TFL & "Managed Decline"

[notverydeep]

What is a "simplification" to a well-heeled planner looking at neat lines on a map is the exact opposite - a complication (not to mention a significant slowing of the overall journey) - for someone struggling (on account of disability, luggage, kids, shopping, whatever) to make a journey on a wet winter evening. Those "simplifying"/"rationalising" public transport routes rarely seem to have any real-world experience of the struggles of some of those relying on the services.

As someone who has spent the last 20 plus years of my career planning service improvements and building a case for them (not those being discussed here), it is very disheartening to have to reverse them in the full knowledge of the real losses that this will cause for the passengers who have to deal with the longer and more inconvenient journeys - and when normality returns as it surely will, more crowded conditions. It is even more disheartening for it to be suggested that we somehow see it as an improvement and actually want it to come about, when the reality is the funds to continue the previous services are simply not available.

And if you know where there are jobs for a transport planner that pay sufficiently to become "well healed", can you let me know where these can be found? The last time my pay rose sufficiently to keep pace with inflation was in 2013.

 

[Bletchleyite]

As someone who has spent the last 20 plus years of my career planning service improvements and building a case for them (not those being discussed here), it is very disheartening to have to reverse them in the full knowledge of the real losses that this will cause for the passengers who have to deal with the longer and more inconvenient journeys - and when normality returns as it surely will, more crowded conditions.

Normality won't return in terms of London office commuting at least. The "work from home part of the week" cat is out of the bag and is not going back in for most people.

But regarding the services, I'm sure it is frustrating, but there are gains from simplification (the understandability and simplicity of a metro style bus network). Generally it's said that London's system being as it is is because the Tube can't cope, so you need buses to take some of the load. If that is no longer true, surely the bus should revert to its Germanic role of just taking people to/from the Tube, plus an accessibility role where stations/lines can't be made accessible? This means a much, much smaller network but also a change to true through ticketing, and the financial accessibility thing being done another way i.e. a discount on all fares, not just buses being cheaper?

 

[notverydeep]

Normality won't return in terms of London office commuting at least. The "work from home part of the week" cat is out of the bag and is not going back in for most people.

This is likely true and is recognised, but the degree that it will occur is still hard to predict, especially over the longer term. It means there is at least a risk that transport providers may end up being forced to cut significantly, only to see near normal traffic levels within months. After all if you have just had Omicron and plenty clearly will have had by the spring, what is there to stop you going out and behaving normally? It is though, hard for operators to rely on this with much less money coming in at present!

The pandemic hasn't changed the amount of office space available (and that continues to be added by new development). In the short term, employers will seek to cut space and costsas employees attend less frequently, but this is likely to depress office rental rates and gradually attract new companies who have had to settle for less attractive locations in the past can now afford to add / upgrade to a (the now cheaper) Central London location from a suburban location or location in another town or city. In this future you could end up with the same total number of trips, but comprising of fewer trips made by more individuals. It isn't guaranteed and some office capacity might be converted to other uses such as residential. But these new homes would still generate trips.

Office trips could also vary more by day of the week and time of year. Anecdotal evidence suggests that Tuesday to Thursday were much more popular for returnees than Monday or Friday (Friday commuting demand had been declining even before the pandemic). Working at home on a pleasant warm day can be much more attractive, if breaks and meetings can be conducted from the garden. It can also be more attractive if you have to face below freezing temperatures walking to the station, so maybe we end up with is busy trains on grey Spring and autumn Days mid-week! Providing capacity for the busiest days, without the constant revenue of the old commuter model will be a huge challenge.

Office commuter journeys will not dissappear and are nowhere near a majority of the public transport demand in London. Plenty of commuters (key workers, retail, hospitality, etc.) are much less able to work from home and leisure traffic was recovering strongly prior to Omicron, suggesting a strong desire to go out after the pandemic. The peaks are still the busiest times in absolute terms and demand had grown significantly in the last decade, meaning that even if demand were permanently 25% lower, we may well just be back to the number of trips that were normal in the early 2000s - it never seemed particularly quiet then! Other factors could end up being more influential to future demand, what public transport demand is very sensitive to in London is population. If this falls and the reduction persists, demand will stay lower long term, if it recovers and carries on growing, we will soon be back to a fairly similar demand level, but with some differences in the distribution of traffic across the day / week / year.

 

[Horizon22]

TfL has been bloated from the moment it was created. A horribly political construct, a typical Blair-era creation.

If Johnson really wanted to do something useful, as opposed to playing Eton Debating Society politics, he could ditch TfL and return it to what it was with LT - essentially a provider of transport. He won’t do it of course, firmly in the “too difficult” box.

TfL does primarily provide transport, only that has grown a lot to include multiple modes now. One of the issues has been that we have a hodge-podge of political framework with multiple London councils, a London Authority (that basically just scruitinises the Mayor) and the Mayoral system. For the road network as an example, this is a nightmare.

Any big organisation like TfL will be involved in certain agendas and discussions that perhaps go beyond the direct remit of transport, simply because it has a large part to play in the operations of London. If you were to name the average Londoner what the Mayor is responsible for many would probably rank "transport" very highly, despite the fact it is fairly low down people's general priority list.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 Jan 2022 ==

Normality won't return in terms of London office commuting at least. The "work from home part of the week" cat is out of the bag and is not going back in for most people.

But regarding the services, I'm sure it is frustrating, but there are gains from simplification (the understandability and simplicity of a metro style bus network). Generally it's said that London's system being as it is is because the Tube can't cope, so you need buses to take some of the load. If that is no longer true, surely the bus should revert to its Germanic role of just taking people to/from the Tube, plus an accessibility role where stations/lines can't be made accessible? This means a much, much smaller network but also a change to true through ticketing, and the financial accessibility thing being done another way i.e. a discount on all fares, not just buses being cheaper?

To an extent - commuting from outer London inwards is still relatively strong; commuting from the Home Counties? That's another issue entirely.

Right up until December certain tubes (and suburban trains) were getting genuinely rather busy again. The weekend is also continuously busy of course.

 

[Bletchleyite]

TfL does primarily provide transport, only that has grown a lot to include multiple modes now. One of the issues has been that we have a hodge-podge of political framework with multiple London councils, a London Authority (that basically just scruitinises the Mayor) and the Mayoral system. For the road network as an example, this is a nightmare.

The political structure of London is certainly a problem - same with the other large metropolitan areas. In other countries worldwide, you would have an overall Council which has powers over everything from transport to housing to electricity generation, not just weak sham mayors who barely control anything but transport. The Boroughs are an incredibly inefficient way to do it, with a lot of duplication, and only really exist for political reasons - Thatcher didn't want such strong entities with Labour leadership, as was likely.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 Jan 2022 ==

To an extent - commuting from outer London inwards is still relatively strong; commuting from the Home Counties? That's another issue entirely.

True, but those Home Counties commuters typically arrive "in the sticks" - Euston, KX/SP, Marylebone and Paddington - and use the Tube in large numbers to get to the City/Holborn area (mostly) for work. Take them off the Tube and you've got a load more capacity that doesn't need to be laid on over the top in buses any more*, and can allow the bus's role to change to become more European - primarily about getting people to their nearest rapid transit rail station and not for long, slow end to end journeys which result in massive peak vehicle requirements. The potential cost saving there is vast, as high tens if not over a hundred buses crawl their way along it at slower than cycling pace at any given time. Buses** in city centres are negative for many reasons - pollution (until all electric), making the environment oppressive for cyclists due to their threatening size even if generally well driven, not to mention that huge cost of a large number of vehicles crawling along at 10mph on routes that criss-cross so much that priority is not workable.

* Accessibility also needs to be considered, but Crossrail will make massive dents in that. In a German city, it's likely the opening of Crossrail (as a fully accessible service) would result in the complete removal of all bus services along Oxford St, for instance. Indeed, this could feed into the potential pedestrian/cycle-isation (I'm thinking pedestrianised with a narrowish two-way cycle-only road down the middle) of Oxford St, which would be an excellent idea.

** Clearly not all of them; there are parts of central London poorly served by the Tube and some would need to remain, and we need to avoid "Gateshead examples" as those just make people drive. But do we really need long, slow "cross city" routes all over London just because we have had for years? I don't think so.

 

[Horizon22]

I think one major loss - for C. London anyway - has been a lack of tourists on the tube too. Obviously commuter numbers are down for those doing the final stretch from their London termini but those whose journey started & ended on the Underground network have probably held up relatively well.

As for buses, they tend to do the orbital bits quite well I find - for example linking up different tube lines in a clockwise or anti-clockwise direction which otherwise would be a ridiculous detour via C. London.

 

[AlbertBeale]

* Accessibility also needs to be considered, but Crossrail will make massive dents in that. In a German city, it's likely the opening of Crossrail (as a fully accessible service) would result in the complete removal of all bus services along Oxford St, for instance. Indeed, this could feed into the potential pedestrian/cycle-isation (I'm thinking pedestrianised with a narrowish two-way cycle-only road down the middle) of Oxford St, which would be an excellent idea.

Accessibility for many people isn't to do with avoiding stairs; it's to do with being able to get close to your destination when carrying shopping or small children, or when not able to walk long distances. Crossrail, with stations many times further apart than bus stops are (not to mention needing to walk a quarter of a mile or more to get between train and street), doesn't provide "accessibility" for many Oxford Street destinations.

You do realise that the superfluous "conductors" on that stupid bus were principally employed to prevent people getting on and off between stops? The whole concept was a ridiculous anachronism viewed through nostalgic rose tinted glasses while costing a disproportionate amount of money. Incidentally, only the first couple of hundred were built with the ability to have open backs. There was never any intention to expand that ludicrous concept any further.

I don't think a system which allowed people to cut 30% off of journey times when moving around central London (and which provided safety reassurance to many vulnerable people) is at all "anachronistic". I call it "passenger-friendly".

But regarding the services, I'm sure it is frustrating, but there are gains from simplification (the understandability and simplicity of a metro style bus network). Generally it's said that London's system being as it is is because the Tube can't cope, so you need buses to take some of the load. If that is no longer true, surely the bus should revert to its Germanic role of just taking people to/from the Tube, plus an accessibility role where stations/lines can't be made accessible? This means a much, much smaller network but also a change to true through ticketing, and the financial accessibility thing being done another way i.e. a discount on all fares, not just buses being cheaper?

Most London bus routes don't run parallel to tube lines. And even where they do, they provide a more door-to-door service since their stops are much more closely spaced than stations are.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 Jan 2022 ==

As someone who has spent the last 20 plus years of my career planning service improvements and building a case for them (not those being discussed here), it is very disheartening to have to reverse them in the full knowledge of the real losses that this will cause for the passengers who have to deal with the longer and more inconvenient journeys - and when normality returns as it surely will, more crowded conditions. It is even more disheartening for it to be suggested that we somehow see it as an improvement and actually want it to come about, when the reality is the funds to continue the previous services are simply not available.

I agree that there's a dreadful tendency for any diminution of public service because of a decision to cut the funds needed [which isn't the same as "there isn't enough money"; these are political choices] to be dressed up by those in charge as somehow an improvement, rather than admitting that it's a worsening. This must be as frustrating for those doing the work who are forced to publicly parrot the "party line" and pretend they're not making things worse as it is for users of the service who see through the dishonest rhetoric.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Accessibility for many people isn't to do with avoiding stairs; it's to do with being able to get close to your destination when carrying shopping or small children, or when not able to walk long distances.

Every other pedestrianised town/city centre copes, usually by means of more directed offerings towards mobility needs like Shopmobility schemes. They don't need oppressive large vehicles everywhere at tremendous cost. It is only London that seems to eschew pedestrianisation of its main shopping areas.

Most London bus routes don't run parallel to tube lines. And even where they do, they provide a more door-to-door service since their stops are much more closely spaced than stations are.

UK bus stops are too close together. 500m or so is the norm in Germany, with thought actually given to the locations, which means much, much faster operation, thus making the service far more attractive. (Oxford St is terrible for the lack of thought given to bus stop locations and how routes are grouped at them - if anyone had paid any attention at all to where people tended to get on/off in Routemaster days they'd not be anything like what they are now).

I agree that there's a dreadful tendency for any diminution of public service because of a decision to cut the funds needed [which isn't the same as "there isn't enough money"; these are political choices] to be dressed up by those in charge as somehow an improvement, rather than admitting that it's a worsening. This must be as frustrating for those doing the work who are forced to publicly parrot the "party line" and pretend they're not making things worse as it is for users of the service who see through the dishonest rhetoric.

Even if the funds exist they should not be wasted on a complex, highly duplicated and not-as-well-integrated-as-it-could-be (I'm thinking fares here) transport network.

 

[AlbertBeale]

UK bus stops are too close together. 500m or so is the norm in Germany, with thought actually given to the locations, which means much, much faster operation, thus making the service far more attractive. (Oxford St is terrible for the lack of thought given to bus stop locations and how routes are grouped at them - if anyone had paid any attention at all to where people tended to get on/off in Routemaster days they'd not be anything like what they are now).

Very true re Oxford Street. Changes of stops in recent years have made things - including especially switching between routes at junctions like Oxford Circus - progressively worse. And even in earlier years with better placing of stops, many people - as you note - were getting on and off at other places for convenience. (This is exactly one of the places where the brief return of open-platform buses was a relief, and sped up journeys so much.)

If there were open-platform buses still, then fewer people might complain about your idea of 500m between stops...

 

[Falcon1200]

UK bus stops are too close together. 500m or so is the norm in Germany, with thought actually given to the locations, which means much, much faster operation, thus making the service far more attractive.

But unless you live near, and your destination is near, one of the widely-spaced bus stops, the additional walking time to and from the stop surely negates the quicker bus journey !

 

[dm1]

But unless you live near, and your destination is near, one of the widely-spaced bus stops, the additional walking time to and from the stop surely negates the quicker bus journey !

For very short journeys that could be the case, but for those other options such as walking or cycling (or mobility scooters or whatever) are likely to be more practical in any case.

For anything more than a couple of stops, an increase from 200m stop spacing to 400m stop spacing means you need to walk at worst an extra 200m (instead of ca 100m on each end, 200m at each end), around 2.5 minutes at 5km/h walking speed. That is conservative, since with sensible stop placement, it is likely that either the destination or the starting point will be closer than this. Average walking speed in London is also much higher than this.

Let's do a back-of-the-envelope calculation with the average bus journey in London:

To keep the maths simple, consider a journey of exactly 4000m, just under the average distance travelled on a london bus (2.7 miles according to Google), and assume all stops are exactly equally spaced.

London buses had an average speed of 9.3mph last year. Since that includes night time where buses are faster, we will assume this as their average travel speed between stops at peak times (this is an approximation, but probably a decent one).

At 200m spacing, and assuming 30s dwell times at each stop (fairly conservative), then the bus will need approx 48s between each stop. So to go 4200m on the bus (20 stops) it will need 20 x 48s and 19 dwells of 30s = 1530s or around 25.5 minutes. That assumes you get on just before it leaves and get off as soon as it arrives.

Now assume a spacing of 400m instead. Keeping everything else constant, that means you only need to go 10 stops instead of 20, so will need to wait 10 dwells of 30s, giving a total travel time of 20.5 mins and saving you 5 minutes on the bus.

But that doesn't take the time saving from braking and accelaration into account, as well as the effect of buses not getting in each others' way as much since they stop less. So lets assume, conservatively, that we can get the average travel speed of the bus up to 10.5mph. Then it takes us only 86s to go the 400m between stops on average. For our 4000m journey this gives us a moving time of 860s and a total journey time of 1160s or around 19 minutes. Adding on our worst-case 2.5 minutes extra walking time gives us 21.5 minutes.

So increasing the stop spacing in this way saves us 4 minutes on the average bus journey. For longer journeys the savings would be much larger, for shorter ones slightly less. If more segregation and bus priority were to be implemented, as well as all-door boarding, then then the average speed could probably be increased further and the dwell times reduced.

In reality, with congestion, intersections, uneven stop spacing and stops placed near high demand locations, the calculation becomes much more complex. The resultant time savings could potentially be much larger, or in some cases much smaller. But in general, increasing stop spacing will make most journeys faster overall, up to a certain point. For buses in urban areas, as the lowest rung on the public transport hierarchy, 400m seems to be widely accepted as the distance to aim for, whilst taking local demand patterns into account. This distance is easily walkable for the majority of the population. Since there are fewer stops you can also invest in making them more comfortable, by providing shelters and benches etc for older or less mobile people to rest, whereas with 200m spacing many stops are little more than a post with a bus stop flag on it.

 

[philthetube]

The "stupid" bus was one good thing that happened in that era - while the rear platforms were open, it cut up to 30% off of many end-to-end journey times. But of course bus passengers are not considered important enough for the value of their time to be included in any cost-benefit analysis. The cycling schemes haven't been all bad either - mostly they've been too unambitiions because of fear of alienating car drivers (who shouldn't be in much of London anyway).

So a 30% requirement in vehicles to run a service, something wrong somewhere?

 

[AlbertBeale]

So a 30% requirement in vehicles to run a service, something wrong somewhere?

Assuming you mean a 30% "reduction" - no. I was talking about the time for a passenger's journey*, not a bus's journey. By being able to hop on and off, these are decoupled. (Though buses in that case do move somewhat faster - albeit by a lesser percentage - so that does allow fewer buses per route, or a more frequent service [thus speeding up times for passengers even more].)

(*Some of my trips around central London, requiring one or more changes, could save up to 30% of my time end-to-end when all the routes concerned were hop-on-hop-off. The combination of opportunistic changes of route, plus starting and finishing a ride at a convenient point irrespective of where bus stops were, meant that time on a stationary bus, time waiting for a bus, and time walking between stops, were all greatly reduced.)

 

[Wolfie]

The "stupid" bus was one good thing that happened in that era - while the rear platforms were open, it cut up to 30% off of many end-to-end journey times. But of course bus passengers are not considered important enough for the value of their time to be included in any cost-benefit analysis. The cycling schemes haven't been all bad either - mostly they've been too unambitiions because of fear of alienating car drivers (who shouldn't be in much of London anyway).

The "BoZo" bus, otherwise known as the "Roaster" is an over-priced, under-performing, heap of junk. The sooner they are all scrapped the better.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Jan 2022 ==

You do realise that the superfluous "conductors" on that stupid bus were principally employed to prevent people getting on and off between stops? The whole concept was a ridiculous anachronism viewed through nostalgic rose tinted glasses while costing a disproportionate amount of money. Incidentally, only the first couple of hundred were built with the ability to have open backs. There was never any intention to expand that ludicrous concept any further.

Regarding the cycle schemes they had a significant adverse impact on the bus network. Road user charging is the right way to deter car usage.

Spot on, well said.

 

[43066]

You do realise that the superfluous "conductors" on that stupid bus were principally employed to prevent people getting on and off between stops? The whole concept was a ridiculous anachronism viewed through nostalgic rose tinted glasses while costing a disproportionate amount of money. Incidentally, only the first couple of hundred were built with the ability to have open backs. There was never any intention to expand that ludicrous concept any further.

Regarding the cycle schemes they had a significant adverse impact on the bus network. Road user charging is the right way to deter car usage.

On “normal” buses, it’s not unknown for people who are refused permission to get off between stops to simply open the doors themselves with the emergency button. I can’t really see the harm if the bus is stationary at lights or in traffic. It doesn’t seem to cause any undue issues as the driver simply closes the doors as normal and continues.

 

[Bletchleyite]

On “normal” buses, it’s not unknown for people who are refused permission to get off between stops to simply open the doors themselves with the emergency button. I can’t really see the harm if the bus is stationary at lights or in traffic. It doesn’t seem to cause any undue issues as the driver simply closes the doors as normal and continues.

With so many roads in London having cycle lanes, I wonder how many cyclists are injured as a result of people doing this?

I'm not sure how you'd prevent it, though, as the buttons are legally required, and if you put them behind glass it would be broken several times a day.

(I have had a driver tell me to do it in a traffic jam where there was no sign of anything moving for a while - "I can't let you off, I'd get sacked, but there's nothing I can do about it if you just press that button there")

 

[Dave W]

The Boris New Bus for London Master things are pretty horrible, a decade in. In the early days the saloons were quite nice - softly lit - and I did appreciate the little nod to heritage and leaping off between stops even if it was largely ceremonial. But they've just turned into any other bus now, and so far as I understand are far more expensive to run than their counterparts. If the current mayor could I'm sure he would love to see them off, but they're not going to be used anywhere else are they? Another good example of a Johnson vanity project gone south.

This is sacrilege as a Labour voter, I'm sure, but I'd be more confident of TfL's position if I thought Khan cared about Londoners more than having a political appendage-swinging contest with his counterparts in SW1. Afraid I'm not convinced.

With so many roads in London having cycle lanes, I wonder how many cyclists are injured as a result of people doing this?

I once barely avoided a collision with an elderly man who had persuaded the driver to let him off in a queue of traffic as I was coming up the inside in a marked lane. I still cringe about how close it was now, I ended up hugging him with my front wheel well past him. Tore my calf to shreds against my chainset and he was very lucky I had just had a brake service and was riding cautiously. What was the result? A ton of abuse off the bloke and a driver who made it more than clear that it somehow wasn't his problem...

 

[Busaholic]

I'm not aware that the person-hours saved by people's ability to hop on and off at traffic lights, and to change routes at junctions without waiting for bus stops, etc, which was possible with open platforms, was ever counted (timings, I thought, were on the assumption that people sat obediently until they reached a bus stop). And even people not personally availing themselves of the hop on and off facility had quicker journeys because of lower bus stop dwell times.

And anyway, counting the value of people's time in terms of what they'd pay for it - well, that of itself undervalues the time of many poor people who have no financial choice; they couldn't afford to pay extra for a quicker journey anyway, which makes their time worthless by that reckoning. If people on trains are richer than people on buses, then a transport provider saving time on a train journey is seen as more valuable than saving time on a bus journey because the time of a passenger on the former is "worth" more. But to the individuals concerned, their time is as important to them as anyone else's. And maybe important to the family they're have less time to care for because their bus journey is slower. And the idea that the need for extra changes is just a matter of counting the extra minutes - no, it's also the stress and discomfort, and (in some cases) the impossibility of then making such a journey at all.

I hear what you're saying about the ability to hop on and off at traffic lights, and to the extent that the Borisbus initially allowed for that I agreed with the concept, being a Londoner who'd done it all my life, albeit not living there after the age of 40. I was almost certainly the last person to both jump on and, a little later off, a 'proper' Routemaster in normal service on Oxford Street, doing this on the second-to-last 159 in December 2005, a spur of the moment decision in both cases. BJ knew, though, because he'd been told so by so many knowledgeable people, that TfL would not be able to sustain the continued operation of the 'new Routemaster' on these lines for very long, the cost of 'crew' operation and the legal/PR ramifications of any 'accidents' only two of many problems. Being Johnson, he ploughed on regardless, and the ridiculous mayoral system allowed him to.

 

[JonathanH]

the legal/PR ramifications of any 'accidents' only two of many problems

I once witnessed someone not making a bus they had run for in Oxford Street. If you didn't take a firm grip of the pole when making that last desperate leap to board a moving bus, the outcome wasn't very nice and could easily end up with a visit to a hospital.

Simply not worth it.

 

[Busaholic]

I once witnessed someone not making a bus they had run for in Oxford Street. If you didn't take a firm grip of the pole when making that last desperate leap to board a moving bus, the outcome wasn't very nice and could easily end up with a visit to a hospital.

Simply not worth it.

Wouldn't argue with your logic, but human nature being what it is, especially when you're young and fit..... That said, I was always far more concerned with slam door Southern Region electric trains running on a third rail system, particularly at stations which weren't termini e.g. London Bridge on the SE side. Accidents there were usually either fatal or life-changing.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I once witnessed someone not making a bus they had run for in Oxford Street. If you didn't take a firm grip of the pole when making that last desperate leap to board a moving bus, the outcome wasn't very nice and could easily end up with a visit to a hospital.

Simply not worth it.

The thing that's really a problem is that no effort seems to ever have been made to study where people were getting on and off open platform buses so as to inform where the stops should be.

 

[JonathanH]

The thing that's really a problem is that no effort seems to ever have been made to study where people were getting on and off open platform buses so as to inform where the stops should be.

Wouldn't that lead to stops being closer rather than further apart? I don't think open platform buses are truly missed - the main justification seems to be about getting 'trapped' in traffic - the best way to deal with that is to try and eliminate the traffic congestion.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Wouldn't that lead to stops being closer rather than further apart?

Depends how you look at it. If it was "we will have 4 stops total each way, we will use the survey to influence where they should go before open platform working is stopped" that could have brought benefits, a bit like the way the best way to design path layouts in new developments is not to build any, leave it a few weeks, see where the grass has been worn down by people walking "desire paths", and build them there.

 

[WelshBluebird]

On “normal” buses, it’s not unknown for people who are refused permission to get off between stops to simply open the doors themselves with the emergency button. I can’t really see the harm if the bus is stationary at lights or in traffic. It doesn’t seem to cause any undue issues as the driver simply closes the doors as normal and continues.

Why? Nowhere else in the country as far as I am aware allows such actions so why do you think Londoners are so desperate that they must be allowed to do that? If people are using the emergency buttons inappropriately then I hope there is some consequence to that (like there is for using the emergency buttons on trains).

 

[rebmcr]

Why? Nowhere else in the country as far as I am aware allows such actions so why do you think Londoners are so desperate that they must be allowed to do that? If people are using the emergency buttons inappropriately then I hope there is some consequence to that (like there is for using the emergency buttons on trains).

There is no consequence (unless you are volunteering to go out and enforce it), it happened routinely when I used to use buses in Manchester.

 

[AlbertBeale]

There is no consequence (unless you are volunteering to go out and enforce it), it happened routinely when I used to use buses in Manchester.

And it happens commonly in London too - at least I do it all the time if I'm on a rear platform bus which is stuck in traffic a bit short of its stop. I see no reason to be imprisoned on a bus, having my journey slowed down. The main problem is that it's not so easy to open the door from the outside if you want to hop on.

The more convenient public transport is, the easier it is to ban private cars.

Why? Nowhere else in the country as far as I am aware allows such actions so why do you think Londoners are so desperate that they must be allowed to do that? If people are using the emergency buttons inappropriately then I hope there is some consequence to that (like there is for using the emergency buttons on trains).

Not desperation - speed and convenience.

 

[43066]

Why? Nowhere else in the country as far as I am aware allows such actions so why do you think Londoners are so desperate that they must be allowed to do that? If people are using the emergency buttons inappropriately then I hope there is some consequence to that (like there is for using the emergency buttons on trains).

Why? Simple convenience. They aren’t allowed to do it, but many simply do it anyway. There are no consequences of doing so (aside I suppose from the risk of being run over/colliding with a cycle).

I don’t think believe there’s any kind of offence being committed by simply exiting a passenger vehicle on a public road (in stark contrast to egressing from a train of course).

 

[Bletchleyite]

Why? Simple convenience. They aren’t allowed to do it, but many simply do it anyway. There are no consequences of doing so (aside I suppose from the risk of being run over/colliding with a cycle).

I don’t think believe there’s any kind of offence being committed by simply exiting a passenger vehicle on a public road (in stark contrast to egressing from a train of course).

Which makes a lot of sense as the risks are objectively different.

 

[Busaholic]

I don’t think believe there’s any kind of offence being committed by simply exiting a passenger vehicle on a public road (in stark contrast to egressing from a train of course).

Don't let Priti Patel know that or she'll be on the case immediately.

 

[matt_world2004]

And it happens commonly in London too - at least I do it all the time if I'm on a rear platform bus which is stuck in traffic a bit short of its stop. I see no reason to be imprisoned on a bus, having my journey slowed down. The main problem is that it's not so easy to open the door from the outside if you want to hop on.

It causes the emergency brakes to come, on most models of bus. Sometimes the driver has to restart the ignition to get the door to close properly .wasting the time of other passengers. So it is quite a selfish act.