Saturday bus frequencies often less than Mon-Fri : why?

[nw1]

One thing I've noticed of late is how, on certain routes, the Saturday frequency is actually less than Monday to Friday daytime, off-peak. Examples include the Bluestar routes 2, 11, 12, 16 and 19.

In my experience buses are actually busier on Saturday daytimes, compared to Mon-Fri daytimes, due to weekend shopping; Sat is certainly the busiest day in the city centre.

So why are Sat frequencies often less than Mon-Fri off-peak?

Going back to previous eras, the converse appeared to be true: for example I was looking at some GMPTE bus timetables from the 70s recently and the Sat frequency was similar to Mon-Fri peak, and greater than Mon-Fri off-peak.

 

[Class142sbad]

Also noticed this in Northumberland. The 35 Which links Morpeth, Ashington and Woodhorn runs every 20 Minutes Monday - Friday but only Every 30 Minutes on Saturday. The X21 and X22 Which link Ashington, Bedlington and Newcastle come every 20 Minutes Monday - Friday but only Every 30 Minutes on Saturday. It always looked confusing because Saturday is often busier. 20 Years ago there used to be Saturday only buses that link parts of South Tyneside, Sunderalnd and Durham with Metrocentre. Theses are now gone.

 

[K4016td]

Isn't that the Saturday & Sunday are treated as weekend and that's why they don't run as often?

One other thing I don't understand is why operators insisting on running the route at the same frequency throughout the day, rather than differentiate between morning & afternoon peaks where buses should be running more often (and the case if often they reduce it instead to account for the traffic congestion) and during off peak where there are barely any passengers the frequency should be reduced to reflect the demand.

 

[MotCO]

Is it to reduce the number of drivers who have to work weekends when it may be more difficult to find staff to fill the roster?

 

[Soundwave]

Is it to reduce the number of drivers who have to work weekends when it may be more difficult to find staff to fill the roster?

There is an element of that. However, some operators usually tend to run a reduced frequency before 0900 and then ramp up for shopper time, as they won't need as many early drivers.

 

[hexagon789]

Used to be common in Glasgow with First until COVID. You might have had an up to 10 min Mon-Fri, but every 12-min Sat and every 15 or 20 min Sunday frequency. Now its mostly 15 M-F, 15 Sat and 20 or 30 Sun.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Peak passenger volumes are still weighted Monday to Friday 0700-1000 and 1530-1830, especially where schools traffic is a factor.

Frequencies could be dropped in between those peaks. That would save some fuel and enable planned maintenance, and some do take the opportunity to do just that. However, many operators still have agreements where split shifts or part-time (in that respect) are not permitted or are limited. Therefore, dropping Mon to Fri off-peak frequencies would mean paying for drivers to be unproductive whereas it is probably cost-effective to have similar off-peak frequencies.

Saturday mornings may seem busy but certainly after 1400, travelling figures drop off appreciably (less so on Christmas run up and excluding the impact of sport events like football or rugby matches).

 

[2192]

Do drivers get time-and-a-half for Saturdays, and double time for Sundays? If so, that could lead to management putting on a lower frequency service.

 

[daodao]

Some bus routes now don't run at all on Saturdays, but a regular Mon-Fri service is provided. Examples in Cheshire include:

• D&G 94 Congleton-Biddulph-Newcastle
• D&G 317 Scholar Green-Alsager-Sandbach-Leighton Hospital
• High Peak 394 Glossop-Marple-Stepping Hill Hospital, Stockport

There is less demand for shopping trips to decaying town centres, but work journeys (generally Mon-Fri) may still be made by bus, and are more time-critical.

 

[K4016td]

Peak passenger volumes are still weighted Monday to Friday 0700-1000 and 1530-1830, especially where schools traffic is a factor.

Frequencies could be dropped in between those peaks. That would save some fuel and enable planned maintenance, and some do take the opportunity to do just that. However, many operators still have agreements where split shifts or part-time (in that respect) are not permitted or are limited. Therefore, dropping Mon to Fri off-peak frequencies would mean paying for drivers to be unproductive whereas it is probably cost-effective to have similar off-peak frequencies.

Saturday mornings may seem busy but certainly after 1400, travelling figures drop off appreciably (less so on Christmas run up and excluding the impact of sport events like football or rugby matches).

That's what I was actually thinking, it's all due to internal agreements which just make it easier to run a route every 30 minutes for the whole day - however with a nationwide driver shortage, maybe advertising split shifts with a free 5 hours between the short runs or just morning/afternoon shifts in peaks could appeal to people who have caring responsibilities or don't want to work full time due to retirement or other issues.

 

[Martin1988]

North Yate had a spell of over 2 years without a proper Saturday service between March 2020 when the Saturday journeys on the Y3 were withdrawn at the start of the first lockdown and October 2022 when the Y3 was replaced with the 47.

I personally felt the services from North Yate into Bristol were quiet on a Saturday morning but then passenger usage picked up as the day progressed.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Some bus routes now don't run at all on Saturdays, but a regular Mon-Fri service is provided. Examples in Cheshire include:

• D&G 94 Congleton-Biddulph-Newcastle
• D&G 317 Scholar Green-Alsager-Sandbach-Leighton Hospital
• High Peak 394 Glossop-Marple-Stepping Hill Hospital, Stockport

There is less demand for shopping trips to decaying town centres, but work journeys (generally Mon-Fri) may still be made by bus.

In Somerset and Dorset, there are countless examples of tendered services that only operate on a weekday simply because they have a schools element that dictates a vehicle and driver is available. In North Dorset, there are NO registered bus services on a Sat except those that are tendered by and run in cross border from Wiltshire.

That's what I was actually thinking, it's all due to internal agreements which just make it easier to run a route every 30 minutes for the whole day - however with a nationwide driver shortage, maybe advertising split shifts with a free 5 hours between the short runs or just morning/afternoon shifts in peaks could appeal to people who have caring responsibilities or don't want to work full time due to retirement or other issues.

The concern from unions is that would be a means of getting drivers on the cheap. It was always implacably opposed but actually, there is more latitude nowadays in terms of flexibility in hours. If it suits you to go home for 5 hours, then that's a positive, and I know of some large groups where it has been implemented especially when operating school contracts.

However, how would you feel in your current job if you were brought in for 4 hours, told to go home, and come back for another 4 and you got paid for 8 but for a spread of 13? There is the risk that it could be used to hollow out terms and conditions.

 

[telstarbox]

One thing I've noticed of late is how, on certain routes, the Saturday frequency is actually less than Monday to Friday daytime, off-peak. Examples include the Bluestar routes 2, 11, 12, 16 and 19.

In my experience buses are actually busier on Saturday daytimes, compared to Mon-Fri daytimes, due to weekend shopping; Sat is certainly the busiest day in the city centre.

So why are Sat frequencies often less than Mon-Fri off-peak?

Going back to previous eras, the converse appeared to be true: for example I was looking at some GMPTE bus timetables from the 70s recently and the Sat frequency was similar to Mon-Fri peak, and greater than Mon-Fri off-peak.

Highly loaded buses are exactly what the operator wants, unless they're so full that passengers can't board and pay. No point having 100 passengers across 4 buses when they fit on 3!

 

[K4016td]

The concern from unions is that would be a means of getting drivers on the cheap. It was always implacably opposed but actually, there is more latitude nowadays in terms of flexibility in hours. If it suits you to go home for 5 hours, then that's a positive, and I know of some large groups where it has been implemented especially when operating school contracts.

However, how would you feel in your current job if you were brought in for 4 hours, told to go home, and come back for another 4 and you got paid for 8 but for a spread of 13? There is the risk that it could be used to hollow out terms and conditions.

I see the point here, of course it won't be as desirable, however based on how the things work on the continent this seems to be a norm to have full day shifts and peak only shifts joining in for 5-6 hours a day, spread across morning and afternoon hours, also peak hours is the time where older or more fuel hungry buses are joining in that would otherwise make no economical sense to run, but since they only operate 2-3 journeys before they come back to the depo it's justified

I generally think if the bus company is reasonable, and gives the employees some benefits by not working these couple of hours during the day this might have work well - in the end with current fuel prices, having an employee on a standby, even if that would mean being paid half or full time is still cheaper than running an empty bus across the town. The key would be to balance it out by offering a variety of shifts to the drivers so they don't get bored or fed up with doing same schedule for couple of weeks in a row - at least that what my granddad was telling me, a bus driver with 45 years experience on both city and local routes, towards the end of his career he did school contracts and this seemed to work well for him

 

[Runningaround]

Why are they more frequent between 10am - 4pm than earlier and later when you want to get to and home from work?

 

[nw1]

Why are they more frequent between 10am - 4pm than earlier and later when you want to get to and home from work?

This is (I believe) because they do not wish to use extra vehicles just for the peak, and traffic means that journey times are longer. So a given route might be run by, say, 6 buses, and the round-trip is longer in the peak, so the gaps between services gradually increase.

It would make more sense to employ additional peak-only vehicles (as they evidently did in the past,and still do in some continental countries and large US cities), but sadly, that is nowadays seen as too expensive.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 16 Mar 2023 ==

Peak passenger volumes are still weighted Monday to Friday 0700-1000 and 1530-1830, especially where schools traffic is a factor.

Frequencies could be dropped in between those peaks. That would save some fuel and enable planned maintenance, and some do take the opportunity to do just that. However, many operators still have agreements where split shifts or part-time (in that respect) are not permitted or are limited. Therefore, dropping Mon to Fri off-peak frequencies would mean paying for drivers to be unproductive whereas it is probably cost-effective to have similar off-peak frequencies.

OK, fair enough, thanks for that explanation.

Saturday mornings may seem busy but certainly after 1400, travelling figures drop off appreciably (less so on Christmas run up and excluding the impact of sport events like football or rugby matches).

I'd have expected Saturday midday and pm to be busier than early, as I have found that in Southampton city centre at least (maybe not typical) it's busiest from 1100 onwards and still very busy at 1700. Certainly buses out of town leaving around 1700 are very busy indeed, while those leaving town in the early afternoon are not, especially. The only exception, perhaps, is that brief window in January when it's not Christmas and it still goes dark before 1700.

Again I may not be typical but if I go into large towns for shopping, etc, reasons at the weekend it tends to be the afternoon. Much more relaxing staying in during the morning and going out after lunch, than rushing out first thing!

 

[JKP]

I was once told by a senior bus manager in the south of England that the number of passengers on Saturdays before 11.00 and after 15.00 did not justify the frequency provided between these times but were only run so that the drivers could have a full shift.

In my small town, other than school days, the busiest buses are on Mondays to Fridays between the school peak and Saturday mornings. Buses after 16.00 carry very few passengers. Larger towns are not exempt from this.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 16 Mar 2023 ==

That should read….before 11.00 and after 15.00 did not justify the frequency provided before or after these times…

 

[NorthernSpirit]

I think the reason why certain Saturday services are less frequent than others is demand.

Looking at services 357/360/361/362 Goole to Scunthorpe/Swinefleet in East Yorkshire (prior to the operator change in 2014) saw a 2 hourly service from Goole to Scunthorpe Monday to Friday which interworked with the 362 Swinefleet shorts, some journeys ran via Crowle and were numbered as a 361, some ran via Amcotts but these were mostly served by the 360.

However on Saturdays, all journeys ran as a 357 and ran via Crowle to a non clockface timetable, with departures from Goole at 0830 (to Scunthorpe), 1000 (to Swinefleet), 1145 (to Scunthorpe), 1530 (to Scunthorpe) and 1753 (to Swinefleet). The departures from Swinefleet, Eastoft and Scunthorpe departures were 0815 from Swinefleet, 0915 from Eastoft and 1000, 1315 and 1645 from Scunthorpe.

Sometime between 2010 and 2015, the operator Sweyne Coaches relinquished the Saturday service to Stagecoach who extended the former 0815 Swinefleet to Goole and 1753 Goole to Swinefleet journeys to Scunthorpe, still retaining the non clockface Saturday journeys in the process. Sweyne later axed the 0915 Eastoft to Goole and 1000 Goole to Swinefleet journey leaving Stagecoach to run the four remaining journeys. Then in late 2014 Swyene lost the Monday to Friday tender to East Yorkshire Motor Services who axed the 362 Swinefleet shorts, took on the Saturday service and revised the timetable to such an extent even I cannot reconise it apart from the four Saturday journeys which are still going strong nine years later.

 

[JD2168]

This is particularly prevalent in South Yorkshire mostly at First South Yorkshire, some services even running less frequent after around 4pm, an example of this is the 50/50a in Doncaster. On Monday to Friday it is a 10 minute combined frequency, on Saturday it is every 15 minutes combined until 4pm then it is every 30 minutes combined.

 

[miklcct]

Why are they more frequent between 10am - 4pm than earlier and later when you want to get to and home from work?

I would say this is because the bus companies don't even bother to run services which cater to passengers' need. Normally, a full-day bus needs to be driven by two drivers to cover 18 hours, from 6 am to midnight.

 

[buslad1988]

It really is dependent on area and how attractive/busy the town or city centre is (and evening nightlife). Traditionally Monday to Friday commuters and Saturday leisure shoppers were the core business - school holidays were like Saturdays everyday. Sundays used to have a skeleton service but with more retail opening this has increased over the years.

Not naming any operators but there was one municipal where Saturday passengers had decreased so much they were looking into introducing a weekend timetable whereby Saturday/Sunday timetables were the same. This never happened though.

 

[markymark2000]

It really is dependant on area and how attractive/busy the town or city centre is (and evening nightlife). Traditionally Monday to Friday commuters and Saturday leisure shoppers were the core business - school holidays were like Saturdays everyday. Sundays used to have a skeleton service but with more retail opening this has increased over the years.

I think in some touristy areas, the Saturdays and Sundays are busier than Monday to Friday because of the amount of tourists which head down to try out services.

Sadly, from my experience, even though more retail is opening on Sundays, Sundays still seem to see the bigger cuts. Boxing Day is another interesting one. For many, it's one of the busiest retail days, yet buses run less frequent than a normal Sunday, it makes no sense.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

I see the point here, of course it won't be as desirable, however based on how the things work on the continent this seems to be a norm to have full day shifts and peak only shifts joining in for 5-6 hours a day, spread across morning and afternoon hours, also peak hours is the time where older or more fuel hungry buses are joining in that would otherwise make no economical sense to run, but since they only operate 2-3 journeys before they come back to the depo it's justified

I generally think if the bus company is reasonable, and gives the employees some benefits by not working these couple of hours during the day this might have work well - in the end with current fuel prices, having an employee on a standby, even if that would mean being paid half or full time is still cheaper than running an empty bus across the town. The key would be to balance it out by offering a variety of shifts to the drivers so they don't get bored or fed up with doing same schedule for couple of weeks in a row - at least that what my granddad was telling me, a bus driver with 45 years experience on both city and local routes, towards the end of his career he did school contracts and this seemed to work well for him

My father was a driver and trade union rep for nearly 40 years. He could take the loss of paid breaks etc and the deterioration in terms and conditions but split shifts was always the most emotive factor with him and his colleagues.

Bus companies are now being more flexible with work patterns, and indeed, I know of situations where there is a "Dads Army" of semi-retired drivers who basically don't mind doing schools work - they do 35 weeks a year, a couple of hours at the start and finish of the day, and in the middle, they are quite happy to have a card school going in the canteen etc. There are also part-time arrangements where drivers come in to do evening shorts between 1900 and 2400, or are happy to do standard shifts but only working 3 days a week.

Forgive me for being a bit challenging (and really, I'm not being provocative or objectionable about it) but what are these "some benefits" that drivers will receive for not working during the day? How will you sell this to the 30 year old driver who is doing a day with a 13 hour spread; how much will you pay him/her?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 17 Mar 2023 ==

Sadly, from my experience, even though more retail is opening on Sundays, Sundays still seem to see the bigger cuts. Boxing Day is another interesting one. For many, it's one of the busiest retail days, yet buses run less frequent than a normal Sunday, it makes no sense.

Given that in many firms, Christmas Day/Boxing Day/New Years Day attracts a higher pay increment (double time and a day in lieu?) and so direct operating costs are much higher, then it does make sense.

 

[K4016td]

Forgive me for being a bit challenging (and really, I'm not being provocative or objectionable about it) but what are these "some benefits" that drivers will receive for not working during the day? How will you sell this to the 30 year old driver who is doing a day with a 13 hour spread; how much will you pay him/her?

Well, it may not fit the market nature of the provincial operations in the UK, but during my granddad times (he worked in Poland where majority of bus operators are still municipal), they always had couple of ''reserve duties'' during the day with being in the depot on hold, just in case there were major delays on any route, or if one of the buses had broken down, the dispatcher could always send these reserve buses instead to join in to the route as and when needed with these drivers waiting just for this purpose. If you didn't have to go out on road on that day, they paid you half-time and when you left the depot, this was fully paid as a normal duty.

The other way they've done it for drivers with these peak hours, was being paid half-time for the hours they didn't drive and you could just be waiting in a social room in the depot with other drivers to join in to the traffic again in the afternoon, or you were free to go to the swimming pool, gym or cinema during these 4-5 hours in between, as the company had often given out vouchers to be used by the drivers - of course they tried to rotate as many people as possible on this type of shifts, so you may have end up with one or maximum two shifts like that during the week and everyone seemed to accept the way things worked. Well - if you look in the timetables in my hometown, you can see that still is the case with the buses running with different frequencies throughout the day according to the demand.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Well, it may not fit the market nature of the provincial operations in the UK, but during my granddad times (he worked in Poland where majority of bus operators are still municipal), they always had couple of ''reserve duties'' during the day with being in the depo on hold, just in case there were major delays on any route, or if one of the buses had broken down, the dispatcher could always send these reserve buses instead to join in to the route as and when needed with these drivers waiting just for this purpose. If you didn't have to go out on road on that day, they paid you half-time and when you left the depo, this was fully paid as a normal duty.

The other way they've done it for drivers with these peak hours, was being paid half-time for the hours they didn't drive and you could just be waiting in a social room in the depo with other drivers to join in to the traffic again in the afternoon, or you were free to go to the swimming pool, gym or cinema during these 4-5 hours in between, as the company had often given out vouchers to be used by the drivers - of course they tried to rotate as many people as possible on this type of shifts, so you may have end up with one or maximum two shifts like that during the week and everyone seemed to accept the way things worked. Well - if you look in the timetables in my hometown, you can see that still is the case with the buses running with different frequencies throughout the day according to the demand.

Remember that in the UK, bus companies are commercial businesses except London. You don't generally have staff waiting around for a duty, even on half pay, waiting for work.

Even in London, cost-down pressure means that they have stripped back non-productive hours both from drivers but, more especially, support staff. In fact, one of the major aims of deregulation was to remove the inefficiencies. Instead, it's about having resources (staff and vehicles) being utilised as much as possible. If you have drivers and vehicles spare and there is sufficient daytime trade to more than cover the marginal running costs (fuel, tyres, etc) then firms will operate as they are getting a contribution to fixed costs. That's transport business economics!

With schools transport, it makes more sense. You have a requirement that only exists for 35 weeks or so a year and a limited working day, and often elderly vehicles. Part-time working is an accepted way of working in these circumstances.

What you often have now is traffic congestion impacting peak frequencies so that a service that is operated by 4 vehicles on a 15 min headway off-peak can't be done in peak without additional resources so instead those same four vehicles operate every 20 mins in peak.

 

[Typhoon]

One car households don't need the bus at the weekend?

 

[K4016td]

Remember that in the UK, bus companies are commercial businesses except London. You don't generally have staff waiting around for a duty, even on half pay, waiting for work.

Even in London, cost-down pressure means that they have stripped back non-productive hours both from drivers but, more especially, support staff. In fact, one of the major aims of deregulation was to remove the inefficiencies. Instead, it's about having resources (staff and vehicles) being utilised as much as possible. If you have drivers and vehicles spare and there is sufficient daytime trade to more than cover the marginal running costs (fuel, tyres, etc) then firms will operate as they are getting a contribution to fixed costs. That's transport business economics!

With schools transport, it makes more sense. You have a requirement that only exists for 35 weeks or so a year and a limited working day, and often elderly vehicles. Part-time working is an accepted way of working in these circumstances.

What you often have now is traffic congestion impacting peak frequencies so that a service that is operated by 4 vehicles on a 15 min headway off-peak can't be done in peak without additional resources so instead those same four vehicles operate every 20 mins in peak.

I seemed to notice that over last 15 years in the UK, sadly the commercial side of things made me ditch public transport for good, due to being focused on profit, rather than service to the passengers that just become too unreliable to rely on it, I only feel sorry for these who don't have a choice and are forced to use it. Although there are some positives recently - especially I am a fan of keeping singles at £2 for as long as possible, only if the level of service would be a bit better and operators had integrated their day and season tickets in larger towns - but's that's just goldfish wishes to make life easier.

Back to this frequency question, I feel like this is an everlasting outcome of whether we should treat bus companies and generally public transport as a service or a commercial for-profit enterprise. I am a fan of the first approach and will generally lean towards subsidising unprofitable journeys from the councils budget, just in a similar way we subsidise education, healthcare or social care. London example its quite unique, not only due to the way buses are run by the TfL, but also due to the fact that owning a car in the capital isn't a necessity, especially with enormous traffic, limited parking, costs of parking and many other restrictions placed on the drivers. Even myself, when I go to London I never use a car, because the public transport is so good and can be trusted to get me to where I need quicker than driving.

 

[Dai Corner]

I seemed to notice that over last 15 years in the UK, sadly the commercial side of things made me ditch public transport for good, due to being focused on profit, rather than service to the passengers that just become too unreliable to rely on it, I only feel sorry for these who don't have a choice and are forced to use it. Although there are some positives recently - especially I am a fan of keeping singles at £2 for as long as possible, only if the level of service would be a bit better and operators had integrated their day and season tickets in larger towns - but's that's just goldfish wishes to make life easier.

Back to this frequency question, I feel like this is an everlasting outcome of whether we should treat bus companies and generally public transport as a service or a commercial for-profit enterprise. I am a fan of the first approach and will generally lean towards subsidising unprofitable journeys from the councils budget, just in a similar way we subsidise education, healthcare or social care. London example its quite unique, not only due to the way buses are run by the TfL, but also due to the fact that owning a car in the capital isn't a necessity, especially with enormous traffic, limited parking, costs of parking and many other restrictions placed on the drivers. Even myself, when I go to London I never use a car, because the public transport is so good and can be trusted to get me to where I need quicker than driving.

I don't know about Slough, but here in Newport the commercial Stagecoach services are at least as good as the local municipal operator's.

 

[K4016td]

Slough over the last couple of years went downhill in so many aspects - I recently described that in the the First Berkshire thread. Before the price-cap single ticket costed as much as £4.00 for a 2-3 mile journey down the road and the level of service was just pathetic, with daily cancellations and reducing major trunk routes to half hourly or even hourly frequencies. In a town of a size of Slough that's just unforgivable, bearing in mind the prices they charge.

 

[nw1]

I think @K4016td has made a good point. Public transport, particularly buses, in the UK is no longer demand-driven, but costs-driven. Consequently there is much less in the way of peak enhancement than there used to be, because it costs money; indeed, it costs money even to maintain the off-peak frequency on the buses, due to congestion leading to longer round-trips, so to maintain the off-peak, extra buses need to be drafted in. So we end up with this rather illogical pattern of less-frequent peak services. 20 mins in the peak vice 15 in off-peak is one example I've noted.

This does seem to differ from some other countries. In some continental countries, and notably (for a generally non-PT-friendly country) large US cities, you still (at least within the last 10 years or so) see peak enhancements, and buses do come out of the depot to work peak extras.

I do wonder, however, why vehicles used on school runs between say 1500-1630 cannot then be employed on evening work peak services, working out of cities around 1700 and enhancing the frequency. In the morning this is obviously not possible (as school and work peaks coincide) but in the afternoon/evening, the work peak is perhaps 90 mins after the school peak, enough, theoretically, for a bus to work a school journey then a peak extra.

Not sure what the situation is in the larger UK cities, with some form of PTE or equivalent, such as London and Manchester. Do they still do peak enhancements?