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Just spotted that Stagecoach have introduced a new half hourly (hourly evenings & Sundays) route from Skelmersdale to Kirkby station. The route is branded as ‘Train Link’
Does anyone know if:
The route is commercially provided
Are there through bus/rail tickets available
Are PlusBus tickets valid
Are Merseytravel Saveaway and season tickets valid
Presumably Merseyside issued ENCTS are valid on train and bus but can ENCTS issued to West Lancashire (Skelmersdale) residents use the train as well as the bus?
Overall seems a long overdue initiative, but without integrated ticketing then how successful will it be?
Lancashire County Council have played a role in arranging the service I believe. They have received funding under a successful Bus Service Improvement Plan bid recently although I don't know if that funding has been able to contribute to this service. It is intended to connect with Merseyrail trains from the new Headbolt Lane station which hopefully will shave a few further minutes off journey times when it opens.
Links between train and bus are not available at Kirkby using Liverpool Plusbus, and Skelmersdale is a way outside of the validity area for it anyway so I don't think it's relevant. A through rail fare may have been arranged, or will be soon, but if that's the case I'm not aware of it.
Indeed - traditionally I think that far more people who use public transport end-to-end between Skelmersdale and Liverpool changed at Ormskirk, presumably because the bus service was rather better to there. However the journey times are very poor indeed changing to trains either in Wigan or Ormskirk and frequency is too low to use the Northern services which aren't reliable enough for connecting like that every day anyway.
One wonders if this would have been proposed at all if it weren't for Headbolt Lane having some new dedicated bus stops? Quite why a dedicated TrainLink stop couldn't be put in at Maghull North, I don't know.
The timetable leaflet (click here) has on the rear “in partnership with Lancashire County Council” and “funded by UK Government”. Regarding fares, it lists those for the route and other Stagecoach services but when it comes to bus and train it simply says “buy train tickets separately at the stations or on mobile rail apps”.
The timetable leaflet (click here) has on the rear “in partnership with Lancashire County Council” and “funded by UK Government”. Regarding fares, it lists those for the route and other Stagecoach services but when it comes to bus and train it simply says “buy train tickets separately at the stations or on mobile rail apps”.
Great to see that the bus runs in the evening, not so sure I fancy waiting outside Kirkby rail station for 16 minutes waiting for the ‘connecting’ bus after 8pm at night though…!
The lack of any through ticketing will kill it and no doubt the service will be canned when the funding runs out.
I went on the 319 last week, & it's doesn't stop inside the station itself, but stops on the main roads instead, which rather defeats the point of the service as a raillink bus service, the start & terminus in Kirkby is the Civic Centre bus station.
I went on the 319 last week, & it's doesn't stop inside the station itself, but stops on the main roads instead, which rather defeats the point of the service as a raillink bus service, the start & terminus in Kirkby is the Civic Centre bus station.
It does feel like a classic British half job, doesn't it? It indeed seems to use the stops half way up the road when there's one right in front of the station. Ridiculous.
Were it in the land of Wurst und Bier, it'd be through ticketed and serve the station directly. And probably Maghull North, not Kirkby!
It does feel like a classic British half job, doesn't it? It indeed seems to use the stops half way up the road when there's one right in front of the station. Ridiculous.
Were it in the land of Wurst und Bier, it'd be through ticketed and serve the station directly. And probably Maghull North, not Kirkby!
It will probably serve the station directly at Headbolt Lane. Merseytravel could put in a dedicated stop at Maghull North but they'd be sacrificing some car parking spaces to create it - not really a problem in my view but they can get fussy about such things.
It will probably serve the station directly at Headbolt Lane. Merseytravel could put in a dedicated stop at Maghull North but they'd be sacrificing some car parking spaces to create it - not really a problem in my view but they can get fussy about such things.
I could have sworn it was meant to have one as built, but you're right it doesn't. This could well be the reason why it doesn't go there. What a poor piece of (dis)integration.
I could have sworn it was meant to have one as built, but you're right it doesn't. This could well be the reason why it doesn't go there. What a poor piece of (dis)integration.
I went on the 319 last week, & it's doesn't stop inside the station itself, but stops on the main roads instead, which rather defeats the point of the service as a raillink bus service, the start & terminus in Kirkby is the Civic Centre bus station.
Are there any issues with full size buses using the stop in the car park? A bit of googling suggests the 97 and 133 which use it might both be run with Solos.
The council and Stagecoach probably prefer the bus station as the terminus because it means passengers can use the service to get to the town centre, I'm guessing there are probably staff facilities there and you wouldn't save a vehicle by turning round at the rail station.
And given it is running to the bus station, the turnarounds are quite tight, so the extra time needed to go round the station car park might not be acceptable without making savings elsewhere - e.g. cutting out some of the stops in Skem.
And given it is running to the bus station, the turnarounds are quite tight, so the extra time needed to go round the station car park might not be acceptable without making savings elsewhere - e.g. cutting out some of the stops in Skem.
If the turnarounds are quite tight, it won't be punctual, and if it's not punctual it'll break the connections, and if it breaks the connections people won't use it.
I utterly, utterly despair. I give it a year or two at most.
Are there any issues with full size buses using the stop in the car park? A bit of googling suggests the 97 and 133 which use it might both be run with Solos.
Yes. This is the exact issue. Only solos can really use the station because even though some of the turns are ok for larger buses, because it's also used as a free for all for taxis and cars picking up/dropping off, you'd struggle to get the full size buses through. In addition to that, you would have almost no chance getting a full size to turn left out of the train station.
The council and Stagecoach probably prefer the bus station as the terminus because it means passengers can use the service to get to the town centre, I'm guessing there are probably staff facilities there and you wouldn't save a vehicle by turning round at the rail station.
Extending to Kirkby Civic Centre offers far more onward connections than the train station does. While there aren't really staff facilities as such in Kirkby, that is where driver changeovers happen. It gives shopping links both ways for people and of course provides links (via connections onto other bus routes) to Kirkby Admin Industrial Estate. Skelmersdale is statistically a deprived area with poor transport links and so extending into Kirkby Town Centre means people can access more jobs using public transport (directly using the 319 or using connecting buses to Kirkby Admin for example)
And given it is running to the bus station, the turnarounds are quite tight, so the extra time needed to go round the station car park might not be acceptable without making savings elsewhere - e.g. cutting out some of the stops in Skem.
And let's be honest, it doesn't serve much of Skem as it is. Seems a bit daft having a rail link bus which hardly serves any of the town and you can't connect really to/from other buses easily because the contract was given to a firm who don't operate any other buses within Skem. It doesn't even serve Old Skelmersdale War Memorial which would be a tiny time penalty but expand the catchment area of the route. Really poor route in my opinion when it comes to serving Skelmerdale, it may as well have ran none stop from Skem Concourse to Kirkby as it's as good as useless for the residential areas. That is unless someone is going to link up the 319 with one of the Skem tenders to make it more worthwhile (such as have the 312/313 run as they did a few years ago prior to Arriva dropping the Skem local 313 and then have the 319 extend around Ashurst instead to make the routes much more useful and give a bit more layover to play with and give more through links for passengers.
Extending to Kirkby Civic Centre offers far more onward connections than the train station does. While there aren't really staff facilities as such in Kirkby, that is where driver changeovers happen. It gives shopping links both ways for people
There's a shopping centre in Skelmersdale (Skem). People don't, by and large, go from Skem to Kirkby to shop - one doesn't really offer anything the other doesn't.
There may be a bit of traffic for employment, e.g. to the Co-op Bank in Skem or formerly the Barclaycard offices in Skem, but it's probably minimal.
I doubt many other onward connections would be massively attractive. For Wigan there's a direct bus service which would be quicker than going to Kirkby/Headbolt Lane and onward by train.
and of course provides links (via connections onto other bus routes) to Kirkby Admin Industrial Estate. Skelmersdale is statistically a deprived area with poor transport links and so extending into Kirkby Town Centre means people can access more jobs using public transport (directly using the 319 or using connecting buses to Kirkby Admin for example)
I think the traffic for this will be tiny. Skem has a decent amount of industrial and retail employment. While it's structurally a bit different, the two are very similar places.
And let's be honest, it doesn't serve much of Skem as it is. Seems a bit daft having a rail link bus which hardly serves any of the town and you can't connect really to/from other buses easily because the contract was given to a firm who don't operate any other buses within Skem. It doesn't even serve Old Skelmersdale War Memorial which would be a tiny time penalty but expand the catchment area of the route. Really poor route in my opinion when it comes to serving Skelmerdale, it may as well have ran none stop from Skem Concourse to Kirkby as it's as good as useless for the residential areas. That is unless someone is going to link up the 319 with one of the Skem tenders to make it more worthwhile (such as have the 312/313 run as they did a few years ago prior to Arriva dropping the Skem local 313 and then have the 319 extend around Ashurst instead to make the routes much more useful and give a bit more layover to play with and give more through links for passengers.
If I was doing it I'd run a figure 8 of the estates, then to the Concourse, then fastest route to Maghull North via the M58. Or perhaps two routes with an eastern and western loop.
Extending to Kirkby Civic Centre offers far more onward connections than the train station does. While there aren't really staff facilities as such in Kirkby, that is where driver changeovers happen. It gives shopping links both ways for people and of course provides links (via connections onto other bus routes) to Kirkby Admin Industrial Estate. Skelmersdale is statistically a deprived area with poor transport links and so extending into Kirkby Town Centre means people can access more jobs using public transport (directly using the 319 or using connecting buses to Kirkby Admin for example)
There's a shopping centre in Skelmersdale (Skem). People don't, by and large, go from Skem to Kirkby to shop - one doesn't really offer anything the other doesn't.
There may be a bit of traffic for employment, e.g. to the Co-op Bank in Skem or formerly the Barclaycard offices in Skem, but it's probably minimal.
I doubt many other onward connections would be massively attractive. For Wigan there's a direct bus service which would be quicker than going to Kirkby/Headbolt Lane and onward by train.
Oldies will go anywhere that there is a bus so the lack of bus link to Kirkby may be holding back some of the demand.
One interesting thing that I've just remembered is that the college in Skem runs a bus to Kirkby for students so there is some education demand. Again, not massive but there is some demand. Add up the little bits of demand from the various areas (education, work and retail), you've likely got a good enough reason to extend to Kirkby Bus Station rather than terminating at the rail station. That's before you look into the operational benefits of it for Stagecoach who centre a lot of their network on Kirkby Civic Centre and the connections which can be made there.
I think the traffic for this will be tiny. Skem has a decent amount of industrial and retail employment. While it's structurally a bit different, the two are very similar places.
Down side of Skem industrial employment though, there is no transport to it. Kirkby is relatively well linked by public transport. The numbers making that journey may not be in their thousands but there will be some people doing it.
If I was doing it I'd run a figure 8 of the estates, then to the Concourse, then fastest route to Maghull North via the M58. Or perhaps two routes with an eastern and western loop.
It needs to serve more estates, the areas it currently serves are minimal.
As for Maghull North, there's a few points. Firstly, it wouldn't be much quicker anyway given the bus will be quicker but the train would be longer so it would be about the same journey time. Secondly, I think the original aim was for the 319 to stop in Kirkby Rail Station, not outside. It was only later on they realised that it wasn't going to happen. Thirdly, why generate links that way when this is already possible by using the 310, 375 and 385, 5 buses per hour linking Skem to Ormskirk and then change onto the train. Finally, with the rail link constantly being proposed and one day, maybe it will happen, the rail link will go to Kirkby. It therefore makes sense to build up usage of people travelling Skem - Kirkby line trains as it would make a greater case for the rail link and if/when the rail link comes about, it builds upon the 319. People may start working at Fazakerley Hospital for example and use the 319 and train or bus to Fazakerley Hospital. In which case, when the rail link comes about, it makes these peoples journey better.
Going to Maghull North, if you look at it as linear as 'Link Skem to the closest train station and ignore everything else', yes Maghull North is a great idea. If you start looking at it logically though and consider why they may want the bus to go to Kirkby, it makes much more sense to go to Kirkby.
It does feel like a classic British half job, doesn't it? It indeed seems to use the stops half way up the road when there's one right in front of the station. Ridiculous.
Were it in the land of Wurst und Bier, it'd be through ticketed and serve the station directly. And probably Maghull North, not Kirkby!
It is like a parody bus route. It is as if they read the flame wars on RailUK and went out to deliberately prove that the UK can't do integration, in the process vindicating those who don't see integration as being important. Even calling something a 'train link' is a kind of a joke. You don't need to brand something a 'train link' in Switzerland, as buses tend to do that by default anyway.
The timetable maybe quite tight, 4 minute layover at both ends, but it's doable, when i went on it the bus arrived at Skelmersdale early, it goes down the M58 which is one of the quietest Motorways in the UK, the only issues when i went on it were roadworks with temporary traffic lights, but wasn't late arriving in Kirkby.
I think the internal road at Kirkby Station is a bit too tight for long buses, 319 uses E300, other routes stop inside Kirkby Station, but E200s are used on the 133, & Stagecoach use Solo's on the local Kirkby service.
If the turnarounds are quite tight, it won't be punctual, and if it's not punctual it'll break the connections, and if it breaks the connections people won't use it.
I utterly, utterly despair. I give it a year or two at most.
Even if it's on time, there's several one minute connections between bus and train (including at peak hours). They don't look like a good thing to recommend to people.
Conversely, the 32 minute connection on every trip from Liverpool on a Sunday (of the total 56 minutes end to end) isn't going to persuade anyone out of their cars.
Even if it's on time, there's several one minute connections between bus and train (including at peak hours). They don't look like a good think to recommend to people.
You are right it isn't hard. But somebody has to sign off the cost for the extra bus....
Alternatively, why not allow for some flexibility with the railway timetable? After all, it's on its on a bespoke, self contained network. No doubt somebody will talk about "paths"
You are right it isn't hard. But somebody has to sign off the cost for the extra bus....
Alternatively, why not allow for some flexibility with the railway timetable? After all, it's on its on a bespoke, self contained network. No doubt somebody will talk about "paths"
I'd be interested to hear how you'd prefer this to work. The bus circuits by their nature need to be given different times at different times of day. If the bus company planner doesn't do this, none of the bus services will have a hope of running reliably. The train circuits however are able to run their peak service most of the day because it's not as variable. The only obvious ways to square this circle to me are either to accept that the service won't be able to make reliable connections at peak times, and may have difficulty at any time of day, or to put out an additional vehicle and driver at peak times to run more services which keep the connections.
The only other realistic option would be a dedicated busway or tramway, but that would cost almost as much as extending the railway to Skem.
I'd be interested to hear how you'd prefer this to work. The bus circuits by their nature need to be given different times at different times of day. If the bus company planner doesn't do this, none of the bus services will have a hope of running reliably. The train circuits however are able to run their peak service most of the day because it's not as variable. The only obvious ways to square this circle to me are either to accept that the service won't be able to make reliable connections at peak times, and may have difficulty at any time of day, or to put out an additional vehicle and driver at peak times to run more services which keep the connections.
The only other realistic option would be a dedicated busway, but that would cost almost as much as extending the railway to Skem.
I'd suggest listening to the latest podcast by former TfL director of Land Transport Leon Davis where he discusses integration with Roger Davies. Leon explains in detail why integration doesn't really work and what people think it means compared with what it actually means.
You are right it isn't hard. But somebody has to sign off the cost for the extra bus....
Alternatively, why not allow for some flexibility with the railway timetable? After all, it's on its on a bespoke, self contained network. No doubt somebody will talk about "paths"
Because it's a metro that runs an all day, memorable clockface timetable, which is how it's meant to be done on this sort of railway. I don't entirely understand the first train being off pattern by one minute; the last train being off by 10 is irrelevant as the bus doesn't connect to it, absolutely everything else is on-pattern. Also, the bus is secondary to the train; most passengers won't come from Skelmersdale.
If the road into Kirkby has congestion, the answer is to run to Maghull North instead, as there is no road on that route that would have any congestion at all - Skem doesn't, and the M58 is massively overspecced, a single carriageway road would easily carry all its traffic at peak times, and were it built now it'd probably be a dualled regular road like Milton Keynes' A5 diversionary route. While there isn't a stop at the station, Maghull North has stops on the road outside which are no further from it than the ones being used at Kirkby.
Another option would be not to run every peak bus to the Civic Centre. Is this a rail link, or is it not? It being two things makes it do neither well.
Having said that, the maximum running time seems to be 29 minutes, with the normal one being 26. If layovers were adequate then that'd not be a problem (you'd just have the peak ones leave the Concourse a bit earlier than normal, because the train is the fixed thing). As such I think it is fairly clear that the problem is that it needs one more vehicle all day than it has. Or, again, if you didn't run to the Civic Centre or ran to Maghull North then you'd not need it.
If the bus is slowed by increased use causing increased times taking fares, we've had enough debates on how that is fixed everywhere bar the UK (and in London). The timetable is NOT the way to fix that. In a sensible world, Merseytravel passes and tap-in, tap out contactless (or even flat fare*) would be accepted and so almost nobody would pay on the bus.
Another thing to look at is again "what is it for?" in rail terms. Wigan is irrelevant, there's a direct bus from Skelmersdale to Wigan twice an hour which is quicker than going down to Kirkby then across, and that can be used to connect to Manchester too via a far more frequent rail service than the very unattractive one from Kirkby, which is slow, infrequent and has no evening service. Thus, your primary purpose in the morning peak is connecting to Merseyrail to Liverpool, something the existing bus service provides for very poorly. As such you want to time your morning peak journeys to connect well with those trains, you don't have to overly worry about others. The route won't be used significantly for inbound commuting to Skelmersdale, that near enough all goes by car to the southern industrial estates, and the sort of jobs where people aren't paid enough to own a car (i.e. the minimum wage retail) is available in Liverpool and Kirkby so the commute won't be worthwhile financially. Is there enough commuting to the Co-op Bank site, the one source of skilled employment it does serve, to be worth not prioritising the connections to Liverpool? The rest of the skilled work that will have significant inbound commuters is in the southern industrial estates it doesn't go anywhere near (e.g. Pimbo).
* Remember it's a rail link. If that means it overcharges people a bit for an internal Skelmersdale journey then that's not important. It isn't for that purpose anyway.
If the bus company planner doesn't do this, none of the bus services will have a hope of running reliably. The train circuits however are able to run their peak service most of the day because it's not as variable. The only obvious ways to square this circle to me are either to accept that the service won't be able to make reliable connections at peak times
Given that the whole point of this service is connections, that's untenable. It MUST be punctual, and it MUST, bar serious incidents like car crashes closing roads, ALWAYS make the connections.
If it doesn't, it is worse than valueless because it discredits public transport by failing to deliver what it's intended for.
Or don't run to the Civic Centre at peak time with every bus - run say half of them there and turn the others nearer to the station. It's either a rail link, in which case the whole concept is driven around quality connections, or it isn't, in which case it can do what it likes but it shouldn't be using the branding it is. If Lancashire County Council want to tender a regular, non-integrated bus from Skelmersdale to Kirkby it should just do that.
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I'd suggest listening to the latest podcast by former TfL director of Land Transport Leon Davis where he discusses integration with Roger Davies. Leon explains in detail why integration doesn't really work and what people think it means compared with what it actually means.
It's very clear that it does work in those countries that do it properly. A trip to a German city or Switzerland makes that clear.
Anyone who says it doesn't themselves understand. I'll not go into detail as there's a thread on the general matter already, but there are countries that do do it very effectively.
The primary problem with this service is that it's underresourced for what is being operated. It either needs to (a) run to Maghull North instead, a route that is entirely uncongested at all times of day, or (b) add an extra bus all day (4 minutes are not enough layover for a route taking about half an hour, one unexpected stop at a set of traffic lights, the driver running to the loo, or being stuck behind a cyclist for a short while will eat that) , or (c) truncate some or all of the peak services at the station and not run to the Civic Centre to add more peak layover and serve the primary market, or (d) accept that rail is not in fact the primary market and remove the rather misleading branding.
I'd suggest listening to the latest podcast by former TfL director of Land Transport Leon Davis where he discusses integration with Roger Davies. Leon explains in detail why integration doesn't really work and what people think it means compared with what it actually means.
One more option 5: if the Civic Centre is that crucial, reduce the peak services to be less frequent. One option might be "flighting" - noting that peak passengers in both directions won't be at the same times (to be at your desk/in your shop by 9 in Liverpool you're going to want a train around 0800) you may want to drop a round trip and run both vehicles to connect to two key peak trains 15 or 30 minutes apart. Another might be to reduce peak frequency to every 45 or even hourly, with again very careful selection of which trains it connects with. One aspect of the peak in Liverpool is that it's very narrow - basically it's the two trains that arrive at Liverpool around 0830 and 0845, and the three departing it around 1715, 1730 and 1745 (the evening being a bit more spread as some people work 9-5 with a shorter lunch and some 9-5:30 with a longer one). It isn't really the proverbial rocket science to work out which ones are key - I'm sure Merseyrail would tell them which the busiest ones are.
There will be similar timings for jobs at the Civic Centre and Skelmersdale too. (The factories work different shifts but these are irrelevant as it goes nowhere near them).
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Even if it's on time, there's several one minute connections between bus and train (including at peak hours). They don't look like a good thing to recommend to people.
Conversely, the 32 minute connection on every trip from Liverpool on a Sunday (of the total 56 minutes end to end) isn't going to persuade anyone out of their cars.
I think you're looking at the times at the bus station for the one minute connections. There is a two minute connection advertised on Saturday mornings, but other than that everything seems to be at least 5 minutes. Though whether that's enough, especially for people who need to buy a ticket at the station, is another matter - but then if you make the connections too long the journey ends up being too slow.
Connections on Sundays are 14/15 minutes.
On the discussion about turnaround time, some peak services do have longer, and the peak service is already reduced with 35-40 minute gaps to accommodate longer running times.
I think you're looking at the times at the bus station for the one minute connections. There is a two minute connection advertised on Saturday mornings, but other than that everything seems to be at least 5 minutes. Though whether that's enough, especially for people who need to buy a ticket at the station, is another matter - but then if you make the connections too long the journey ends up being too slow.
It's an interesting point. 5 would be spot on if the bus served the station front and people already had tickets or could use contactless. If a whole bus is going to have to queue at one booking office window and buy a ticket having had to walk from up the road, then you probably want 10, but ideally 5 from the arrivals because there isn't the same issue - people will have return tickets. Obviously you can only sort-of get that due to the times not matching up.
On the discussion about turnaround time, some peak services do have longer, and the peak service is already reduced with 35-40 minute gaps to accommodate longer running times.
That doesn't align with trains, which is the whole point of it. The intervals that you can reduce to are either 45 or 60 minutes on the 4tph service, or you can, as I note above, consider "flighting" of services in the primary direction (morning away from Skelmersdale, evening towards it) to maintain the half hourly service in that direction during the main peak at the expense of a gap later to run the buses back into place for an all day half hourly service.
So I ask again - is it a rail link or not? The thing that's preventing setting optimal times at the station (which is much easier at a terminus) is running to the Civic Centre - if it's a rail link, that is the problem, if it's not a rail link and is more about being a Skem-Kirkby bus, then get rid of the branding and be honest.
I agree. It's also spending the Council's scarce resources, and the BSIP grant they've received, on something which is likely to be very poor value for money. They could have just spent the money on an extra circuit in the Skem locals and would have probably got better value.
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