How to encourage bus use?

[tbtc]

Bus services can be changed at short notice. The Knutsford-Macclesfield service has changes numerous times over the past few months (which includes a reduction in the number of services serving Astra Zeneca) and from April there is currently no operator to run the service. You wouldn't get an announcement saying Northern are withdrawing a train service in 6 weeks!

This is a problem, whether perception or reality, people are nervous about using a service that may be scrapped/ amended at short notice. We need to have some guaranteed lengths for timetables, so that people know that the link will still be there in a few months.

(to be facetious, WSMR withdrew their services at much shorter notice though)

Bus deregulation is not necessarily set in stone. Indeed, West Yorkshire are continuing to work towards Quality Contracts. You can do bus priority but otherwise we are basically wasting our time if we have to work with the current low subsidy, deregulated system. If you want to do things properly, it does cost money.

Nothing is set in stone, if you can get acts of parliament etc. But I'm trying to be realistic here. If your wishlist starts with "get the Government to spend billions extra in subsidising buses" then it's not going to work, certainly not at the moment. There are a lot of simple things that could be done very cheaply.
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Burnley & Pendle used to do printed adverts promoting The Witch Way route. One was of a car with a dent in it saying how much is that going to cost to repair. Another was showing the saving between a bus season ticket and a car parking season ticket for Manchester city centre with a beach background, implying you can afford to go on holiday more if you take the bus.

That's a great approach - the kind of way of attracting motorists to *want* to use the bus, not bullying them with "anti-car" policies that make them resent buses - a lot of people don't understand all of the costs involved with motoring - I'm all in favour of any bus company who tries to promote their services as A Good Thing (and not just a last resort for the desperate/ pensioners).

 

[radamfi]

In the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland and probably many other places in Europe, bus timetables only change once a year, the same date as the Europe-wide train timetable change date.

 

[jon0844]

The Stocksbridge by-pass (the route from Greater Manchester/ Woodhead Pass to Sheffield/ M1) was built like that in the late '80s and has seen a lot of accidents/ deaths as a result.

But I'm talking about the more modern design, where you have a crash barrier (metal ropes) that separate the carriageways - not painted lines and cat's eyes that have been ripped from the ground in a matter of months.

Then for turnings right, you have a slip built that goes off to the left and turns so you cross the road straight over - not trying to turn right and having a car in the back of you. Of course we've had roads with two lanes in one direction and just one the other for some time, but some of them are incredibly dangerous - especially at the junctions where people misjudge speed. Where you have junctions, you make sure that you've got the road down to 1 lane in either direction and possibly a lower speed limit and/or cameras.

You'd have to see how it's done to see that our interpretation isn't quite there, but I'll concede if this type of set up is now being used somewhere in the UK.

Anyway - totally off topic. Apologies.

Back to the buses, promoting buses to non bus users is certainly important and I think that now people are glued to their smartphone/iPad there is a 'hook' right there. When you're on a bus, you can enjoy the time you'd otherwise be spending driving in traffic*.

I do know that, from my own experience, bus timetables can change relatively quickly. I believe 90 days notice has to be given, but can be done at pretty much any time.. so a new bus route could end quite quickly which might put people off giving up their car.

* If you live somewhere where your drive is quite pleasant, I expect this wouldn't have much of an effect!

 

[anthony263]

A good example has to be Stagecoach Wales where they have recently increased the frequency of Routes 120/130 Treherbert/Blaenrhondda - Treorchy - Pontypridd - Caerphilly to operate every 20 minutes from both Treherbert and Blaenrhondda which offee a bus every 10 minutes between Treorchy & Caerphilly to help cope with the large increase in passengers.

You have had the various kickstart schemes in Aberdare & Caerphilly where some destinations now have buses very 10 minutes or so which has helped lead to a large increase in passenger numbers.

First Cymru have done something similar with certain routes in Swansea and they have also done something similar by increasing my local bus route from every 20/30 minutes to run every 15 minutes which is a great help during the peaks.

The hourly sunday service with buses running from 08:30 is much better than what it was about 5 years ago when our first bus from Bridgend wasnt til 13:30.

Buses should also try to serve places where people want to go where possible, a good example in Bridgend is the Mc Arthur Glen outlet villiage near Sarn & the M4

 

[radamfi]

I do know that, from my own experience, bus timetables can change relatively quickly. I believe 90 days notice has to be given, but can be done at pretty much any time.. so a new bus route could end quite quickly which might put people off giving up their car.

In fact, operators only need 56 days notice. A route can even be changed during the notice period. So if a new route is registered to start in 56 days, but the operator decides a week later that it doesn't want to run it after all, then the route can be cancelled after one week's operation.

What is almost as bad is that fares are totally unregulated and can change at any time with no notice. Londoners have a great advantage in that fares usually only change once a year and the changes are announced a couple of months in advance.

 

[anthony263]

smartcards similar to the oyster cards in London will help encourage mor epeople to use the buses if they offer cheaper fares.

Wales is introducing its own oyster style smartcard,The Go-Cymru card was launched today in Wrexham and hopefully will eventually be rolled out across wales.

 

[radamfi]

smartcards similar to the oyster cards in London will help encourage mor epeople to use the buses if they offer cheaper fares.

Wales is introducing its own oyster style smartcard,The Go-Cymru card was launched today in Wrexham and hopefully will eventually be rolled out across wales.

Why 'hopefully'? Operators should be forced to accept them. Otherwise there will be little or no progress. Operators will just drag their heels as long as possible.

 

[anthony263]

Why 'hopefully'? Operators should be forced to accept them. Otherwise there will be little or no progress. Operators will just drag their heels as long as possible.

problem is more with the WG rather than the bus operators with First and Stagecoach actually welcoming this new smartcard

 

[Statto]

In fact, operators only need 56 days notice. A route can even be changed during the notice period. So if a new route is registered to start in 56 days, but the operator decides a week later that it doesn't want to run it after all, then the route can be cancelled after one week's operation.

What is almost as bad is that fares are totally unregulated and can change at any time with no notice. Londoners have a great advantage in that fares usually only change once a year and the changes are announced a couple of months in advance.

One example an operator registered a new route in my area to start last August, then decided to cancel the registration within a week & the route only operated for 4 weeks. Also same operator introduced a new route last April, which is now on it's 5th timetable since introduction, which is annoying as it's quite a useful route although the route is covered by other operators it required a couple of changes on different operators to do the full end to end journey before the company introduced the route.

 

[Lewisham2221]

The simple answer is.... there isn't a simple answer. Just like with every industry, there are different markets and each market may well want totally different things. The only thing most markets will have in common is that they want 'value for money'. What defines 'value for money' depends on exactly what that customer wants from a bus service. For example, some people may simply want a very low cost method of getting from A to B. For them, they may not care about leather seats, air con, fancy route branding or next stop announcements/displays, they just want a bus that turns up and charges a low fare. Others may be happy to pay a higher fare in exchange for a more 'premium' service. See the Trent Barton/Premiere saga. Compare this to the supermarket industry, with it's various tiers of price/quality (Aldi, Tesco, Waitrose etc).

This leaves two main obstacles to improving the appeal of buses:

1) Not everyone wants the same thing from a bus service, so one operator/brand/service is going to struggle to appeal to a wide market.

2) Many of the factors are essentially out of the hands of bus operators, being instead in the hands of local authorities. Unless you've got a pro-bus/public transport local authority, you're going to find it much harder to make your buses appeal to the masses.

 

[AndyHudds]

For someone who holds a West Yorkshire bus only Metro Card my main source of annoyance is the lack of credible services to Leeds from Huddersfield (sorry to talk specifics), it currently takes 1 hr 30 on the current services. Back in the 80's we used to have some limited stop service to Leeds but now we have sod all, we have the X6 to Leeds but that goes via Bradford first. Now I know the train is quicker with 5 trains an hour from Hudds to Leeds but I have to pay again for that don't I. Same to Barnsley we used to have buses to Barnsley but they knocked them on the head, now that is somewhere the buses could compete on the train as the Penistone Line takes an age to Barnsley, a limited stop service to Barnsley would be sustainable. Just seems to be continual cuts to services that have caused bus patronage to dwindle. With modern innovations in bus design and real time information screens PTE/Operators should be seizing opportunities to attract new customers. Although there is one stop in Huddersfield town centre on one of Firsts flagship routes (372) that has a real time information screen that's been there yonks and never actually been used, so even when they install these things they don't use em!!!

The shelters could be improved dramatically too, currently draughty and open to the elements. Enclosed shelters like those found in train stations that are heated with some proper seating on main roads and in built up areas would be a massive boon.

Be interesting to see what happens in WYPTE area when they introduce the Quality Contracts as some of the services in West Yorkshire are laughable after 6pm and on a weekend.Personally I'd like to see First run off the road in West Yorks as they just seem to operate buses when its convenient for First rather than services that passengers actually want.

 

[90019]

Lothian buses have great timetable/ fare information at their stops, but I appreciate that other cities aren't as simple to understand.

Having a flat fare system really helps with that.
Though plenty of people still don't actually bother to read either part. ("Where are you going?" "This is the Elm Row bus." "It should say that on the timetable then." "It does." (It says Part Route Elm Row on the front and side of the bus, too)) :roll:

Most of the stops in the city centre also have posters with information about using the buses various languages.

 

[tbtc]

Having a flat fare system really helps with that.
Though plenty of people still don't actually bother to read either part. ("Where are you going?" "This is the Elm Row bus." "It should say that on the timetable then." "It does." (It says Part Route Elm Row on the front and side of the bus, too)) :roll:

Most of the stops in the city centre also have posters with information about using the buses various languages.

True. Before the current "flat" fare, the posters used to have something like amber/ green/ red on the schematic map to show the 60p/ 80p/ £1 boundaries - something that anyone could understand - wish everywhere had such a simple system and good enough publicity too!

People in Edinburgh don't know how lucky they are (and I've seen enough refer to five year old buses as "old"!)

 

[LE Greys]

In town, replace them with trams wherever possible and trolleybuses where trams can't run for whatever reason.

Seriously, stop trying to be over-ambitious with the timetable, especially around traffic blackspots in the rush hour (as happens in Herts). Make the real-time information displays more accurate. Put up better information at bus stops, not just a list of times, and write the information so that someone who knows the area would be able to understand it (I might not know where Orchard Road is, but I will know King's College/Aberdeen University). Stop taking mad risks with traffic lights (as often happens in Aberdeen). Don't run so slowly that the bus behind you overtakes (as also happens in Aberdeen). Enforce bus stop parking restrictions. And generally all the stuff listed above.

 

[ainsworth74]

IMake the real-time information displays more accurate.

This. All this discussion of timetables or smart cards is lovely and I'm sure it'll help but none of it will do anything to prevent the problem of people not knowing when buses are going to turn up because most bus timetables rapidly become works of fiction. If I can't know when the next bus is going to arrive at my local stop within a five minutes I'm going to make alternative arrangements (obviously this only applies to areas which aren't high frequency which is a lot of them).

 

[MidnightFlyer]

My local council installed lots of lovely interactive info points at selected stops around my town and borough last year, with fares info, timetables and used GPSs attached to the bus to provide up to the minute running information. Unfortunately they never bothered to update the timetables when the services were drastically altered in September (with a lot of routes totally rewritten and rerouted), and the GPS system has never worked (on partial account of varying types of bus now working the route as opposed to the previous nearly uniform fleet, so it just works as a live timetable that is just a replica of the paper one next to it), and the fares info tab just tells us to ask the driver onboard... So yep, a completely and utterly pointless addition to the public transport infrastructure. Fortunately most of the buses I ever need to catch are off-peak so they are generally reliable, however I'd give my right arm for some proper, true live running info, the current provision is horrendous.

Aside from that, I'd also prefer even slightly lower fares or at the very least some sort of online database of fares structure (which in my experience is non-existent in comparison to railways) so I can analyse the best options for myself without wasting the driver's time. To be fair though it is going to have to take a hell of a lot to shift buses from their position as my least favourite form of public transport - often occasions I'll walk instead of getting the bus, for the reasons outlined in both my and previous posters' posts.

 

[Drsatan]

My local council installed lots of lovely interactive info points at selected stops around my town and borough last year, with fares info, timetables and used GPSs attached to the bus to provide up to the minute running information. Unfortunately they never bothered to update the timetables when the services were drastically altered in September (with a lot of routes totally rewritten and rerouted), and the GPS system has never worked (on partial account of varying types of bus now working the route as opposed to the previous nearly uniform fleet, so it just works as a live timetable that is just a replica of the paper one next to it), and the fares info tab just tells us to ask the driver onboard... So yep, a completely and utterly pointless addition to the public transport infrastructure. Fortunately most of the buses I ever need to catch are off-peak so they are generally reliable, however I'd give my right arm for some proper, true live running info, the current provision is horrendous.

Aside from that, I'd also prefer even slightly lower fares or at the very least some sort of online database of fares structure (which in my experience is non-existent in comparison to railways) so I can analyse the best options for myself without wasting the driver's time. To be fair though it is going to have to take a hell of a lot to shift buses from their position as my least favourite form of public transport - often occasions I'll walk instead of getting the bus, for the reasons outlined in both my and previous posters' posts.

Indeed: several years ago Hampshire County Council introduced monitors showing live running information at several bus stops around Winchester. A few of these monitors no longer work, meaning the passenger is back at square 1 when it comes to live running information.HCC went through a phase of installing new bus stop flags, and printing on them a number to text for the next three bus departures from that stop. However, information given is not real-time information i.e. someone could receive a text giving the bus time to destination A, not knowing that the bus there was running late. Given that in the past I've had to wait over 30 minutes for a late running bus, real-time monitors installed at all bus stops where there is an available electricity supply (or even printing bus times on electronic paper which can be updated in real time) would encourage, IMO, more commuters to use the bus.

As others have already indicated in this thread, I'd like to see uniform fares structures introduced in cities. Britain seems to be alone in Western Europe for only having journey, not time-based tickets. It seems very odd to have to pay twice if you're changing buses in the UK, compared to other cities where tickets, validated on board the bus or tram, are valid for one hour, 90 minutes, 24 hours or more once validated.

I'm fairly certain that the only way bus fares will decrease in price is if the bus industry moves to net cost tendering where the local authority decides upon the bus routes, sets frequencies and service hours, and then pays a bus company a fee to run the service (or owns the buses outright.) While this means buses are more heavily subsidised, it will create lots of social benefits: for instance low paid retail and catering workers will be able to work early/late shifts without having to drive or use a taxi

 

[mchunt]

I now use busses in London where before I would have got a tube and walked the main reasons which have got me using the busses are

Oyster Card - I hardly ever carry cash around, if I get a bus at home in Hertfordshire I end up having to find a cash point first.

Simple fares - simple reasonable flat rate fare.

Online journey planners via web & apps. Using London Bus Buddy I can easily find out when the next bus to where I want to go is.

On bus information - London busses tell you what the next stop is which is extremely useful when you dont know the area.

Every time I go on a bus outside the capital it always seem such a faff with finding the correct amount of cash, finding out when they are running and then knowing where to get off.

When I went back to my home village near Leicester I nearly missed the bus as they had moved the bus stop to the opposite side of the road (it had been the other side for at least 40 years).

My only wish in London would be for a transfer ticket as travelling a few stops and then changing to another bus costs 2 flat fares whereas on the Tube this would only be a single fare - but this could be quite hard to engineer with a touch in only system.

 

[jon0844]

This. All this discussion of timetables or smart cards is lovely and I'm sure it'll help but none of it will do anything to prevent the problem of people not knowing when buses are going to turn up because most bus timetables rapidly become works of fiction. If I can't know when the next bus is going to arrive at my local stop within a five minutes I'm going to make alternative arrangements (obviously this only applies to areas which aren't high frequency which is a lot of them).

Ideally the two will go hand in hand, as the system that enables bus location/monitoring is likely to see a more modern ticket machine that can accept smartcards.

Uno (operator in Hertfordshire) has the GPS to provide real time info, and smartcards are accepted for bus passes, but as yet they do not have any form of payment system for ordinary punters - and no plans to do so (which presumably means Herts County Council has no immediate plans to do so around here).

Flat rate fares, smartcards to avoid people being unable to travel because they only have a £20 note, real time information and next stop information will all make buses as easy to use as a train. Good maps and timetables at bus stops showing routes (basically, just send councils down to London to see how it can be done) all helps too - along with apps that can work, like in London, to plan a route that involves more than one bus.

Oh, and ticketing (again - hopefully solved with smartcards) that are valid on more than one bus. I am sure many people don't fancy paying a £1.50 flat rate fare to go only a 'few stops' before having to pay another £1.50 for a second bus - where a daily ticket, if it exists, is probably not cheap enough.

I had plusBus and had free use of the buses all around Hatfield, for around £300 or so a year - but I can't get one now as I don't commute by train. Now I'm back to having to fumble around for change and I've had to skip the bus on more than one occasion simply because I didn't have the right money - as in only having notes.

People in London are probably not going to look down on buses as the service is generally so good (although avoiding buses at school times is always a good idea!) and I think people outside of London in more rural areas would not think of buses as being so bad if everything was as easy and simple as possible. It's not enough to just lay on fancy new buses, or just assume that a high frequency service is the best solution.

 

[starrymarkb]

Questions I often get at work that I can't answer because the info isn't supplied to us

How much will it cost?
Is my bus on time?

I do think that a move to time based tickets would be a good idea. Though the UK does seem to have longer interurban routes then the continent.

 

[tbtc]

Flat rate fares, smartcards to avoid people being unable to travel because they only have a £20 note, real time information and next stop information will all make buses as easy to use as a train...

...I am sure many people don't fancy paying a £1.50 flat rate fare to go only a 'few stops' before having to pay another £1.50 for a second bus

That's the problem with flat rate fares - they sound great as long as you are making a long enough journey to "benefit" from the flat fare. Nice and simple, yes, but then you'll get people demanding cheaper fares for shorter journeys.

 

[bb21]

My only wish in London would be for a transfer ticket as travelling a few stops and then changing to another bus costs 2 flat fares whereas on the Tube this would only be a single fare - but this could be quite hard to engineer with a touch in only system.

Shouldn't really be that difficult.

Subsequent bus journeys are free if you touch-in within one hour, say, of the first touch-in.

 

[starrymarkb]

That's the problem with flat rate fares - they sound great as long as you are making a long enough journey to "benefit" from the flat fare. Nice and simple, yes, but then you'll get people demanding cheaper fares for shorter journeys.

A lot of continental places do a short trip ticket, often valid for 3 stops only.

I do like these German timetables, they are much clearer then the UK grids

http://www.lvb.de/file/lvb_maps/fah...Wd3aXR6L0FGUF9CVTgwXzJfMTAwMjYwM18xLlBERg==/f

 

[citybus]

One problem in cities is that people often aren't very clued up on local geography. You get people complaining that 'if I wanted to travel to my place of work I would need to get a bus in to town and then another bus out again'; whereas if they looked at a map they could see that actually if they walk 15 minutes to another bus route then they can go direct to a destination. TFL have got round this problem by having maps at every bus stop, and this should be implemented in every city. However I would like to see bus companies being more proactive about educating potential customers. A few years ago my bus company sent bus timetables in the post to every resident. I would go further by sending them letters that told them in writing what services there are in that part of the city. Something like this.

1. Your closest bus is the 25, and goes via Station Road, every 15 minutes.
2. If you want to get to the hospital, walk down High Street to Main Street, and get the 17. The extra walk is offset by the time saved not having to get two buses.
3. The bus stop in your estate only sees a half hour service, but if you walk to the main road they are much more frequent.

Advice like this demystifies timetables that can often be confusing. Bus companies would argue that tailoring information to individual parts of the city (maybe divide it up into square mile pockets) would be too time consuming for their staff, but anyone with a knowledge of a city and it's bus network could knock up a system like this in no time at all. It could well attract them new customers and is worth a try.

 

[LE Greys]

One problem in cities is that people often aren't very clued up on local geography. You get people complaining that 'if I wanted to travel to my place of work I would need to get a bus in to town and then another bus out again'; whereas if they looked at a map they could see that actually if they walk 15 minutes to another bus route then they can go direct to a destination. TFL have got round this problem by having maps at every bus stop, and this should be implemented in every city. However I would like to see bus companies being more proactive about educating potential customers. A few years ago my bus company sent bus timetables in the post to every resident. I would go further by sending them letters that told them in writing what services there are in that part of the city. Something like this.

1. Your closest bus is the 25, and goes via Station Road, every 15 minutes.
2. If you want to get to the hospital, walk down High Street to Main Street, and get the 17. The extra walk is offset by the time saved not having to get two buses.
3. The bus stop in your estate only sees a half hour service, but if you walk to the main road they are much more frequent.

Advice like this demystifies timetables that can often be confusing. Bus companies would argue that tailoring information to individual parts of the city (maybe divide it up into square mile pockets) would be too time consuming for their staff, but anyone with a knowledge of a city and it's bus network could knock up a system like this in no time at all. It could well attract them new customers and is worth a try.

Exactly! It took me a year to learn the ins and outs of buses in Aberdeen (like heading to the hospital to get a bus to the airport, or later walking up St Machar Drive accross the railway bridge to Great Northern Road). If such information had been available earlier, I wouldn't have had to spend so much money on taxis to make sure I didn't miss flights.

Although I only flew if I had a late lecture on the day I needed to leave, a train at 14:55 helped no end.

 

[JamesRowden]

One problem in cities is that people often aren't very clued up on local geography. You get people complaining that 'if I wanted to travel to my place of work I would need to get a bus in to town and then another bus out again'; whereas if they looked at a map they could see that actually if they walk 15 minutes to another bus route then they can go direct to a destination. TFL have got round this problem by having maps at every bus stop, and this should be implemented in every city. However I would like to see bus companies being more proactive about educating potential customers. A few years ago my bus company sent bus timetables in the post to every resident. I would go further by sending them letters that told them in writing what services there are in that part of the city. Something like this.

1. Your closest bus is the 25, and goes via Station Road, every 15 minutes.
2. If you want to get to the hospital, walk down High Street to Main Street, and get the 17. The extra walk is offset by the time saved not having to get two buses.
3. The bus stop in your estate only sees a half hour service, but if you walk to the main road they are much more frequent.

Advice like this demystifies timetables that can often be confusing. Bus companies would argue that tailoring information to individual parts of the city (maybe divide it up into square mile pockets) would be too time consuming for their staff, but anyone with a knowledge of a city and it's bus network could knock up a system like this in no time at all. It could well attract them new customers and is worth a try.

Traveline Website Journey Planners provide the information that people need in order use the bus (times, maps of where to walk and get on/off). There is even a simple text based website (for the South East Region, other regions probably have equivalent) that allows one to look up a journey fast on their mobile internet (no maps).

 

[LE Greys]

Ideally the two will go hand in hand, as the system that enables bus location/monitoring is likely to see a more modern ticket machine that can accept smartcards.

Uno (operator in Hertfordshire) has the GPS to provide real time info, and smartcards are accepted for bus passes, but as yet they do not have any form of payment system for ordinary punters - and no plans to do so (which presumably means Herts County Council has no immediate plans to do so around here).

Flat rate fares, smartcards to avoid people being unable to travel because they only have a £20 note, real time information and next stop information will all make buses as easy to use as a train. Good maps and timetables at bus stops showing routes (basically, just send councils down to London to see how it can be done) all helps too - along with apps that can work, like in London, to plan a route that involves more than one bus.

Oh, and ticketing (again - hopefully solved with smartcards) that are valid on more than one bus. I am sure many people don't fancy paying a £1.50 flat rate fare to go only a 'few stops' before having to pay another £1.50 for a second bus - where a daily ticket, if it exists, is probably not cheap enough.

I had plusBus and had free use of the buses all around Hatfield, for around £300 or so a year - but I can't get one now as I don't commute by train. Now I'm back to having to fumble around for change and I've had to skip the bus on more than one occasion simply because I didn't have the right money - as in only having notes.

People in London are probably not going to look down on buses as the service is generally so good (although avoiding buses at school times is always a good idea!) and I think people outside of London in more rural areas would not think of buses as being so bad if everything was as easy and simple as possible. It's not enough to just lay on fancy new buses, or just assume that a high frequency service is the best solution.

100% agreed! Both in Herts and Aberdeen, changing buses can be a pain in the backside, and flat fares can cause problems with not having the right change. The ideal solution would be some sort of interchangable ticket, or possibly smartcards (but I get a bit paranoid about them). For instance, where I live now, to go to Hitchin involves catching one bus to the Lister and another one from there. That's two fares. Generally, I walk to the next village (a mile or so) and avoid that, but it gets a bit annoying to walk back carrying stuff. In Aberdeen, it was worth getting an annual pass, which also opened up the chance to reach Deeside (although annoyingly it only covered First, not Stagecoach). It's just not worthwhile for the two-days-a-week runs into Stevenage, though, but at least Arriva still give change, despite being a bit pricey (a return to Stevenage costs £3:60, it's 1½ miles, but walking to the Lister every day saves £1).

 

[jon0844]

That's the problem with flat rate fares - they sound great as long as you are making a long enough journey to "benefit" from the flat fare. Nice and simple, yes, but then you'll get people demanding cheaper fares for shorter journeys.

Keep the flat rate fare, but just let me use my ticket within a certain time on other buses. And if the second bus takes me outside of any sort of zone, when I board that bus and ask to go to wherever, let my smartcard automatically charge only the difference (in effect an extension).

All dead simple with modern technology.

Also, these are the new style timetables being introduced by Herts County Council;



Not perfect as I don't believe at the bigger stops they have a map like London bus stops do - and as such you can find yourself having to check 10-20 timetables like this to see which ones you can take. There are still a few too many notes and other confusing additions on the page too, which - again - become more complicated at a bus stop with more than one bus!

 

[radamfi]

The Dutch smartcard system does away with zones and simply charges you a price per km, plus a 'boarding fee'. If you change buses/tram/metros within 35 minutes then you don't pay a second boarding fee, meaning that it costs the same whether you change or not.

 

[TheWalrus]

Thank you for all the responses much appreciated! loads of ideas I've never thought of. These will help me a lot!

I'm particularly interested in bus-sensitive traffic lights. How do they work?
The route I have in mind is a rural route but starts in an urban area which takes around 15 mins to get out of. If they were installed along this section of the route, would it attract customers not only from the town and surrounding suburbs but also from towns and villages further out as it'd be quicker than driving through the town?