey a certain core audience. Privatisation saw decline of bus networks and increased costs at the point of use. Today we have Government touting its investment in buses, but the reality is a sticking plaster and whitewash to the mainstay use enhancement of daily, depending on these fragmented networks. Value for money, affordability, accessibility, reliability, cleanliness, driver attitude, company hands-on management and direction/leadership and the adequacy of integration with rail stations, access to public toilets of a civilised standard and abundance open during bus operations at very least not part-time. These things attract or repel bus usage on a regular basis or not. In Bedford, out of the 3 main operators, Stagecoach, Grant Palmer and UNO, Stagecoach are probably with the edge in professionalism across the piece. Grant Palmer tries, but like the other day, bus failed at the Bus Station (thankfully) but not a word from the driver (10.30am No. 44, Wednesday 14^th July 2021); people had to decide whether to stay or look for another bus at inconvenience to themselves. Likewise, the 28 and 21 wait only a fraction few seconds before departing at the Bus Station and better duration waiting may enable people changing buses from elsewhere around the bus station to have a chance to change, whereas miss it and 30 minutes or 1 hour wait not uncommon. 

Getting off peak buses to link with Bedford Midland and Bus Station has been a post privatisation endeavour, but only of limited response. It should be flagrantly obvious and advantageous. Take buses out and unadulterated car dependency and congestion, add buses in, politicians and car drivers think congestion is compounded, but no! It is a choice and some carrot and stick could draw more to bus usership if the price, convenience and frequency when needed is tuned to what the customer needs and demands. Alas, getting hands-on coordination, rather than aloof science study procedures by people who drive very often is the convoluted order of the day... things must change. Extending the Concessionary Bus Pass to Under 65's and making them obtainable for all who want to use them and merging bus and rail cards to enable more public transport lifestyle/environment usage should be seen as a part of the jigsaw to cut congestion, emissions and pollution. It would also fill off-peak public transport - another goal fulfilled. 

Who pays? We do if we do, we do if we don't, what then tips the balance? Whether you believe in a Climate Emergency or not and are willing to do 'whatever it takes' to optimise the reduction of car lifestyles by choice than dictate. Any Government who gets it right, achieves a great step in the right direction!

There’s a place for nostalgia in our recollection of buses as per this historic bus stationed at Northampton on a special run-about service day circa 2018, by the Historical Society which has some old buses, some of which are from the days when the Civic Corporation ran local services for local people as a staple transport. No thought of profit motive, no disproportionality to incomes of likely users. Now, things are very different and balancing out the environmental efficiency of using public transport, is a sense of ‘who would use it?’ and does it present an attractive alternative to the car/value for money?

You may wish to peruse this link article from the Guardian for a reader:

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/jul/19/uk-bus-privatisation-has-caused-poverty-and-job-losses-says-un?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

A vision for a core circular routes pattern to encompass both Bedford Midland Railway Station and Bedford Bus Station. Any takers? Join ERTA and give us your support. Enquiries via richard.erta@gmail.com

Let's Have Better Buses for Bedford!

 re: https://www.bedford.gov.uk/council-and-democracy/have-your-say/consultations/bus-travel-consultation/

I have done this survey but found it to be inadequate for the purposes of communicating a list of concerns and cares about local buses and associated matters. One is at a loss as to where the buck stop beit operators, councils or Government or a share for all. I do not have a bus officer email for Bedford Borough and welcome this email to be forwarded to appropriate people who may take up matters in the, I believe, wider public interest and potential benefit:

1. X5 Oxford-Bedford-Cambridge now truncated with a required change to a 905 which is a double decker and takes longer, much longer. You can carry a bike anywhere on the X5 coach between Oxford and Bedford, but not the 905. There's a toilet on board the X5, not the 905. There's plenty of luggage space for variety of things on X5, not on 905. 905 may benefit Cambridge local commutes from St Neots, Cambourne and principal radial stops, but end to end is useless from a Bedford-East Anglia quick end to end timing. The excuse was that X5 coaches were too big to do the corner at Ashburnham Road/Midland Road and turn at the front of Cambridge Railway Station. Now, a double decker and still no linkage with Bedford and Cambridge Railway Stations. Whatever purposes the 905 serves, can we have our X5 Oxbridge end to end coach back, maybe missing out Great Barford (use the bypass) and St Neots (call at Tesco/incentivise local services to fill gaps/give 905 optimum local feed markets including Longsands to serve the St Neots Rail Station as a part of its route, the walk gap, especially in winter nights, is a long way to former X5 stop and deters the linkage and reliability of a joined-up transport system to be relied on).

Other related requests are:

a. reinstate the St Peters Street Bus Stop for 905 to call at - right opposite the Eagle Bookshop, which Oxbridge Arc, should be a good excuse to break journeys and explore what Bedford has to offer more).

b. Install a stop for X5 by the Biddenham/Bypass Roundabout to help people access going out of Bedford/coming in without recourse to have to go into Bus Station, change and out again. This would save time and boost patronage.

c. I note Eaton Socon Church Bus stop has been cut, please work to reinstate it as local, accessible and not-so-far-to-walk stops makes accessing local buses easier.

2. Make Grant Palmer normal services serve the Bedford Midland Railway and Bus Station as a part of their routes. Likewise the No. 7 should after Bus Station go via Midland Road, Ashburnham Road, Bromham Road (new stop for Wyvern House area) and along Bromham Road (reinstate Guild Hall Bus Stop) and via St Peter's to Kimbolton Road. Decluttering St Paul's waiting x more footfall and spend northern half of High Street is a beneficiary and time saving. Putnoe to Bedford Midland seems useful and marketable. Well done the No. 6 does Bedford Midland as a part of its route now, this should be trumpeted more to make people aware of the Bus-Rail Station links more. No. 3 could turn from River Street to Midland Road, Ashburnham Road, Bromham Road, Hassett Street to Bus Station and out via St Paul's for looping from the Fenlake, likewise No. 74 Grant Palmer Biggleswade-Bedford bus - could do more/needs marketing.

3. Someone said that you can get to the Essex Border, but places like Saffron Walden, Buntingford and Stevenage to Bedford are patchy except via Hitchin. Could more links out of Biggleswade to these places be looked at for more cross-country-travel options, avoiding main urban centres like congested Cambridge or expensive rail? Likewise, does it make sense for Sandy-Bedford-St Neots when a direct bus link could feed both town centres and plug a gap maybe giving Blunham, Tempsford and Roxton/Little Barford better links?

4. Bedford-Northampton No. 41: This takes 1.5 hours each way between two principal towns. It is too long in the saddle for disabled people and commuter potential. We need to separate out a local all stopper service round Will's Mother's and a semi fast regional Cambridge-Bedford-Northampton A428 corridor fast service, bringing end to end times down to 45 minutes and linking again, with Northampton Rail Station and Bus Station. It feeds back to Bedford, gives job-seekers more scope vice versa and is healthy for both towns economies.

5. Every day the buses bring hundreds  of people to Bedford Town Centre. We need to better value bus users and their weight in gold. Encouraging town centre quality shops like an M&S Food Hall and a Morrisons Metro style, would be for the good. 

6. Better public toilets, we have lost 3 in the town centre - former Debenhams, M&S and Beales and need kore. Likewise, near the Butterfly Bridge a toilet block could be very useful. We rightly market the town and riverside ambience, but between Town Bridge and Longholme Bridge, no toilets, which is a consideration for many including people with certain propensities, disabilities and mothers with children for example. Cambridge has blocks near both River Cam and Jesus Common.

7. Time keeping on No. 81 and 44 via Wixams needs checking up. Sometimes 2 buses come along together on a regular basis - then leave 1 hour gap for the next.

8. The Kempston Bus Stop in St Paul's Square currently has no flag, no published timetable and no Real Time Information (RTI) working. Can it be fixed or is it now closed? Many buses serve it and many people go there for all call there, whereas bus station they leave at different times from different stops scattered about and if slow moving, by the time you get from one to another, miss all.

Hope this feedback is helpful and welcome an officer for liaison to work with us on improving and shoring up to be the best it can be going forward. Government money must go into appropriate projects and schemes to enhance bus usage. One idea is to give lifestyle flexibility to choose bus over car more. There must be a cost-saving incentive and be able to do more with one card. Making criterions for more Under 65's to obtain Concessionary Bus Passes should be looked at, ability to buy one anyway akin to a Season Ticket and for it to be a Government 'greening' goal for bus-rail concessionary travel nationwide for a nominal sum with free for those with low incomes/disabilities/on benefits built in for all to enjoy and benefit from better, cleaner mobility than locked-in to car reliance and cost or stuck in a geographical location denied reasonable cost-ratio to income mobility. 

Help save Bedford's Buses

Our approach is the more the merrier and a growing membership helps to underscore our representative baseline - that we are not just a bunch of amateurs or enthusiasts but are doing 'good work' advocating and championing better public transport. 

Professionalisation: Some professionals get insider information, the briefings and so know what's going or not going on. Outsiders like us do not get such direct sourced information and so are often left to second guess, using our experiences as public transport users, our ears, eyes and general consensus and observations. Some times we get it right, other times we meet a wall of silence or denial.

Cllr Notebook: 

Bedford Town Centre: Like many towns across the English Regions, Bedford has more than its fair share of closed shops. The pattern has been that where buses, which drop off dollops of people (footfall and potential spend) have been withdrawn over the years traffic congestion has grown to fill the capacity available and patterns of footfall have changed to where the buses still go. Thus we have no less than 4-5 different and regular buses along Union Street per hour and nothing along the Tavistock Street, Harpur Street North, High Street, Prebend Street and scant still linking the railway station with the bus station, which is a good 10 minute walk through un-desirable area with uneven footpaths, useless for bags on wheels for example, wheelchairs and buggies, let alone cycling with parked cars, free-for-all junctions and hazardous corners and layouts. In short Alexandra place and Woburn Road should both be made one-way, Alexandra Road an Conduit Road, made one-way towards Bromham Road. Contra flow cycle lane bi-directional should be installed and drive-ways made congruent to the main pavement/pathway to and from town centre and railway station from Greyfriars. Too many cars turning too many directions makes for hazardous negotiations. Not all is daylight and politeness, cold, wet, moody and miserable exists on any menu as well.

Restoring buses: The No. 7 has competition coming into Bedford along Kimbolton Road with Grant Palmer buses heading for another part of the exact same bus station. Now rather than go St Peter's - Dame Alice Street-Hassett Street, the distributor role given No. 7's are small buses could be to turn into High Street, stops either side of the Mill Street lights (make Mill Street one way towards High Street and no left turn from High Street but contra cycle lane for bi-directional use - currently it is chaos and hazardous for pedestrians and a free-for-all car/direction 'me first' sort of atmosphere and attitude drive-wise, especially now we have taxi/car hire vehicles swarming the area. No.7 could wrap around at St Paul's Square - Horne Lane and on-to Bus Station and back out again as now. Grant Palmer Buses need to have timetable and numbers which stop (officially?) outside Pizzaland in St Peter's Street so passengers can deduce what stops there and ideally the X5 would still stop there as it does across the road albeit dropping off only. Someone said like Park and Ride, differential rules/laws governing the number of stops these services can make vary and that prohibits the placing of them. Given it is a mile from Bus Station to the Polhill X5 stop, surely the stop adjacent to the Quarry Theatre would be desirable? Yet this bus shelter which has a contract to clean and maintain it, still sports the Bedfordshire bus stop sign and has no timetables published in it. It never gets vandalised but why waste money on a bus shelter if no passengers are to be permitted to access buses or coaches from it = daft and a missed opportunity. Yes, No. 7's would use more derve and take a little longer, but given so many get off at St Peter's and walk to High Street, quite a few with this distributor role would get off around the town, bringing the vital feed of footfall and spend, small, regular dollops of people. Likewise No. 7 bus users have suffered since the cutting back to half hourly with standing room only coming out of the town whilst Grant Palmer equivalent Kimbolton Road destination buses including the No. 28, have half dozen users at most from a separate loading at the Bus Station. 

So people come into Bus Station by whatever, but only determined and specific Grant Palmer users are loading to go northwards, the No. 7 for local access is taking the brunt on probably increases in usage. On a Sunday it is hourly and has a larger bus - so it can do the roads it uses - so we either need a bigger bus like No. 5's or restored 3 per hour (20 minute) frequency to ease over crowding. Again weekdays it runs up to 9.30pm ish at night and that last bus is scantily used as most shops and the town centre is all done by 6pm with just commuters and so on left. Surely outward No. 7's like No. 6's could run out via the railway station and do back along Bromham Road, Harpur Street North and call at Pizzaland Bus Stop instead? Any St Paul's late stragglers could walk to St Peter's or catch a No. 5 which links at Church Lane with No. 7's anyway and work back from there or have uniform cut off let's say 9pm and run No. 10's onwards and outwards via St Paul's wrap around, Horne Lane, River Street-Midland Road, Railway Station and home via Bromham Road and Union Street. All commuters pay the same tickets, so should have buses at peak times to all parts of Bedford and more wrapping around during the day like UNO buses would be useful especially if a new bus stop to serve the shops and offices around Wyvern House in Bromham Road had a new bus stop inserted. It is only a flag, but gives more options. If no.7 buses go Church Lane-Elliott Crescent (new stop by Spinney)-Putnoe Street returning to the town, they don't need to double back on themselves which would save derve for the distributor role via High Street and St Paul's Square/Horne Lane and Bus Station.

Milton Keynes creep: Bedford is growing, it is sprawling. We have the town centre, parts not served by buses. Railway Station-Bus Station-Nat West/High Street is a good 20 minute walk and no direct bus link. Retail Park Kempston does have buses but vastly more vehicles than space for parking and like with Lidls in Lurke Street, queues trail back to junctions blocking other road users and making hazardous conditions for pedestrians.

Castle Road cluster of shops and the Goldington - the spread is not geared to pedestrian, marginally cycling and mainly built design-wise around the accessibility, ease and convenience of car use. Bushmead - Howbury Street should be made one way except for buses and cyclists and ideally pavements widened with trees and benches to inform a kind of 'square' at the centre of the village feel of small shops and coffee outlets. It has been said "you can buy a skinny latte from Castle Road, but thanks to closure of the Post Office, no longer send a parcel and stamp access is patchy." 

Council must get real with people about these trends and seek rectifying and encourage people out of cars and onto public transport, cycling and walking at every turn and Milton Keynes like-wise if they have any sense and know what's good for the environment, let alone care.

These patterns are across other towns also. Bicester is compensated by being adjacent to the M40 and having 2 main-line railways, pity Witney where new development like the Bedford North River Development was juxtaposed with a cinema but what happened was early shift to the new venue was at expense of shops located in High Street and elsewhere and so not only did the new development have vacant properties, so did the High Street (traditional areas) too. In short it did not generate sufficient new to make real robust growth. Bicester has empty shops because the new development from bus station to High Street attracts the lion's share whereas south behind Sainsbury's to the Market Square has insufficient footfall and spend and many empty spaces. Road-side footpath from Bicester Village Station to town centre via Market Square is rough, poor quality and no dedicated cycle lanes last time I looked. It is key to sort out to optimise new flows of customers. Northampton has the A43, A45 and M1 in the urban cordon but lacks places for parking, is full of congestion and unless the conundrum of getting over London Road/Bridge Street can be resolved by a pro-action consortium, has it's traffic issues locked in with growth and a dying town centre with empty shops and lowering footfalls and spend. Rail delivers bulk. That is why the Retail Park Rail Station on the Bedford-Bletchley railway is so crucial to sort as it would bridge between Retail Park and Town Centre, arcingly and inform new flows off road of footfall and spend, which helps to sustain businesses. 

East-West Rail will boost East Bedfordshire if delivered integratedly and in a timely manner. We want spades on the ground sooner than later and £10 million to draw a line of intent on a map to say where the railway will go gets many dismayed when the need for these links is now, we've waited 20 years. Surely the £27 million + given everyone says they are short of money, should cancel yet another road scheme and divide the money between councils who have sponsored studies galore to get it recognised by Government 'making the case' to compensate their coffers and keep front-line services going including coordinated and integrated public transport. No, we do not have all the answers, but we would be failing in our duty not to pass on some solutions! If Councils do not listen or include, we can't help that, but to the ballot box they will be judged whether post bypass they do have a more benevolent pedestrian, public transport and cycling safer accessibility strategy or are just gimmicking pandering ever more to popularism and that symbolized in locked-in car dependency and exhaust pollution which backs us into a counsel of despair in some cases. We can be better, we achieve more when we work together. Thank you.

Finally, if anyone is prepared to be-friend our association and help us get a noticeboard access at Bedford and/or Richmond or Northampton or whatever like other rail user groups, please let us know. We don't seek special favours, just equality. We feel somewhat ostracised currently and that goes against the public interest surely?

If you agree, please write to: Bedford Borough Council, Cauldwell Street, Bedford, MK42 9AP and Mr Richard Fuller MP for Bedford and Kempston, c/o House of Commons, Westminster, London, SW1A 0AA. You can also join ERTA and help us help you and others together: https://ertarail.com/membership/

Yours sincerely,

Richard Pill

ERTA Principal Transport Officer.