Good Value Bus Weekly Rangers/Rovers

[ashworth]

Anyone able to recommend any exceptionally good value weekly bus rover/ranger tickets available in various parts of the UK. Weekly tickets seem particularly good value in comparison to day tickets.

Every summer I spend about 10 days at friends in Blackpool. Most years I make use of the excellent value 7 Day North West Rail Rover which I think is now about £80. It was only just over £50 when I first started using it!

This ticket covers a vast area by rail but I also sometimes make use of weekly bus tickets as an add on to this to cover some of the more rural areas not served by rail and to provide links between two rail routes to shorten an otherwise longer journey. I have on a couple of occasions tried just to use the bus tickets but the bus journey to/from Blackpool to Preston or Lancaster, especially on the way home after a long day out, became too tedious after a day or two!

These are the weekly tickets I have used in the NW:

Stagecoach Megarider Gold - £26
Covers a vast area of Lancashire, Cumbria, Merseyside (now into Chester), also valid from Carlisle to Dumfries and Newcastle.
I've found this very useful to get from Workington to Penrith (or changing at Keswick to Windermere). Lots of nice routes around Lancaster up to Kirkby Lonsdale and around the Lakes. Also useful for Southport to Preston.

Transdev Lancashire 7 Day Silver - £19.80
Very useful for services from Preston to Clitheroe and Skipton. Also Burnley to Keighley. Many local services also useful in Lancashire like Chorley to Blackburn.

Arriva North West and Wales Weekly Saver £19
Extends my rail ticket well into Wales but also provides local links like Chorley to Wigan, Ormskirk to Southport etc.

I'm also aware of the Day Tickets available for Warrington Buses and Rossendale Buses but have never used these.

Are there any similar tickets available in the East Midlands Area in particular Nottinghamshire? I'm aware of Trent Barton and Stagecoach Day Tickets but don't know of any weekly tickets.

 

[CallySleeper]

Are there any similar tickets available in the East Midlands Area in particular Nottinghamshire? I'm aware of Trent Barton and Stagecoach Day Tickets but don't know of any weekly tickets.

Stagecoach tickets. £10.50 weekly in Mansfield, £13.20 + suburbs and surrounding villages and £19 all Stagecoach in Notts, Derbys and East and South Yorkshire (inc. TB Pronto to Nottingham).

TB weekly+ 'saver' tickets. Max. £30 a week covering whole TB network (Notts and Derby), less if confined to Nottingham suburbs or for longer time period. The mango smartcard offers 25% off all single fares and a £5 cap ('zigzag') after 9am weekdays (£8 before).

 

[overthewater]

ONE TICKET, which covers East Central Scotland:

* http://www.one-ticket.co.uk/evoke/ticket/pricelist
* http://www.one-ticket.co.uk/maps.html

Or Stagecoach east scotland Megarider: £40 Unlimited travel on all Stagecoach East Scotland services throughout Fife, Perth & Kinross, Stirling, Falkirk, Dundee & Angus, and as far as Glasgow, Livingston and Edinburgh.

 

[transmanche]

Arriva, North East All-Zones Weekly Saver £26.

Allows travel from Berwick in the north, Carlisle in the west to Richmond and Scarborough in the south.

The day equivalent at £7.30 (£13 for a family ticket) is also good value. Or the multi-operator Explorer North East covers much the same area (inc T&W Metro) for £9.30 a day.

 

[Ivo]

Around here there's the First South West offering, which stretches from Chippenham in the East right through to Land's End. £7 for a day ticket or £25 for a weekly.

I can't remember the exact specifics of it, but some of the Stagecoach Megariders - I'm thinking specifically the one on the X5 corridor - are also very good value.

 

[34D]

There is a new product available in west Yorkshire land from tomorrow. A bus 'weekender'. £8 from the bus driver from 18:00 on Friday, for unlimited travel on all w/y bus operators from 18:00 Fri to 23:59 Sun (journey commenced by).

Contrast this with the daily MetroDay of £5.40 (or plusbus for £3 if a suitable rail ticket is held) or MetroCard week £21.

 

[Polarbear]

I can't remember the exact specifics of it, but some of the Stagecoach Megariders - I'm thinking specifically the one on the X5 corridor - are also very good value.

That'll be the Stagecoach East Megarider Gold which costs £33.00 for a week. Covers a huge area including Oxfordshire, Warwickshire, Northants, Bucks, Cambridgeshire (I think Swindon to Bury St Edmunds is possible, including the X5 as well).

There is also a Southern Megarider Gold, valid on all Stagecoach services in the south of England.

Other useful products include a Wiltshire Day Rover & there are a few one day explorer tickets available in the south of England that are available on multiple operators.

 

[ashworth]

Stagecoach tickets. £10.50 weekly in Mansfield, £13.20 + suburbs and surrounding villages and £19 all Stagecoach in Notts, Derbys and East and South Yorkshire (inc. TB Pronto to Nottingham).

TB weekly+ 'saver' tickets. Max. £30 a week covering whole TB network (Notts and Derby), less if confined to Nottingham suburbs or for longer time period. The mango smartcard offers 25% off all single fares and a £5 cap ('zigzag') after 9am weekdays (£8 before).

I didn't know that Stagecoach did the 7 day ticket. I knew about the one day Explorer ticket. Both great value for the huge area it covers.
I'm also surprised that you are allowed to use it on the Pronto service as the one day Trent Barton Zig Zag and Stagecoach Explorer Tickets are not valid.
As Pronto is my nearest Stagecoach service, only 2 miles away from home, can you buy a 7 Day Megarider Gold on the Pronto bus? I realise you probably wouldn't be able to if it was a service operated by Trent Barton.

 

[CallySleeper]

Yes you can. As you'll know, Pronto is run roughly on a ratio of 2:3 Trent Bartontagecoach. As you can see from the website, longer period Stagecoach passes are available but I'm not sure if you'd be allowed to use them on Pronto as they aren't really advertised at all, especially with TB's ticket machines. It's £19 for the full route from Nottingham - Chesterfield (a paper ticket without the need for a smartcard) but also obviously includes the rest of the Stagecoach network. You can also buy this ticket on a TB bus, and it has the same title (not a 'weekly' ticket) so should be accepted further afield than just on the pronto route - but I've never personally tried it.

Zigzag/mango/saver can't be used because Stagecoach won't allow it with their ticket machines and similarly TB & Explorer tickets. It's a shame really because other than the weekly ticket you have the day return at £5.20 or twotrip at £6 and that's it - quite pricey

 

[Tomonthetrain]

Nbus (WMPTE) - covers all bus operators for just £19!

 

[bnm]

Around here there's the First South West offering, which stretches from Chippenham in the East right through to Land's End. £7 for a day ticket or £25 for a weekly.
/QUOTE]

Rather strangely, the FirstDay SouthWest is priced at £7.30 in the Devon & Cornwall area. :-?

 

[34D]

Zigzag/mango/saver can't be used because Stagecoach won't allow it with their ticket machines and similarly TB & Explorer tickets. It's a shame really because other than the weekly ticket you have the day return at £5.20 or twotrip at £6 and that's it - quite pricey

This isn't quite correct: Mango et al do not use the ITSO protocol, so it's like saying that the stagecoach buses can't read the magstripe on a plusbus ticket.

 

[transmanche]

A TfL weekly bus & tram pass for £19.60 is also good value.

 

[Deerfold]

Yes you can. As you'll know, Pronto is run roughly on a ratio of 2:3 Trent Bartontagecoach. As you can see from the website, longer period Stagecoach passes are available but I'm not sure if you'd be allowed to use them on Pronto as they aren't really advertised at all, especially with TB's ticket machines. It's £19 for the full route from Nottingham - Chesterfield (a paper ticket without the need for a smartcard) but also obviously includes the rest of the Stagecoach network. You can also buy this ticket on a TB bus, and it has the same title (not a 'weekly' ticket) so should be accepted further afield than just on the pronto route - but I've never personally tried it.

Zigzag/mango/saver can't be used because Stagecoach won't allow it with their ticket machines and similarly TB & Explorer tickets. It's a shame really because other than the weekly ticket you have the day return at £5.20 or twotrip at £6 and that's it - quite pricey

This page says you can use Megarider Gold on pronto - but not on trips run by trentbarton. Unfortunately the timetables no longer show which trips are run by which company (annoyingly this coincided with a change in the timetable so even having an old timetable is unlikely to help except for the overnight journeys run by tb):

http://www.stagecoachbus.com/ticket...4&period_filter=any&x=32&y=11&drpOperator2=-1

The page for the explorer states it cannot be used on pronto:

http://www.stagecoachbus.com/mansfield-explorer.aspx

 

[W-on-Sea]

Traveline (e.g. even http://www.travelinesoutheast.org.uk/) does indicate which journeys on the pronto are run by Stagecoach and which by tb: you think that information would be made available in a better known/more accessible place as well...

 

[Ivo]

Around here there's the First South West offering, which stretches from Chippenham in the East right through to Land's End. £7 for a day ticket or £25 for a weekly.

Rather strangely, the FirstDay SouthWest is priced at £7.30 in the Devon & Cornwall area. :-?

Really? Wonder why...

 

[CallySleeper]

This page says you can use Megarider Gold on pronto - but not on trips run by trentbarton. Unfortunately the timetables no longer show which trips are run by which company (annoyingly this coincided with a change in the timetable so even having an old timetable is unlikely to help except for the overnight journeys run by tb):

http://www.stagecoachbus.com/ticket...4&period_filter=any&x=32&y=11&drpOperator2=-1

You'll see from the website that Gold tickets (those valid on Pronto) are offered either in smartcard form or in paper ticket form for the same price, and both state clearly in the conditions whether they are accepted on trent barton services or not.

As I said, this is so that passengers can still use this ticket on TB services when their ticket machines wouldn't recognise the stagecoach card. While smartcards aren't accepted on TB services, paper tickets still are. It would be pointless as a 'joint' service if passengers had to search for and use only Stagecoach services for example, because tickets weren't inter-available on both operators.

What I'll accept however is that longer Gold season tickets (>monthly) aren't really advertised on buses, only the weekly ticket. You only discover this information on stagecoach's website. Then again, given the ticket cost, it's probably not something TB would wish to advertise since they probably don't see any of the money...

Traveline (e.g. even http://www.travelinesoutheast.org.uk/) does indicate which journeys on the pronto are run by Stagecoach and which by tb: you think that information would be made available in a better known/more accessible place as well...

This information is probably not considered to be important for travellers, pronto being a 'joint' service. Listing the operator in timetables would also probably cause a lot more space to be required!

 

[W-on-Sea]

This information is probably not considered to be important for travellers, pronto being a 'joint' service. Listing the operator in timetables would also probably cause a lot more space to be required!

Well, if it has implications for ticket validity, it is not unimportant.

The timetables for the routes operated jointly by Oxford Bus Co & Stagecoach do show the operator - it just takes a short reference above each working

A PDF of the hard copy timetable
http://assets.goaheadbus.com/media/route_pdf/city2_2013_Web.pdf

and the online Stagecoach variant
http://www.stagecoachbus.com/getTimetable.ashx?code=XOAO002D&dir=OUTBOUND&date=22/06/2013

 

[Deerfold]

You'll see from the website that Gold tickets (those valid on Pronto) are offered either in smartcard form or in paper ticket form for the same price, and both state clearly in the conditions whether they are accepted on trent barton services or not.

Yes, I didn't read both sets of conditions - those for the paper and card versions. I assumed the same product name at the same price would have the same validity. As the conditions don't appear until you ask for them, they could make this clearer.

As I said, this is so that passengers can still use this ticket on TB services when their ticket machines wouldn't recognise the stagecoach card. While smartcards aren't accepted on TB services, paper tickets still are. It would be pointless as a 'joint' service if passengers had to search for and use only Stagecoach services for example, because tickets weren't inter-available on both operators.

I wonder why similar tb tickets such as their trentbartonland ticket are
not available at all.

What I'll accept however is that longer Gold season tickets (>monthly) aren't really advertised on buses, only the weekly ticket. You only discover this information on stagecoach's website. Then again, given the ticket cost, it's probably not something TB would wish to advertise since they probably don't see any of the money...

Why would TB accept the ticket with no payment and no reciprocal acceptance of their passes?

This information is probably not considered to be important for travellers, pronto being a 'joint' service. Listing the operator in timetables would also probably cause a lot more space to be required!

They managed to include it until this year in about the same space. Trentbarton manage to include info on who runs the X38 and which buses on the black cat don't take mango easily enough.

If some tickets are only valid on one operator's service - with a potential wait of over an hour between a tb and the next stagecoach bus leaving that seems to be quite important information.

 

[ashworth]

I find the fact that on the Pronto service they don't accept Trent Barton Mango or ZigZag or Stagecoach Day Explorer tickets a real inconvenience to the passenger. If you want to use Pronto as part of a longer journey using a number of bus services it can work out very expensive.
I have to make a return journey from just outside Hucknall (Nottinghamshire) to friends near Blackpool at the end of July during the six weeks when Nottingham Station is completely closed along with the whole Nottingham-Mansfield-Worksop (Robin Hood Line). As I'm travelling north I didn't really want to do rail replacement bus south to Nottingham, then even further south by bus to East Midlands Parkway before getting the train north.
I considered getting a service bus to Chesterfield to get the train but it worked out very expensive with having to get two bus tickets at full price (Trent Barton 141 then Pronto).
In the end I have found the cheapest and actually quickest route is to use my Mango Card on Trent Barton Service 3B from Hucknall to Kirkby Cross and then the 9:3 from there to Alfreton Station. Well under £5 and takes less than 1 hour. I've also got very cheap Advance Tickets from Alfreton to Manchester and Manchester to Blackpool and so the whole return journey including bus to and from Alfreton is under £30. This is much less than the cheapest return I could get from Hucknall to Blackpool by rail and replacement buses and takes much less time.

 

[CallySleeper]

I wonder why similar tb tickets such as their trentbartonland ticket are not available at all.

(Also re: W-on-sea above)... There are no tickets which are only valid with one operator but not the other on pronto. This means that there is no real need then to advertise which operator runs individual services.

Mango and saver (i.e. their trentbarton land) tickets are smartcards using INIT technology which I assume isn't compatible with the equipment stagecoach uses.

This therefore gives the TB/SC partnership two options - allow these tickets on TB services only (defeating the purpose of advertising this as a 'joint' service) or, make it easier and clearer for passengers and not allow these tickets on the route full stop.

Black cat is run jointly with Notts and Derby, also part of the Wellglade group which has meant that the necessary technology is available on all buses on this route.

X38 is run with Arriva and yes the services which don't accept Mango are noted. I don't know what is different between how the X38 and Pronto are managed but obviously Arriva doesn't have an issue with TB using mango, Stagecoach does. My understanding is not only that stagecoach won't go the distance to accept mango on their services but that they actually won't allow TB to allow it on theirs!

Why would TB accept the ticket with no payment and no reciprocal acceptance of their passes?

Again, I wouldn't be able to comment on how the route is managed in this context, and whether any revenue is shared. Considering stagecoach's timetable change on this route nine months ago, I doubt it.

I find the fact that on the Pronto service they don't accept Trent Barton Mango or ZigZag or Stagecoach Day Explorer tickets a real inconvenience to the passenger. If you want to use Pronto as part of a longer journey using a number of bus services it can work out very expensive.

I would agree with this. But unfortunately, that's just the way it is. A couple of weeks ago I spent over £30 on 14 buses in 24 hours, I think about two thirds of which was spent on the Pronto.

 

[Deerfold]

(Also re: W-on-sea above)... There are no tickets which are only valid with one operator but not the other on pronto. This means that there is no real need then to advertise which operator runs individual services.

Apart from the smartcard version of the Megarider - obviously you'd be daft to buy this if the pronto is your regular route, but you may decide to buy it if you only use pronto occasionally or you may realise you want to catch pronto after you've bought it - it'd be nice to let these people know which buses they can catch.

Black cat is run jointly with Notts and Derby, also part of the Wellglade group which has meant that the necessary technology is available on all buses on this route.

It looks like they have recently changed this - until recently they were not accepted by Notts+Derby - there's still a reference to this in the Mango FAQs at https://www.trentbarton.co.uk/mango/mango-faqs under "which trentbarton services have mango" but the reference in the Black Cat timetable has gone.