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I'm not going to argue with the specific examples, but they demonstrate the challenge of managing organic change (e.g. new developments) onto long term organisations.
Certainly. I think in this case the error was that when creating Milton Keynes Borough it didn't encompass a wider expansion area on the west and south sides on the reasonable assumption that it wasn't just going to stop at the original proposed size. (It does on the north and east, oddly).
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Not only is it politically difficult sometimes, but it is also financially difficult. Shire Local Authorities are not set up financially to subsidise train services - they are much too expensive per head of poulation that would benefit from them - Central Government is seen as the subsidising Authority for them. Lancashire will have no money to be particularly interested in putting any in Merseyrail. The alternative is for the subsidy for regional train services to be devolved to the Local Authority, but be careful what you wish for as they find rather a lot of bus service can be bought for the subsidy spent on their railway......
The alternative in this case is for the boundary to be moved to encompass the entire primary travel-to-work and travel-to-leisure area of Liverpool and not just part of it, which I strongly advocate.
That's why I also advocate Watford into Greater London. Do Watfordians (that's the word I think) even give a monkey's about Hemel Hempstead or Bishop's Stortford?
This isn't really true, though. It would be negative to primarily design the local bus service in Milton Keynes around connecting with trains, as that's simply not what the majority of users want to do. Yes, passive stuff like ensuring you don't put bus stations and railway stations a mile apart (yes, you, Preston, but there are plenty of other examples) needs to be looked at, and it's probably worth making sure that the last bus of the day that might connect with an inbound train doesn't leave 2 minutes before the train does even if that throws the bus a few minutes off pattern, but is there a need to timetable buses to Bletchley to connect to trains to London? No, not really, hardly anyone would be using them for that even if they were so timetabled, and it's possible that timetabling them like that would cause inefficient operation that would mean lower frequencies for the main use case i.e. going to Central Milton Keynes.
Again, you are going completely overboard. I have not suggested that the whole bus network of a town should be slavishly designed to connect with trains (especially at stations with frequent services), but at key commuting times, often before and after local commuting times, they could be - in many towns that I know this is not considered at all. Quite apart from the timetables and routes, the fare integration is not going to happen in a satisfactorily northern European way without one Authority, with one budget, setting the fares and being responsible for the costs, the revenue and the funding.
Again, you are going completely overboard. I have not suggested that the whole bus network of a town should be slavishly designed to connect with trains (especially at stations with frequent services), but at key commuting times, often before and after local commuting times, they could be - in many towns that I know this is not considered at all.
I'm not sure how many people would actually use them even if they did, to be honest. Most commuters aren't going to be willing to get up half an hour earlier to go to the station by bus when they can drive or take a taxi or in some cases even cycle* much quicker (even in big cities as road traffic around 6am tends to be very quiet). And which trains do you connect them with when there are several options? Connecting to one specific one might make sense in more rural places but not in much of the South East.
If it was important, there'd perhaps be pressure to tender a service start an hour or two earlier, but in most cases with frequent trains to London that'd be plenty.
* From my old house to Bletchley Station was quicker by bike than car by a few minutes because of the number of cut-throughs you could use by bike that weren't available to cars.
I'm not sure how many people would actually use them even if they did, to be honest. Most commuters aren't going to be willing to get up half an hour earlier to go to the station by bus when they can drive or take a taxi or in some cases even cycle* much quicker (even in big cities as road traffic around 6am tends to be very quiet). And which trains do you connect them with when there are several options? Connecting to one specific one might make sense in more rural places but not in much of the South East.
If it was important, there'd perhaps be pressure to tender a service start an hour or two earlier, but in most cases with frequent trains to London that'd be plenty.
It's hard to compare, really, because no other European country really has the sort of high volume long distance commuting from entirely separate towns and cities that we have in the UK. Maybe France at a push into Paris? Most commutes in other European countries are from much closer to the destination.
If someone normally gets the 0815 into work as they might for a commute from say Maghull into Liverpool, they might be willing to leave a bit earlier to connect into that train from a bus timed to meet it even if that bus takes longer than the car, as that way they avoid paying for parking* and can have a drink after work. Similarly and more applicably say Croydon into London. But if they're getting the 0645 and are out of bed just before 6 to manage that, are they really going to get up at 0530 while a bus winds around the houses on the way to the station rather than just driving straight there? I'd venture that they probably aren't. Just as if I'm taking a crack of dawn Luton flight the only way of getting to the airport I'm going to consider is car, because while I might save money by driving to the Coachway and taking a coach, I'm not getting up an hour earlier to do that when it's early enough?
There are actually a few buses in Milton Keynes early enough for commuters, e.g. there's one from Woburn Sands into the centre in time for the early flight of Avanti services, and the busiest routes, the 4, 5 and 6, start running from around 0530 (the first 4 from Bletchley into the centre is as early as 0450, which I suspect has something to do with a warehouse shift change at Redmoor). But they're pretty empty in the morning, the commuters just aren't interested, the only ones busy at those sorts of time are the ones going to warehouses at shift change time.
* I know Merseyrail car parks are free, but most in the SE aren't, and it's an analogy
It's hard to compare, really, because no other European country really has the sort of high volume long distance commuting from entirely separate towns and cities that we have in the UK. Maybe France at a push into Paris? Most commutes in other European countries are from much closer to the destination.
I'm not sure this is entirely true. There was a good deal of commuting into Hamburg from the surrounding areas - e.g. to Kiel, which is 1hr 15 by train (and at this precise moment, 7 minutes faster than by car). I'd say the same is true of a number of the regional platforms at Hamburg Hbf if you look long enough. Yes, huge numbers alight at Pinneberg, much as they do Bromley South, rather than use the stoppers, but there is good reason the express trains used to make more stops in the evening peak...
The difference is that the peaks, and afternoons especially, are much more spread out. 8-4 is just as common as 9-5 (school started at 7:45, so much as we have parental drop off at 8:30 then work at 9 in the UK).
Much as I used to tell people who referred to "European Cafe Culture" that there is no such thing, it's also well worth being cautious about broad-brush assumptions on travel patterns!
The fact remains there is possibility for changing how we manage transport in the UK, and it isn't by playing with local government boundaries.
I'm not sure this is entirely true. There was a good deal of commuting into Hamburg from the surrounding areas - e.g. to Kiel, which is 1hr 15 by train (and at this precise moment, 7 minutes faster than by car). I'd say the same is true of a number of the regional platforms at Hamburg Hbf if you look long enough. Yes, huge numbers alight at Pinneberg, much as they do Bromley South, rather than use the stoppers, but there is good reason the express trains used to make more stops in the evening peak...
An interesting question is whether those Kiel commuters reach the station by bus. I'm suspecting, due to the early start (particularly for an 8-4 job), that they likely mostly don't.
I'd further suspect that because the frequency is typically lower in Germany there's an obvious one or two trains to time buses to meet, whereas from somewhere big enough to have a decent local bus network like Milton Keynes or Aylesbury there are several peak trains so there's no obvious one to time for?
As I said I do think integrating - I'd say *fully* integrating - regional buses with the railway makes some sense. I think it's questionable, however, what benefits would actually derive from integrating local buses in towns and cities with it, except where that town is pretty much purely a commuter town with no substantial centre of its own (somewhere like Maghull might fit this to an extent?)
Thinking back to another aspect of a possible Transport for South East England, I am wondering about the potential difficulties of establishing a rolling stock strategy if several areas have some kind of devolved transport authority. They are likely to raise objections to a standard style of commuter train. Andy Burnham, it seems to me, normally objects to a proposal in order to get it modified so that he can claim to have got the best outcome for the Manchester area. Wasn't it the case that Chris Green insisted on a particular style of coupling connections on classes 165 and 166 so that no-one could easily propose transferring them anywhere else?
I can see the potential benefits of a local transport authority such as those being discussed in recent posts, but I think there are some subjects on which such authorities will want to go their own way when a broader approach would be more in the national interest.
Most district councils are too small to be unitary authorities, which are required to take responsibility for social care and education. Those responsibilities are why the current devolution programme has a guideline of minimum 500k population for a unitary authority.
I just don't agree. Don't forget that the current district council system is the result of the amalgamations of the 1970s - the more you enlarge the council area, the less responsive to local needs they get. Other European countries have local mayors and/or councils for each village/parish, with funding; here the government is making noises about devolving some responsibilities to Parish Councils but I don't see this as any more than a sop to critics like myself who regret the continuing loss of local accountability for local matters. The driving force for the change is economies of scale, not improving services.
The argument about who should pay for social care and education is covered above by others. Sorry, this is getting away from the transport focus; and I guess we'll have to wait another half century for the next master plan to emerge and replace this hastily-conceived mess.
That, and the other instances you quote, sounds quite sensible for regional strategies, e.g. transport. But not for bin collections or street lighting! I think the Prescott plan for the regions was rejected more because it just introduced an extra layer of bureaucracy (or was seen to by the right-wing press).
Oh no, if only it did! Medway was unified on the basis of the former Rochester-upon-Medway and Gillingham Borough Councils, which were themselves formed from Rural and Urban District Councils, which came from parishes. @aron2smith would hate to see the southern boundary of the Medway Council area. Parts of Lordswood are in Maidstone, parts of Walderslade are in Tonbridge & Malling (TMBC). I used to joke my parents crossed a council boundary five times to drive to the supermarket (a single, largely straight road).
Yes I agree the southern boundary of Medway is bonkers but this, and other aberrations which ought to be correctable, shouldn't detract from the wider point. That is what the Boundary Commission is, or should be, for.
That, and the other instances you quote, sounds quite sensible for regional strategies, e.g. transport. But not for bin collections or street lighting!
The mayors won't be responsible for bin collections or street lighting, those will be the responsibility of the unitary authorities, along with the social care and education. The mayors are for the strategies, the unitary authorities are for the delivery of local services.
When Northamptonshire was reorganised recently a new Northampton Town Council was set up. In this part of the world, for example, the town councils in St Neots and Huntingdon have taken on a lot of responsibilities. This isn't just noises.
The local government boundaries do not "need" to move; TfL and the surrounding local authorities need to get better at talking to each other. (It does seem, from other threads, that TfL tends to go in with a mindset not that dissimilar to the 45th and 47th president of the US when opening negotiations...)
I agree so why don't London and the neighbouring counties talk and work with each other better? Boundary changes shouldn't be necessary at all, we only need better buses and more integration with trains and between areas where there are daily travel patterns.
Yeah I did, suggested we need more late evening services and work with TFL and Essex as much as possible. Hertfordshire has tons of cross-boundary traffic, the buses need to match this.
Oh no, if only it did! Medway was unified on the basis of the former Rochester-upon-Medway and Gillingham Borough Councils, which were themselves formed from Rural and Urban District Councils, which came from parishes. @aron2smith would hate to see the southern boundary of the Medway Council area. Parts of Lordswood are in Maidstone, parts of Walderslade are in Tonbridge & Malling (TMBC). I used to joke my parents crossed a council boundary five times to drive to the supermarket (a single, largely straight road).
That seems sadly too typical across the country, in modern times the rural district seems to put its new housing as close to a nearby town or city and then dares complain when someone says the boundary should change! At extreme cases, you end up with significantly underbounded cities like Bristol where huge suburban areas clearly function as part of the city, but somehow still 'South Gloucestershire'. Places like Filton etc. Leicester's and Nottingham's boundaries are something else!
Maidstone is making this significantly worse, even before LGR was a thing, by sticking a chunk of it's housing targets right next to Medway, knowing full well that it will gain the council tax but residents will look to Medway for services.
At the same time, when the Medway option for LGR was revealed, which suggested ironing out these boundaries, the leader of TMBC reacted as though Medway had suggested a hostile takeover involving the TMNBC leadership being dismembered and burned at the stake. The same council who own a car park in Walderslade that never got gritted, and when people phoned to complain they denied they owned one there until they were told "it's got your sign on it, and you seem able to empty the money machine"! (Wow - this part is mad, audacity of that council!)
Pretty much. I've been following LGR since it started, seen the same back and forth arguments all across the country. Especially with Reading/ Berks and Brighton and East Sussex/ Lewes. Rural Devon vs Exeter and Plymouth too. West Midlands Mayor saying he's against Warwickshire joining the WMCA even though it's clearly IN the West Midlands! Whether Swindon is allowed to be in Thames Valley or not. On and on it's goes.
I guess it was inevitable but seems like reorganisation couldn't be taken any less seriously by Labour leaving the process almost entirely to local government. My councillors are Tories and they walked out the Hertfordshire meeting on reorganisation! Just as mad as government not letting districts/ boroughs change county where it would make sense. Broxbourne apparently was looking at joining Essex as was Crawley who were looking at going with Banstead in Surrey, centring a council around Gatwick.
It's sad no one in councils can seem to agree on this stuff at all, the bigger prize would be things like transport, infrastructure, housing and services working far better for all of us. Each place can have its identity or whatever but it's not really an excuse for different councils or counties to not collaborate on the strategic issues.
I agree so why don't London and the neighbouring counties talk and work with each other better? Boundary changes shouldn't be necessary at all, we only need better buses and more integration with trains and between areas where there are daily travel patterns.
The government doesn't seem to have understood this part so far. And yet when the National Bus Company existed, not a single area had the same boundaries as any county or city.
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That doesn't really answer the question. No one seems to talk to anyone here. It's like the neighbouring authorities don't exist to any council around here when it comes to London, Herts or Essex. Even if that is wrong, it's how it comes across. Everyone doing their own thing with no thought of the consequences on neighbouring areas. Also I have plenty of issues with TFL (too many 20mph limits which make buses too slow for one), but I like being able to travel on a regular bus after the 7pm curfew too many places have outside London seem to have.
That doesn't really answer the question. No one seems to talk to anyone here. It's like the neighbouring authorities don't exist to any council around here when it comes to London, Herts or Essex. Even if that is wrong, it's how it comes across. Everyone doing their own thing with no thought of the consequences on neighbouring areas. Also I have plenty of issues with TFL (too many 20mph limits which make buses too slow for one), but I like being able to travel on a regular bus after the 7pm curfew too many places have outside London seem to have.
We've been through these before. Why do you keep raising the same points you know the responses to?
Money. Votes. TfL won't get its standard diluted by low council tax payers in the shires. District councils in shires have no money. It's a thankless job. People are overworked with no resources. The field upon which they grow their fvcks in completely barren.
The mayors won't be responsible for bin collections or street lighting, those will be the responsibility of the unitary authorities, along with the social care and education. The mayors are for the strategies, the unitary authorities are for the delivery of local services.
I know all this, also that local authorities are "not just for transport". I'm just trying to reinforce my point of "horses for courses" when it comes to layers of local authorities. Sorry if I don't make that clear, but you do come over as rather condescending.
In terms of buses, the area I’m proposing would be too big but in terms of cross boundary bus routes in the London area it might be easier to manage these, heck you could even revive a sort of “Green Line” network.
But I’d keep local networks separated, London Buses, Kent & Sussex buses, West Sussex & Surrey buses, Berks & Bucks buses, Herts and Essex buses or something.
As for a wider South East England region, Other cities in the region aside from London have their own commuter belts, Oxford, Cambridge, Brighton, Reading (yes I know it’s technically a town but it’s more like a city) so they could easily have their own sub regions
We've been through these before. Why do you keep raising the same points you know the responses to?
Money. Votes. TfL won't get its standard diluted by low council tax payers in the shires. District councils in shires have no money. It's a thankless job. People are overworked with no resources. The field upon which they grow their fvcks in completely barren.
In terms of buses, the area I’m proposing would be too big but in terms of cross boundary bus routes in the London area it might be easier to manage these, heck you could even revive a sort of “Green Line” network.
But I’d keep local networks separated, London Buses, Kent & Sussex buses, West Sussex & Surrey buses, Berks & Bucks buses, Herts and Essex buses or something.
As for a wider South East England region, Other cities in the region aside from London have their own commuter belts, Oxford, Cambridge, Brighton, Reading (yes I know it’s technically a town but it’s more like a city) so they could easily have their own sub regions
This sounds more like it, just needs good linking services and I think this could be a good solution. After seeing Go Ahead step in for the 477 - Orpington to Dartford and naming themselves 'Kent Country' (in reference to London Country), makes me think if this could come about organically.
I know all this, also that local authorities are "not just for transport". I'm just trying to reinforce my point of "horses for courses" when it comes to layers of local authorities. Sorry if I don't make that clear, but you do come over as rather condescending.
You are clearly a fan - I am not, at least not as it is being rolled out here.
I had to deal with some of the consequences of local government reorganisation in my working career. I'm just trying to make sure that people understand the facts. I live in a two tier area, which also has a mayor and some big town councils, where lots of people don't understand who is responsible for what, sometimes including me.
In my working career it was not for me to be a fan or otherwise. I'm just trying to give some understanding of the government's motivation for doing reorganisation this way.
As someone who had to deal with the consequences of reorganisations my usual preference is to leave things as they are! In my experience most reorganisations are more trouble than they are worth. Here in Cambridgeshire is an exception: what we have now is such a mess, and the stakes are so high, that almost anything will be better than what we have now.
We've been through this before and it's gone beyond tedious. Most people don't care, and this is democracy. Democracy means living with other people's stupidity.
At a technical level, for as long as London bus fares are so suppressed, running TfL buses well beyond the GLA boundary represents too much of London taxpayers subsidising the shires for no votes - beyond legacy cases this just won't happen. The shire authorities (in whatever form) cannot match London bus service levels because they simply will not persuade their residents to pay more council taxes - you are welcome to try and tell us how you get on. Then the Oyster system is an outdated bespoke system. It's up to TfL to make overlapping fare tariffs possible:
- Raise TfL fares to commercial levels. This does two things - TfL extending/running services into the shires does not depend on London taxpayers; shire operations can run into London commercially with the same / similar fare levels
- Drop standards on double doors and part routes for shire services with London permits
- Update the Oyster technology platform to ITSO or a new ITSO-compatible platform where the card is dumb and information is held in the back office.
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A TfSE (not a talking shop, but a proper authority) wouldn't make much difference to buses, but would be relevant for running L&SE rail services. With sufficient levels of governance and funding / fiscal powers, it would take over things like TSGN, SWR, Southeastern, GA and the London facing short-distance portion of WMT (old Silverlink minus LO).
GLA/TfL would be a constituent member on TfSE with voting rights on the board with a 'shareholding' percentage, so it would have direct influence on specifying and managing those services. This would get around the issue that Thameslink isn't (and shouldn't be) run by TfL, and SWR / Southeastern suburbans are difficult to carve out of their existing franchises. For such an TfSE to work you need the other constituent members of TfSE to have GLA/TfL equivalence in size and devolution powers.
With sufficient levels of governance and funding / fiscal powers, it would take over things like TSGN, SWR, Southeastern, GA and the London facing short-distance portion of WMT (old Silverlink minus LO).
This sounds more like it, just needs good linking services and I think this could be a good solution. After seeing Go Ahead step in for the 477 - Orpington to Dartford and naming themselves 'Kent Country' (in reference to London Country), makes me think if this could come about organically.
That’s a good name for the route and a nice nod to the past.
Also worth noting that there is still a small set of Green Line bus routes, mainly to the west and north west of London.
As for the rail network, rail lines could be divided to which terminal they serve, there was such a map in the late 2000s I think where the London connections map briefly had lines according to which terminal they served.
For a wider London, South East and Anglia network this could be easy to divide.
Lines serving both Cannon Street & Charing Cross can be one colour since both serve London Bridge and interlink closely.
We've been through this before and it's gone beyond tedious. Most people don't care, and this is democracy. Democracy means living with other people's stupidity.
At a technical level, for as long as London bus fares are so suppressed, running TfL buses well beyond the GLA boundary represents too much of London taxpayers subsidising the shires for no votes - beyond legacy cases this just won't happen. The shire authorities (in whatever form) cannot match London bus service levels because they simply will not persuade their residents to pay more council taxes - you are welcome to try and tell us how you get on. Then the Oyster system is an outdated bespoke system. It's up to TfL to make overlapping fare tariffs possible:
- Raise TfL fares to commercial levels. This does two things - TfL extending/running services into the shires does not depend on London taxpayers; shire operations can run into London commercially with the same / similar fare levels
- Drop standards on double doors and part routes for shire services with London permits
- Update the Oyster technology platform to ITSO or a new ITSO-compatible platform where the card is dumb and information is held in the back office.
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A TfSE (not a talking shop, but a proper authority) wouldn't make much difference to buses, but would be relevant for running L&SE rail services. With sufficient levels of governance and funding / fiscal powers, it would take over things like TSGN, SWR, Southeastern, GA and the London facing short-distance portion of WMT (old Silverlink minus LO).
GLA/TfL would be a constituent member on TfSE with voting rights on the board with a 'shareholding' percentage, so it would have direct influence on specifying and managing those services. This would get around the issue that Thameslink isn't (and shouldn't be) run by TfL, and SWR / Southeastern suburbans are difficult to carve out of their existing franchises. For such an TfSE to work you need the other constituent members of TfSE to have GLA/TfL equivalence in size and devolution powers.
Maybe to your surprise but I agree with the core of what you are saying, just think London buses being extended 2, 3, 5 miles further up the road as it would be where I live, is not only easily achievable but would make a massive difference to connectivity locally for not a massive cost and really benefit people and the local economies. Just restoring red London buses back to everywhere they covered up from the 1930s to about 1990 is what I want. Given TFL is not voted on, seems like an argument that doesn't make sense and if anything exposes the problem with London's current devolution settlement which seems to have encouraged silo thinking.
Raising TFL fares to commercial levels is an interesting one, given recently Khan said bus fares would be £2.35 today if they had not been frozen for all those years. An amount that would be too high for short trips I think and likely why a number of places stayed at £2 after England raised the cap. Interestingly parts of Scotland and now potentially Wales will cap at £2, so could be a sweet spot in London if they become desperate.
Double doors depends on the service, busy main routes, definitely, not as they are slowed down by people getting in the way of each other as it is but a quieter residential route, it would make sense. If a route only needs a single deck, then a single door usually suffices. They should be a bit more flexible on this standard.
I agree on the need for flexibility, not sure why they can't permit short extensions or routeA style routes, so 217 is Manor House to Waltham Cross and roughly half or so are 217A and go on to Cheshunt for example, this is how London Transport used to do it. Garage runs being used to provide a service at an otherwise uneconomical time of day also makes sense. Given TFL at random cuts journeys short to regulate services and be a nuisance about this, the flexibility should go the other way too.
Oyster, strongly agree it needs replacement, it's massively holding back progress now.
Last couple sentences sound good but I think a larger transport authority has to ensure buses also work across boundaries whilst ensuring rail operations don't get ridiculously complicated as services are split up. A major concern I have with rail devolution and seems at odds with GBR's whole point of existing.
Quite a while back but Hertfordshire raised the idea of a Capital Region Transport Body, definitely seems only more relevant today with things like Overground expansion and Project Oval and the impact of building on the green belt.
This is a time of change for transport planning, with a move to breaking down the artificial barriers created by local authority boundaries. The creation of bodies such as Transport for the North has generated impetus to improve transport links and enable economic growth. Amongst all this...
transporttimes.co.uk
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That’s a good name for the route and a nice nod to the past.
Also worth noting that there is still a small set of Green Line bus routes, mainly to the west and north west of London.
As for the rail network, rail lines could be divided to which terminal they serve, there was such a map in the late 2000s I think where the London connections map briefly had lines according to which terminal they served.
For a wider London, South East and Anglia network this could be easy to divide.
Lines serving both Cannon Street & Charing Cross can be one colour since both serve London Bridge and interlink closely.
Yeah I agree, hoping Go Ahead expand on this in Kent, surprised it hasn't been linked into Fastrack which they also run now. Hopefully in time. In the Chilterns, Carousel (High Wycombe, also Go Ahead) expanded into neighbouring towns as Carousel Country in the past year.
Given the rise of Superloop, Greenline seems like a natural step to come for more regional services. There used to be 25 to 30 routes, only 3 exist today. I think the potential is massive for routes like this again. Filled in a good spot between local buses and national coaches.
Trains - this is probably the only way it could be done without overcomplicating operations. I think there's merit to expanding the Overground but devolving it to just London doesn't fit so well as the services usually always cover a larger area. Is the same with most proposed rail lines in London.
Given the rise of Superloop, Greenline seems like a natural step to come for more regional services. There used to be 25 to 30 routes, only 3 exist today. I think the potential is massive for routes like this again. Filled in a good spot between local buses and national coaches.
There is simply no way that the Greenline of old can compete with the railway around London. National Express can't even make a coach from Gatwick to Victoria viable without it going via Heathrow.
There is simply no way that the Greenline of old can compete with the railway around London. National Express can't even make a coach from Gatwick to Victoria viable without it going via Heathrow.
The problem is the railways all go north to south in counties north of London, we need fast east to west bus routes to connect up places. From Cheshunt, not using a train to get to say St Albans when it means going down to Farringdon to go back up.
If it were up to me, Greenline wouldn't be cross-city routes now (because of traffic and better trains) but instead improving cross-boundary routes to effectively extend the reach of the tube and railway. Orbital connections also need better coordination and to be made faster. Uno's 635 route from Hatfield to Watford is a good example of the kind of the thing we need but with a more consistent and clockface timetable. Expanding on the 724 by introducing the 725 from Stevenage was a good step but should be the start. That's the comparison I make with Superloop, it's about improving town to town connections in commuter areas, the way Superloop is in Outer London.
Also wonder what NX is doing wrong with Gatwick when them and Flixbus are relentlessly in competition on the Stansted to London route even though trains run every 15 minutes!
Also wonder what NX is doing wrong with Gatwick when them and Flixbus are relentlessly in competition on the Stansted to London route even though trains run every 15 minutes!
The difference is that the M23 never crossed the London boundary, there is a much more frequent and cheaper train service at Gatwick than at Stansted. The M11 / A12 gets to Stratford.
Couldn’t TFL continue to be responsible for all transport within London (including the Overground), other county/unitary councils could oversee local bus services in their patch, and a wider TFSEE would be responsible for wider regional transport- all local (ie most non-intercity*) rail services emanating from London (similar-ish to the old Network SouthEast network*) and a handful of orbital/“plugging the gap” express bus services and cross-boundary local services.
This would also avoid any unnecessary disruption to current local government services by redrawing boundaries. I think the creation of unitary mega-councils is a very bad development.
There will also be the odd anomaly and that’s okay; what matters is the best outcome
The difference is that the M23 never crossed the London boundary, there is a much more frequent and cheaper train service at Gatwick than at Stansted. The M11 / A12 gets to Stratford.
Is the difference not also that Stansted is a hub for budget airlines?
(*= at the risk of splitting hairs, to my mind services like Waterloo-Exeter/ Marylebone-Birmingham/ the LNWR Euston-Birmingham are not London commuter services; they are regional services that happen to operate into London and should not be treated as part of a South-Eastern network. Likewise it is extreme that places as far away as Exeter, Norwich and Stratford were part of NSE).
I think we probably would need that. But then you’d need some kind of a regional governing body to oversee it? One thing is I wouldn’t want it called TfSEE. The Transport for X trend needs to stop. London Transport, Welsh Transport (or Railways), sounds much better.
In all seriousness Network South East is a clunky sounding phrase but at least it sounds somewhat striking from a marketing point of view.
The problem is the railways all go north to south in counties north of London, we need fast east to west bus routes to connect up places. From Cheshunt, not using a train to get to say St Albans when it means going down to Farringdon to go back up.
That was what I meant by regional buses. Some do exist like the oft discussed Bedford-Oxford X5 but they are sparse. Question is I suppose how viable they would be - most people in the South East just want to go to London. The likely success of East West Rail is probably less to do with those sorts of journey and more to do with living in Oxford and Cambridge having got rather expensive and thus opening up new commuting into and around those cities specifically.
The problem is the railways all go north to south in counties north of London, we need fast east to west bus routes to connect up places. From Cheshunt, not using a train to get to say St Albans when it means going down to Farringdon to go back up.
The likely success of East West Rail is probably less to do with those sorts of journey and more to do with living in Oxford and Cambridge having got rather expensive and thus opening up new commuting into and around those cities specifically.
This is absolutely right. One of the 2 key things that East West Rail does is commuting, at this end especially from Cambourne and Tempsford New Town. The other is linking up centres of innovation, in Oxford and Cambridge but also in between. If East West Rail was just about the sort of journeys being discussed here then it would have died years ago, and nearly did.
The thing is buses out here aren't run as a joined up network, especially with connections and timetables. Buses often come together and then nothing for ages, connections are difficult and seemingly random too. Tickets are a lot better because of BSIP as zonal tickets exist now but needs an automatic cap so everyone can benefit.
And since the 242 became a proper route again and not just a Brookfield shuttle, it has really opened up journeys across Hertfordshire. With the extension to Hatfield, suddenly most of the county is reachable with just 2 buses or 1 bus and 1 train. Shame they don't make a big deal out of that. But could do with tighter coordination. Even a journey like Cheshunt to Barnet requires a half hour wait in Potters Bar, that won't get people out of their cars! And with the congestion in both and elsewhere, that's something that needs to improve. St Albans would benefit from less traffic like most towns around here.
These localised issues seem to repeat all across the South East, some fare better than others though, so a more regional body makes sense.
Personally would also like to see more marketing encouraging leisure trips and getting to attractions by bus.
