Should Saturday Timetables Be Different To Monday-Friday?

[Dai Corner]

There is some discussion in the Newport Transport thread which I think may be of wider interest.

Saturday service can be reduced in a logical way, such as a few 'NS' (Not Saturday) trips. You don't rewrite a whole timetable. Essentially, try not to make huge cuts to Saturdays, if you must, do it in a way that is still passenger friendly and doesn't make a complete mess for passengers.

Back in the days of manual scheduling it must have been easier to take the M-F plan and delete early morning and peak trips but in these days of detailed ridership data and computers is it a good idea to produce a different Saturday timetable? Are passengers confused by different timetables on Saturdays as well as Sundays?

 

[Leedsbusman]

There is some discussion in the Newport Transport thread which I think may be of wider interest.


Back in the days of manual scheduling it must have been easier to take the M-F plan and delete early morning and peak trips but in these days of detailed ridership data and computers is it a good idea to produce a different Saturday timetable? Are passengers confused by different timetables on Saturdays as well as Sundays?

As with most such topics the answer is ‘it depends’.

Some services need less running times on a Saturday compared to Mon- Fri peak hours.

Some services are quieter on Saturdays v Mon- Fri compared to others so may merit a lower frequency

Less common but some may serve an employment area not required at weekends.

 

[Teapot42]

I think it probably depends on area, but personally I think we are closer to the point where a M-F and Sat/Sun timetable makes more sense.

Traffic flows are a lot different on Saturday to weekdays, and road traffic tends to be worse as well meaning more chance of delays. In addition, during the summer there is a large flow to attractions which often isn't catered for at all, but even during the winter plenty of people want to get out of town at the weekend but are poorly served by buses mainly laid on to meet basic requirements of a service to rural villages.

The only differences between Saturdays and Sundays is that Sunday Trading rules mean things start a little later and end sooner, but traffic volumes are as high if not higher than Saturday, but often buses are much less frequent.

 

[GusB]

Back in the days of manual scheduling it must have been easier to take the M-F plan and delete early morning and peak trips but in these days of detailed ridership data and computers is it a good idea to produce a different Saturday timetable? Are passengers confused by different timetables on Saturdays as well as Sundays?

That's more or less what used to happen on my local route. The Mon - Fri timetable was almost identical, but the 07.xx departure was missing from the Saturday timetable, presumably because the weekday early run was council-funded that the funding didn't extend to a Saturday.

The only other exception was that during the afternoon between 13.00 and 17.00, buses ran half-hourly in order to deal with additional people going shopping. The Saturday extras eventually disappeared.

More recently, after later evening service were dropped completely, they re-introduced a departure around 21.40; useless for someone finishing work at 22.00, and too early for someone going out for a pint. Almost designed to fail, one might say!

 

[Statto]

In some areas before 9am Saturday timetables & frequencies are different to Monday to Friday when roads are lighter & so are loadings [they are on some routes in my area Merseyside], traffic can be worse from mid morning particularly in tourist areas.

 

[WibbleWobble]

Timetables on Saturdays may differ due to the differing flows of traffic in the middle of the day. Take Bluestar for example, some routes need longer than their weekday counterparts due to the combination of shopping, football and cruise ship traffic, not helped by the football ground being almost slap bang in the centre of Southampton.

 

[StretfordEnd96]

They certainly differ with my local service, 350 Ashton to Oldham

Mon-Fri - 4 buses an hour, 2 terminate near Mossley (part route) and 2 carry on to Oldham

Saturday - just the 2 buses an hour to Oldham

So less buses on Saturday than Mon-Fri

 

[Megafuss]

Depends on the area really. What I would say is that those places which have a relatively decent retail offering but not much night life probably do need a thinner timetable on a Saturday, certainly after around 15:00 compared to a weekday.

 

[stevieinselby]

The only differences between Saturdays and Sundays is that Sunday Trading rules mean things start a little later and end sooner, but traffic volumes are as high if not higher than Saturday, but often buses are much less frequent.

That very much depends on where you are. A lot of small towns are dead on a Sunday ... just about the only places open here are the supermarkets, but all of the local shops and even some chain shops like Boots are closed, so there's minimal traffic into the town on a Sunday.

Another small town nearby recently lost its hourly Sunday service to York but retains two services both running hourly Monday to Saturday on a commercial basis – the bus company obviously saw much lower volumes of traffic on Sunday compared to Saturday or they wouldn't have withdrawn the service.

 

[Roger1973]

Would agree with 'it depends'

Most routes won't have the same morning and early evening commuter passengers and accompanying peak traffic, or the schools passengers and accompanying school run traffic on Saturdays. Peak traffic congestion (and therefore bus running time needed) on Saturdays can be round lunch time.

And in smaller towns at least, the town centre tends to go quiet by mid afternoon on a Saturday so there's less demand after about 3 pm.

Having the same 'off peak' times Mon - Fri and Saturdays is a good thing to aim at if it works.

But there's never a good answer. If you make bus timetables too responsive to road congestion, then you can end up with every journey being a minute or two different in terms of running time, which on a 'headway' route (i.e. buses every 10 minutes or less) passengers don't notice, but on a 'timetable' route (i.e. journeys less than every 10 minutes so passengers will check a time) passengers will notice it and be confused by it.

Although there is an argument that an increasing proportion of passengers don't look at a timetable, they look at an app to see when the next bus is.

It does look nice on paper if buses are at exactly the same time past each hour all day every day, but in practice that means you have to choose whether to fit it to an average, so buses will run late (and annoy passengers and could get enforcement action taken against them*) at peak times, and end up sitting at every timing point or risk drivers running early (and will annoy passengers either way) at the most 'off peak' times.

Or be risk averse and have 'peak hour' running times all day every day (so as to avoid the risk of being penalised for late running), which will result in a lot of sitting and waiting around at timing points, and is not the most efficient use of buses and drivers.

As with most things, it's about striking a sensible balance.

* - edit to add, against the operator that is, not against the annoyed passengers!

 

[markymark2000]

There is some discussion in the Newport Transport thread which I think may be of wider interest.


Back in the days of manual scheduling it must have been easier to take the M-F plan and delete early morning and peak trips but in these days of detailed ridership data and computers is it a good idea to produce a different Saturday timetable? Are passengers confused by different timetables on Saturdays as well as Sundays?

I feel the need to add some context/additional comments in regarding my original comments. The Newport Bus network is almost entirely half hourly or lower frequency. Passengers dealing with lower frequency routes have no choice but to remember timetables else they have an awful long wait. The initial point was raised by me because of very low frequency routes (less than 10 trips per day) having timetables completely rewritten. If a route runs every 2 hours (as was the case with the 68 where my initial comments were made), people are forced to remember the times of their bus as missing the bus simply isn't an option for these people. Newport Bus crossed a good number of lines for what is a reasonable Saturday adjustment and made timetables deliberately confusing (Why else would times on Saturdays be 4 minutes different than Mon-Fri? Same journey time, same route, same everything. Just all of the times for a good few hours are retimed by -4 minutes. Link to Newport Bus 42/43 timetable for those who are interested to see the monstrosity)


For me, I think that in almost all cases, there are pretty universal rules which work. And it seems to be the same rules that the industry has been using for years (and for once, it's something that I agree on).
1. Routes upto every 15 minutes it's ok to amend these on the basis that the service is still pretty regular and so people don't need to rely upon a timetable. Even if you drop from every 15 to every 20 minutes, people won't tend to need a timetable, they can remember 'every 15 mins weekdays, every 20 minutes weekends'.
2. Routes which run every 20 minutes - hourly, yes there should be peak time adjustments to compensate for no schools and reduced traffic on Saturdays during 'rush hour'. Saturday running time is normally the same as Mon-Fri midday running times and so for the 'core' timetable, the timetables should be consistent.
3. On very low frequency routes (less than hourly), It's ok to drop your commuter or school runs if the usage is low but your 9-3/9-4ish 'shopper' buses, these shouldn't change without exceptional reasons.

Some exceptions may apply as one off edge cases but I think on the whole, the above is what everyone seems to logically stick to because it makes sense. Easier for passengers to remember, less printing sometimes as well as you can put 'Monday-Saturday' on the timetable rather than having to differentiate Mon-Fri, Sat and Sundays.

Are passengers confused by different timetables on Saturdays as well as Sundays?

A Transport Focus study in 2023 came back and said that 17% of people would use buses more if they were more confident on the routes, timetables and fares. (Source: Link to Transport focus. Download the PDF. Page 21 'Which five reasons would most encourage you to use buses more in future?'). If timetables are simpler, surely that increases confidence in the timetables? More times to remember, the less confident people are?

Sundays I think everyone acknowledges are a quieter day and with many elderly having a day of rest, and less people working and in some areas, the town is as good as shut, people know to expect a different Sunday timetable. Remembering Sunday timetables you then fit into one of 3 categories. You work Sundays so remember the times, Occasional users check as/when you require the service, or the service simply doesn't exist. It's an easy one for most people. Given how few people use Sunday times regularly, most fall into the latter 2 categories.

 

[stevieinselby]

A Transport Focus study in 2023 came back and said that 17% of people would use buses more if they were more confident on the routes, timetables and fares. (Source: Link to Transport focus. Download the PDF. Page 21 'Which five reasons would most encourage you to use buses more in future?'). If timetables are simpler, surely that increases confidence in the timetables? More times to remember, the less confident people are?

Another key aspect to this is ... don't keep changing the timetables every few months.
Arriva and First in particular do this all the time round here – one local route is on its 35th timetable variation since 2013, and OK so a few of those were temporary timetables during Covid, but even so that's getting on for 3 changes a year. And in all that time, it has remained an hourly service Monday to Saturday daytime on the same route, plus the recent addition of a Sunday service. And guess what, the service is no more reliable now than it was ten years ago.
This kind of constant tinkering puts passengers off because it reduces their confidence in the timetable, they can't rely on a printed timetable, and they don't feel like they can plan ahead with any surety.
I would much rather operators kept timetables the same unless there was a substantive change, and stop all this beggaring about with a few minutes here and a few minutes there that ultimately has no real impact in punctuality, resilience or operational convenience.

 

[43055]

Would agree with 'it depends'

Most routes won't have the same morning and early evening commuter passengers and accompanying peak traffic, or the schools passengers and accompanying school run traffic on Saturdays. Peak traffic congestion (and therefore bus running time needed) on Saturdays can be round lunch time.

And in smaller towns at least, the town centre tends to go quiet by mid afternoon on a Saturday so there's less demand after about 3 pm.

Having the same 'off peak' times Mon - Fri and Saturdays is a good thing to aim at if it works.

Indeed. My local route has quite a bit of extra time over the peak hours which even on school holidays can end up waiting at some timing points. On Saturdays this time is instead used to just continue the normal 30 min frequency until the early evening which means an extra return trip.

Alternately another local company largely uses the same base timetables for Monday to Saturdays and just removes services that don't run on Saturdays for example every other service if the frequency is halved.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

I feel the need to add some context/additional comments in regarding my original comments. The Newport Bus network is almost entirely half hourly or lower frequency. Passengers dealing with lower frequency routes have no choice but to remember timetables else they have an awful long wait. The initial point was raised by me because of very low frequency routes (less than 10 trips per day) having timetables completely rewritten. If a route runs every 2 hours (as was the case with the 68 where my initial comments were made), people are forced to remember the times of their bus as missing the bus simply isn't an option for these people. Newport Bus crossed a good number of lines for what is a reasonable Saturday adjustment and made timetables deliberately confusing (Why else would times on Saturdays be 4 minutes different than Mon-Fri? Same journey time, same route, same everything. Just all of the times for a good few hours are retimed by -4 minutes. Link to Newport Bus 42/43 timetable for those who are interested to see the monstrosity)


For me, I think that in almost all cases, there are pretty universal rules which work. And it seems to be the same rules that the industry has been using for years (and for once, it's something that I agree on).
1. Routes upto every 15 minutes it's ok to amend these on the basis that the service is still pretty regular and so people don't need to rely upon a timetable. Even if you drop from every 15 to every 20 minutes, people won't tend to need a timetable, they can remember 'every 15 mins weekdays, every 20 minutes weekends'.
2. Routes which run every 20 minutes - hourly, yes there should be peak time adjustments to compensate for no schools and reduced traffic on Saturdays during 'rush hour'. Saturday running time is normally the same as Mon-Fri midday running times and so for the 'core' timetable, the timetables should be consistent.
3. On very low frequency routes (less than hourly), It's ok to drop your commuter or school runs if the usage is low but your 9-3/9-4ish 'shopper' buses, these shouldn't change without exceptional reasons.

Some exceptions may apply as one off edge cases but I think on the whole, the above is what everyone seems to logically stick to because it makes sense. Easier for passengers to remember, less printing sometimes as well as you can put 'Monday-Saturday' on the timetable rather than having to differentiate Mon-Fri, Sat and Sundays.

I've been on holiday so my responses on other threads have generally been a bit short whilst I've been rubbing in the Ambre Solaire. However, I thought that this thread and these comments deserve some response.

You can't have universal rules as simply, the circumstances are markedly different in a major city, an interurban route, and, in many of the instances that prompted this thread, services that are actually pretty rural, low frequency and tendered. I do appreciate the instances where the X30 has a strangely different Saturday timetable and the 42/43 just seems bizarre.

However, many of the other instances that were referred to in the Newport Transport thread have a bit more nous and context behind them, and this was something that some posters mentioned. Let's take a look at them...

Ser 69 Monmouth to Chepstow - I remember this service as a Stagecoach service (and before that) and it was basically a two hourly service, Mon - Sat, with some additional journeys for schools. What appears to be the case now is that there is an hourly service. Who is paying for that (Monmouthshire CC), I don't know but essentially, it's a case that the additional M-F working (ostensibly for Chepstow school) now operates all day rather than just a peak.

Ser 60 Monmouth to Newport - I don't know when the 60 gained an hourly service on a Mon to Fri but it was again traditionally a two hourly service (like the 69) with a couple of peak extras although the a.m. ones were M-S whilst the p.m. ones didn't run Saturday. Again, I'm unclear as to who's paying for this upgrade to hourly but it looks like the M-F extras just run additionally all day. Note: the 60s don't interwork at Monmouth so it's not to do with driver changes. These are not busy services. They haven't been for 40 or 50 years; that's why they're tendered and not having an hourly service on a Saturday isn't the issue stopping these being a roaring success.

Rather, the practice has some strong parallels with how Faresaver developed the service from Frome to Chippenham. College workings underpinned a 30 min frequency (to force First off the route). The drivers and vehicles are already paid for so they simply ran them rather than the traditional hourly service. However, it was still every hour on a Saturday and this persists on Saturday even after First exited the market. It may be that Monmouthshire are already paying for the vehicles and the marginal cost of running offpeak is acceptable but won't support a doubling of cost on a Saturday.

Coming from a small town with a few core services (30 min headway M-S) and then a number of other services that are built around schools movements, I've always experienced services that have a noticeable change in Saturday timetables. In fact, I've known many a route that had different service patterns on different days to cope with the specific market days that were catered for.

I'll also highlight just how quiet some towns are on a Saturday afternoon. Not because people aren't able to get a bus - I mean as a whole. There isn't the same level of footfall past 1400/1500 hrs. So whilst I get it that it's laudable that we should have headways that are even, and I think that in urban intensive environments that they should be consistent, when we're talking about stuff that's much more rural, then there has to be some insight and understanding as to why things are as they are. You could have a bus every hour going up the A449 on a Saturday but the only outcome is a doubling in the cost (for the day) and precious little additional ridership.

 

[JD2168]

The timetables in South Yorkshire have been less frequent on Saturdays for a long while now. For example:
22X Rotherham to Barnsley every 15 Monday to Friday, every 20 on Saturday.
73 Sheffield to Rotherham, every 30 minutes Rotherham to Trenton & hourly to Sheffield on Monday to Friday. On Saturday it is hourly all day with funding.
75/76 on Monday to Friday generally a 7/8 minute frequency runs Shiregreen to Woodseats, on Saturday it is every 10 minutes.
X19 Barnsley to Doncaster on Monday to Friday is every 30 minutes at peak times & hourly for the rest of the day. On Saturday it is hourly all day.

There are countless other services, some have later starts & they also go onto evening timetables earlier.

In Doncaster some local services used to after 4 pm on Saturday drop to a Sunday frequency.

 

[Martin1988]

Up until recently the Y2 Bristol to Yate route finished an hour earlier on Saturday than it did on the other days. Seem to recall the last journey was something like 23.05 on Monday to Friday and 23.25 on Sunday but 22.25 on Saturday. At the same time the last journey on the Y1 left Bristol at 23.45 on Monday to Friday but midnight on Saturday. This got changed back in April with the last Y1 being 23.35 from Bristol Monday to Saturday and 22.45 on Sunday and the last Y2 being 23.05 Monday to Saturday and 23.15 Sunday.

I never got why the last journey on the Y2 was running later on Sundays than it did on Saturday as Saturday was surely the busier night and the late Sunday departure on the Y2 restored a journey that 6 months previously had been withdrawn, presumably due to lack of usage.

Am almost certain there was also a point where the former X46 route had the timetable changed with the service starting an hour later on Saturdays than it had been doing and this meant the first journey on Saturday was later than on Monday to Friday. The journey that got withdrawn was very lightly loaded from memory so that was probably why. North Yate also had a good 2 and a half years without a Saturday service at all after the Saturday provision on the Y3 was withdrawn at the start of the pandemic and then never returned.

 

[nw1]

I'd expect demand to be Mon-Fri peak > Sat > Mon-Fri off-peak.

However there are some surprising differences on Bluestar, with some routes on lower frequency on Sat compared to Mon-Fri off-peak. For example the 11/12 (West Totton/Calmore) are on a 10-min frequency on Mon-Fri (20 mins on each route) but 15-min frequency (30 mins on each route) on Sat. Likewise the 15 (Hamble) is half-hourly on Mon-Fri but hourly on Sat.

I assume this is because of driver shifts and that on Mon-Fri there are more drivers available in between the school/college peaks to operate additional services compared to Sat, who would otherwise have rather a long break in the middle of the day.

Occasionally the Sat frequency is the same as Mon-Fri, but not the same times in the hour. For example the 9 (Hythe and beyond) is 00/30 from Southampton on Mon-Fri but 10/40 on Sat. That's quite surprising, I'd have expected a consistent 6-day-a-week departure time.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 14 Jun 2024 ==

I'll also highlight just how quiet some towns are on a Saturday afternoon. Not because people aren't able to get a bus - I mean as a whole. There isn't the same level of footfall past 1400/1500 hrs.

That's surprising. In larger towns there seem to be more people about in the afternoon compared to early in the morning - presumably so that they can have a leisurely Saturday morning and then go out in the afternoon.

In places like Southampton 1000 is relatively quiet while it's heaving between around 1500-1700 on a Saturday. The buses leaving town around 1700 on Sat are always very busy.

 

[greenline712]

I'll also highlight just how quiet some towns are on a Saturday afternoon. Not because people aren't able to get a bus - I mean as a whole. There isn't the same level of footfall past 1400/1500 hrs. So whilst I get it that it's laudable that we should have headways that are even, and I think that in urban intensive environments that they should be consistent, when we're talking about stuff that's much more rural, then there has to be some insight and understanding as to why things are as they are. You could have a bus every hour going up the A449 on a Saturday but the only outcome is a doubling in the cost (for the day) and precious little additional ridership.

I've been noticing this for several years . . . unless there is something to attract passengers (football; sports; cinema), then Saturday shops close at 4pm now, and bus services start to run down about the same time. 30 minute frequencies gently degrade to 40 minutes and to 60 minutes by teatime. Often, reducing frequencies after 1500 can save a driver duty. Larger towns might be able to carry on for longer, but in small towns even markets start to close at lunchtime.

I've always worked on 0600-2000 on weekdays; 0700-1900 on Saturdays and 0900-1800 on Sundays as being "commercial" times . . . outwith those times then services would need financial support. Obviously, there are subject to local variations, but as a starting point . . .

In the 1960s, bus timetables were often provided with extra journeys between 11am and 2pm; this was the period when loadings were greatest.

It's good to see that daytime frequencies are being enhanced off the back of school runs, but if the passengers aren't there, then should the trips still run? I agree that the Monmouthshire 60 / 69 routes were traditionally every 2 hours, and the reason was light loadings. I doubt much has changed in the last 20 years.

 

[TheWalrus]

Yes because Saturday morninng and afternoons are very quiet, Saturday late evenings are a lot busier.

 

[nw1]

I've been noticing this for several years . . . unless there is something to attract passengers (football; sports; cinema), then Saturday shops close at 4pm now, and bus services start to run down about the same time. 30 minute frequencies gently degrade to 40 minutes and to 60 minutes by teatime. Often, reducing frequencies after 1500 can save a driver duty. Larger towns might be able to carry on for longer, but in small towns even markets start to close at lunchtime.

Sounds almost like a Mediterranean schedule in a way, whereby shops (but typically not cafes, etc) close down during the afternoon due to the heat in high summer. Yet here we have no such justification. I'm surprised that people wouldn't venture out on a Saturday pm as (to me at least) it seems more natural to have a relaxed Sat morning and then go out in the afternoon, rather than rush out on Saturday morning and then do nothing on Saturday afternoon.

 

[JD2168]

I've been noticing this for several years . . . unless there is something to attract passengers (football; sports; cinema), then Saturday shops close at 4pm now, and bus services start to run down about the same time. 30 minute frequencies gently degrade to 40 minutes and to 60 minutes by teatime. Often, reducing frequencies after 1500 can save a driver duty. Larger towns might be able to carry on for longer, but in small towns even markets start to close at lunchtime.

I've always worked on 0600-2000 on weekdays; 0700-1900 on Saturdays and 0900-1800 on Sundays as being "commercial" times . . . outwith those times then services would need financial support. Obviously, there are subject to local variations, but as a starting point . . .

In the 1960s, bus timetables were often provided with extra journeys between 11am and 2pm; this was the period when loadings were greatest.

It's good to see that daytime frequencies are being enhanced off the back of school runs, but if the passengers aren't there, then should the trips still run? I agree that the Monmouthshire 60 / 69 routes were traditionally every 2 hours, and the reason was light loadings. I doubt much has changed in the last 20 years.

When I was at Wilko in Sheffield City Centre the busiest times on a Saturday were between 11am & 2pm, after 3pm it is was dead with it even more slow after 5pm.

 

[Teapot42]

I've been noticing this for several years . . . unless there is something to attract passengers (football; sports; cinema), then Saturday shops close at 4pm now, and bus services start to run down about the same time.

A big change seemed to come with Covid. When places started to reopen it was for reduced hours and so many places simply didn't restore the full hours even to the present day. So many times we have been out and wanted a drink or something and everywhere has closed up by 4 or even earlier.

I got the impression it was partly due to staff shortages - I guess even if closed the staff will be working with tidying, prep for the next day etc, etc. Even if you save one member of staff over the week it can help offset higher costs in other areas.

We are lucky here that the local towns are large enough to sustain services right through to beyond 5 and the nearby villages are in touristy areas so again are insulated to a degree from drop in demand.

What did surprise me is that last Sunday I went out early for the first time in ages and I was amazed how busy it was. Shops were actually busier at 10am on a Sunday than I've seen on a Saturday for a long time. This is partly why I wonder if better Sunday services in some areas aren't worth considering.

 

[Roger1973]

I've noticed in a couple of bus networks that Saturday services to (relatively) small towns have been reduced but Saturday services to bigger cities (or almost-cities) have been maintained or increased in the last year or so.

It may partly reflect the demographics of who's going shopping where and when - do the smaller towns attract a higher proportion of older people who - if retired - will probably try and do their shopping in the week rather than on Saturdays, and if they do go out on Saturdays tend (as a generalisation) to want to be home again by lunch time? And maybe younger people are more likely to start that bit later and stay out in to the afternoon - but want to go to a bigger town?

What did surprise me is that last Sunday I went out early for the first time in ages and I was amazed how busy it was. Shops were actually busier at 10am on a Sunday than I've seen on a Saturday for a long time. This is partly why I wonder if better Sunday services in some areas aren't worth considering.

There's possibly something in that. Some shops / supermarkets / retail parks seem as busy on Sundays as Saturdays, and Sunday buses in cities big enough to have a good Sunday service seem generally well used in shopping hours at least.

But there's something of a resistance in the industry to increasing Sunday bus services. If an operator / depot doesn't open on a Sunday at the moment, you've got to have at least some supervisory / engineering staff either on duty or on call, and some smaller operators sell 'no evening / Sunday work' in their recruitment advertising.

With larger operators, there is often a (historic) agreement that drivers only work (for example) one Sunday in 3, or that Sundays are optional as rest day work. In the current climate of driver shortages and recruitment difficulties it's probably not a battle that operators want to have, if they are already struggling to keep the existing level of service going and there's plenty of overtime / rest day work available during the week for drivers who want to maximise their hours. (see also difficulties about staffing Sunday rail replacement buses in the last year or two.)

Retail is different, as there's usually a proportion of part time / casual staff working at weekends. While there are some bus drivers like that, it's not anything like as common.

 

[Simon75]

Other countries like Australia, have a reduced Saturday Service (at least since 1990)

 

[Simon75]

I've noticed in a couple of bus networks that Saturday services to (relatively) small towns have been reduced but Saturday services to bigger cities (or almost-cities) have been maintained or increased in the last year or so.

It may partly reflect the demographics of who's going shopping where and when - do the smaller towns attract a higher proportion of older people who - if retired - will probably try and do their shopping in the week rather than on Saturdays, and if they do go out on Saturdays tend (as a generalisation) to want to be home again by lunch time? And maybe younger people are more likely to start that bit later and stay out in to the afternoon - but want to go to a bigger town?



There's possibly something in that. Some shops / supermarkets / retail parks seem as busy on Sundays as Saturdays, and Sunday buses in cities big enough to have a good Sunday service seem generally well used in shopping hours at least.

But there's something of a resistance in the industry to increasing Sunday bus services. If an operator / depot doesn't open on a Sunday at the moment, you've got to have at least some supervisory / engineering staff either on duty or on call, and some smaller operators sell 'no evening / Sunday work' in their recruitment advertising.

With larger operators, there is often a (historic) agreement that drivers only work (for example) one Sunday in 3, or that Sundays are optional as rest day work. In the current climate of driver shortages and recruitment difficulties it's probably not a battle that operators want to have, if they are already struggling to keep the existing level of service going and there's plenty of overtime / rest day work available during the week for drivers who want to maximise their hours. (see also difficulties about staffing Sunday rail replacement buses in the last year or two.)

Retail is different, as there's usually a proportion of part time / casual staff working at weekends. While there are some bus drivers like that, it's not anything like as common.

Some services in evening/weekends may run from another depot due to staffing too

 

[Roger1973]

In the 1960s, bus timetables were often provided with extra journeys between 11am and 2pm; this was the period when loadings were greatest.

At the possible risk of being told off for going off at a tangent, but

In the 60s there were at least still some office workers who did Saturday mornings, or latterly every second or third Saturday morning, so there would have been a mid-day peak of homeward workers at the same time as the shopping rush. (I don't remember my late father going to work on Saturdays except as an extreme rarity, but think he told me he had done alternate Saturday mornings when he started work in the 1950s.)

In London, quite a few suburban bus routes had a higher service frequency and therefore higher bus and / or crew allocation on Saturdays than weekdays, some effectively running 'peak hour' frequency during the daytime well in to the 1970s if not beyond.

This could involve odd allocations on Saturdays to balance weekend work between different crew rotas at one garage, or between different garages (one long standing example was Upton Park Garage having a Saturday only allocation on cross suburban route 86, using buses / crews that worked route 15 the rest of the week, New Cross Garage had a Saturday allocation on Bexleyheath's route 89, route 94 was extended to Brockley Rise to give extra capacity over part of route 122 - this was probably made possible at Catford and Bromley garages by New Cross having a larger share of route 1 and Dalston a bigger share of route 47 on Saturdays.)

There are still a few London routes where there are Saturday / Sunday duties that end up on another route's driver rota, to balance weekend work, but not on the scale it once was, and not sure there are many suburban routes left that have a bigger vehicle allocation on Saturdays than Monday - Friday. Route 261 still does (more on 'London Bus Routes'.)

 

[WAB]

What did surprise me is that last Sunday I went out early for the first time in ages and I was amazed how busy it was. Shops were actually busier at 10am on a Sunday than I've seen on a Saturday for a long time. This is partly why I wonder if better Sunday services in some areas aren't worth considering.

Are there many examples of services being enhanced at all? As @Roger1973 says, there is a fair bit of inertia in minimal service on Sundays, and given that few areas have seen any service enhancements beyond 2019 levels I expect that such an improvement would be unlikely until Sunday trading laws are removed.

 

[Flange Squeal]

Newport Bus crossed a good number of lines for what is a reasonable Saturday adjustment and made timetables deliberately confusing (Why else would times on Saturdays be 4 minutes different than Mon-Fri? Same journey time, same route, same everything. Just all of the times for a good few hours are retimed by -4 minutes. Link to Newport Bus 42/43 timetable for those who are interested to see the monstrosity)

Falcon Buses in Surrey recently did similar with their Woking to Weybridge route 436. Buses in Saturdays run 5 mins earlier than weekdays along their entire length. It doesn’t interwork with anything either. I just don’t get it!

Timetabke at: https://www.falconbuses.co.uk/media/1697/436_08jan2024.pdf

 

[Roger1973]

Falcon Buses in Surrey recently did similar with their Woking to Weybridge route 436. Buses in Saturdays run 5 mins earlier than weekdays along their entire length. It doesn’t interwork with anything either. I just don’t get it!

I've no connection with Falcon Buses or Surrey County Council, so this is purely speculation on my part, but -

It looks like the 'half hourly' service in the morning peak Mon - Fri has the 'hour' stretched a bit to give extended running time in the morning peak, so the bus ends up at 12 and 42 ex Weybridge.

The same morning peak doesn't happen on Saturdays so the bus ends up at 07 and 37.

The service before 0900 is already different on a Saturday, so from an outside perspective, it would probably have made more sense to keep the off peak times the same as M-F and move the early service on a Saturday 5 minutes later than it is to achieve that (although that would mean arriving at each end at 28 and 58, which may be inconvenient for any retail workers who need to be starting work on the hour / half hour.)

Unless there's a design to it and the timetable is designed to connect with trains at one of the railway stations on route, and if the train timetable is 5 minutes different on Saturdays (although I think SW Trains / SW Railway made an effort a few years back to standardise train times through the day / on Saturdays as far as possible.)

 

[markymark2000]

Falcon Buses in Surrey recently did similar with their Woking to Weybridge route 436. Buses in Saturdays run 5 mins earlier than weekdays along their entire length. It doesn’t interwork with anything either. I just don’t get it!

Timetabke at: https://www.falconbuses.co.uk/media/1697/436_08jan2024.pdf

Interesting. So unfriendly for passengers.

The service before 0900 is already different on a Saturday, so from an outside perspective, it would probably have made more sense to keep the off peak times the same as M-F and move the early service on a Saturday 5 minutes later than it is to achieve that (although that would mean arriving at each end at 28 and 58, which may be inconvenient for any retail workers who need to be starting work on the hour / half hour.)

Even if the mornings have a specific need to run at that time (such as connections), you can still easily fix the rest of it by having every bus after 9am drop back by 5 minutes. Woking to Weybridge this works out best as it would mean a standardised last bus as. Weybridge to Woking would still have issues on the last buses but at least 95% of the timetable would be the same Mon-Fri.

With regards to retail workers, in almost all cases, those that are due to book on on the hour/half past are told to arrive 10-15 minutes early to clock in and then be ready to start work. As such, these times would likely be better for them as it gives 17 minutes to run a quick errand and get to work the 15 minutes early that companies now request. I don't think there are many places now which have hour/half hour start times and it is acceptable for you to turn up on the dot for those times.