Leeds pick up point

[YorkshireRider]

Is there a worse pick up point at any other UK rail station? Probably,but something needs to be done at Leeds, it's causing tailbacks and congestion especially on Fridays and Sundays. Its too small and not fit for purpose.The tailbacks can go back down Whitehall Road a good 1/3 of a mile at certain times, delaying cars and buses that are just trying to get into Leeds and don't even want the station. I think the short stay car park needs to go and just make one big pick up point (you could then make some short stay provision in the multi story car park). Also it may be an idea to allow private hire taxis to drop off only at the front end of the station, using the bus stop at the entrance where the city bus currently stops, u could allocate another stop for that bus.

 

[leedstraindude]

The multi story is currently full by 8.30am most weekdays and the longstay full by 10am a lot of days so getting rid of the short stay and using either of those is not an option.

Ive thought a couple of time if network rail could compulsory purchase that bit of and that empty between Aire Street and Wellington street, that could be developed into a drop off with a one way system, you could enter vie Aire street and out onto Wellington Street.
Also another big cause of congestion in that area, though not right next to the station itself is the second set of lights where Northern Street intersect Whitehall Road. The people who insist n turning right there who hold everyone up who wants to go straight on really do my nut and you frequently end up with onyl 2-3 cars going through at a time cause of that. A reprogramming of the lights there would help there a lot.

 

[IanD]

Also a problem is people who insist on sitting and waiting in the pick up area. Someone should monitor the area and move on any car that is not in the process of picking up or dropping off. It doesn't help that you have to pay to park in the short stay bit (even with a blue badge) which just encourages people to wait in the pick up area.

 

[Oswyntail]

Also a problem is people who insist on sitting and waiting in the pick up area. .....

Often taxis! (See elsewhere for comment). But if you have crawled along in the queue and your passenger is not obviously there, what do you do? In this respect, it does not help to have Wetherspoons there. This means that the area is often very crowded with people who are not waiting to be picked up, so noticing and being noticed is often impossible. But there is never any form of crowd control there. The area would be just about right for a station the size of Ilkley, but is just badly planned.

 

[jopsuk]

Cambridge pick up/set down is pretty bad, often blocks the buses, exit from taxi rank. Will be entirely changed by the new road layout in the redevelopment.

 

[Muzer]

Andover's pick-up/set-down area is/was (can't remember if it still exists, even) set-down only to solve that particular problem.

Of course, people still used it as a pick-up area.

 

[noddingdonkey]

Also a problem is people who insist on sitting and waiting in the pick up area. Someone should monitor the area and move on any car that is not in the process of picking up or dropping off. It doesn't help that you have to pay to park in the short stay bit (even with a blue badge) which just encourages people to wait in the pick up area.

Not sure how that would work in practice without somewhere to park up while you wait for the passenger you are picking up to get off their train. Particularly as you cannot predict how quickly you'll be able to get from the train to the pick up area, especially if you boarded at an unstaffed station and the guard was unable to issue tickets so you have to suffer the ticket office queues before getting through the barrier.

 

[IanD]

Not sure how that would work in practice without somewhere to park up while you wait for the passenger you are picking up to get off their train. Particularly as you cannot predict how quickly you'll be able to get from the train to the pick up area, especially if you boarded at an unstaffed station and the guard was unable to issue tickets so you have to suffer the ticket office queues before getting through the barrier.

With all the technology now available, it should be a surmountable problem.

For example, when picking my daughters up at Milton Keynes station at peak times (when there is total gridlock despite the new layout that was supposed to solve this), I wait close to the station and they call me on arrival and then I tell them where I'm going to be after assessing the traffic situation.

(I used to pick them up at the bottom of the station car park lift round the back but London Midland have now deemed this practice unsafe and closed the lift so adding to the congestion out front.)

 

[Condor7]

Also a problem is people who insist on sitting and waiting in the pick up area. Someone should monitor the area and move on any car that is not in the process of picking up or dropping off. It doesn't help that you have to pay to park in the short stay bit (even with a blue badge) which just encourages people to wait in the pick up area.

The small short stay car park is often full at busy times so that is not always an option, and if that is full and you have arranged to pick someone up and they are running late, there is literally nowhere to go!

 

[Dewedin]

There's no excuse for waiting in the pick up point (which I believe is actually illegal). Drivers should wait somewhere else and only turn up when they are sure their passenger is waiting. If they aren't there when you show up, you should go away, drive around for a few minutes and come back. Blocking it up is selfish.

 

[shinkansen1966]

Why on earth would anyone want to drive into Leeds ? There are buses and trains which go there.

 

[Bayum]

Why on earth would anyone want to drive into Leeds ? There are buses and trains which go there.

My bus is a good ten minute walk from the station to Park Row, then another fourty minutes home. If I can get a lift from Leeds, I and others along my bus route will clearly want to get lifts out where available.

Just because Leeds has bus services at the station and a busy train side of the station doesn't mean that a train out to Horsforth or Crossgates will be there as you get off your train. There are all manner of reasons that people rely on being picked up than awaiting public transport.

 

[Tetchytyke]

Because public transport in West Yorkshire on evenings and Sundays is abysmal?

 

[YorkshireBear]

Because public transport in West Yorkshire on evenings and Sundays is abysmal?

That is a polite way of putting it.

 

[shinkansen1966]

Because public transport in West Yorkshire on evenings and Sundays is abysmal?

You are going to meet someone off a train in Leeds. They have arrived by train. And you cannot arrive into Leeds by train too ?

Confused....

 

[Oswyntail]

You are going to meet someone off a train in Leeds. They have arrived by train. And you cannot arrive into Leeds by train too ?

Confused....

Yes? You see, Leeds does not have a convenient tube network running through the evening, complemented by a comprehensive bus network. Nor do the train services to the remoter outposts continue regularly up to midnight. This is why people are waiting to be "picked up". Of course it is different in North London...

 

[Bayum]

You are going to meet someone off a train in Leeds. They have arrived by train. And you cannot arrive into Leeds by train too ?

Confused....

Basically, we don't all live in London, where the vast reaches of the city are reachable by train...

You only have to look at the wymetro map to see that there are massive areas where trains don't visit. The areas that do can have abysmal times as well...

http://www.wymetro.com/uploadedImages/WYMetro/Content/TicketsAndPasses/railnetmap.jpg


For instance Wetherby doesn't have a train station, nor do many of the villages and towns along the A58.

Roundhay and Harehills lack railway stations and bus services depart way away from the main station - imagine carrying luggage with you for ten minutes, then walking through the aforementioned areas?

 

[Tetchytyke]

You are going to meet someone off a train in Leeds. They have arrived by train. And you cannot arrive into Leeds by train too?

On a Sunday, how do you get from Featherstone to Leeds by train?

 

[shinkansen1966]

On a Sunday, how do you get from Featherstone to Leeds by train?

If you are going to Leeds to pick up someone at the station there (as being discussed in this thread), how about arranging to pick your contact at another station - eg Wakefield Wg or Kg, Pontefract or South Elmsall or Cross Gates ?

Or take the bus from Castleford to Leeds (change en route) ?

 

[shinkansen1966]

imagine carrying luggage with you for ten minutes, then walking through the aforementioned areas?

Yes, I can imagine carrying my luggage with me for 10 minutes.

I do the 10 minute walk every time I walk from my house to my nearest tube station - whenever I am going away for a break.

Not having a car means every single trip from my house begins with either
- a 10 min walk to the tube
- a 30 min push bike ride to work
- a 5 min walk to the bus stop
- a 5 min push bike ride to the shop or supermarket

 

[Oswyntail]

Yes, I can imagine carrying my luggage with me for 10 minutes.

I do the 10 minute walk every time I walk from my house to my nearest tube station - whenever I am going away for a break.

Not having a car means every single trip from my house begins with either
- a 10 min walk to the tube
- a 30 min push bike ride to work
- a 5 min walk to the bus stop
- a 5 min push bike ride to the shop or supermarket

I am sure you keep yourself very fit. But the state of public transport in the real world of West Yorkshire means that not only do the (poor) bus services not co-ordinate with the rail station, but they are also quite likely to go nowhere near where you need to get to. And be cancelled at the drop of a hat.

 

[HowardGWR]

I am sure you keep yourself very fit. But the state of public transport in the real world of West Yorkshire means that not only do the (poor) bus services not co-ordinate with the rail station, but they are also quite likely to go nowhere near where you need to get to. And be cancelled at the drop of a hat.

Just out of interest, it was quoted that the bus station is a long way from Leeds station, but I notice a lot of bus stops near the latter. How many out of town services (what percentage roughly) actually go past the station? I would imagine that most from the west and north west would, but it looks a bit more dodgy from the south east.

 

[Bayum]

Just out of interest, it was quoted that the bus station is a long way from Leeds station, but I notice a lot of bus stops near the latter. How many out of town services (what percentage roughly) actually go past the station? I would imagine that most from the west and north west would, but it looks a bit more dodgy from the south east.

Not many:

http://www.wymetro.com/BusTravel/BusStationsAndStops/LeedsStationInterchange/


And then these from Infirmary Street:

http://www.wymetro.com/BusTravel/BusStationsAndStops/LeedsInfirmaryStreetBusPointstatistics/

After a long journey, or on a weekday/weekend evening, most of the buses drop down massively in their frequencies, then journies on some routes are longer as it's later at night etc.


This argument is really a no-brainer. Leeds doesn't have the facilities that London has - we don't have bus stops within ten minutes walk, let alone tube stations to take us to a variety of mainline rail stations... We don't have buses on high frequencies in the outer areas, so nor should we be expected to use public transport from Leeds, to get a bus out from the station... Or even worse, catch a train to yet another station, then a bus with even less frequency that still doesn't get you home...

 

[Condor7]

There's no excuse for waiting in the pick up point (which I believe is actually illegal). Drivers should wait somewhere else and only turn up when they are sure their passenger is waiting. If they aren't there when you show up, you should go away, drive around for a few minutes and come back. Blocking it up is selfish.

Well of course who can argue with that, in an ideal world that is what should happen, however it is never going to happen with most people, and maybe more would if there was actually somewhere to go where you could park up but there is not if the short stay is full.
Also if the person you pick up or you yourself do not have a mobile phone how do you actually know they are there?
Perhaps the best thing would have been for someone who designed such a complex building had put a little more thought into the short stay area. We are talking about one of the major cities of England with one of the busiest railway stations outside London and they provide a small car park for no more than a couple dozen cars and the tiniest drop off point (as someone said more suitable for Ilkley rather than Leeds.
Let's not put the blame entirely on the drivers.

 

[Grumpy]

Just out of interest, it was quoted that the bus station is a long way from Leeds station, but I notice a lot of bus stops near the latter. How many out of town services (what percentage roughly) actually go past the station? I would imagine that most from the west and north west would, but it looks a bit more dodgy from the south east.

I suspect no-one on here will be able to answer your question. However the map on the attached link gives a fair illustration of where the bus routes go

http://www.wymetro.com/uploadedFiles/WYMetro/Content/BusTravel/maps_and_guides/Leeds_WTCYB.pdf

The problem is that this doesn't show frequencies i.e. you cant tell from the map which is a 1 bus an hour route or a 6 bus an hour route.

Most bus passengers of course aren't travelling to use trains but to go to work, shop, study etc. elsewhere in the city centre and the buses must go where the passengers want. To be fair to the PTE over the years they have done quite a bit to improve bus access to the railway station area, by such means as crosslinking routes or extending services from the east, previously terminating at the bus station, to terminate closer to the railway station. Also of course improving access across the city centre.

The bus station is a bit of a joke. It used to be called "Central" bus station but it is well to the east of the city centre, even more so as the area around the railway station has developed in recent years. There have been several opportunities to relocate closer to the railway station and commercial centre in recent years but the PTE haven't been interested. Similar opportunities have been missed to move the bus stations at Halifax and Keighley close to the railway stations, again preferring to spend money on rebuilding. The PTE seems to have been more interested in chucking money away on grand projects such as guided busways, trams and trolleybuses rather than better integration and simple bus park and ride .

However this is a little irrelevant to the original posting. If the railway wishes to attract passengers it need to offer good interchange and that includes people using cars either parking or being dropped/collected. If granny,student daughter etc. with their cases cant be picked up then some rail journeys wont be made. As stated above the present set up is a shambles throughout the day and if passenger growth continues it will get worse. Meanwhile they are proposing to spend tens of millions constructing (and then lots more on staffing) a new southern entrance which will probably only be used a couple of hours a day m-f. Then along come the HS2 planners proposing a separate station a good 10-15 minutes walk to the south and even further away from the buses/commercial centre.

All these threads need bringing together but no-one seems to be doing it.

(Apologies to Bayum and Condor 7-it took me so long to write my reply (other things to do) I didn't see yours which are spot on)

 

[Tetchytyke]

If you are going to Leeds to pick up someone at the station there (as being discussed in this thread), how about arranging to pick your contact at another station - eg Wakefield Wg or Kg, Pontefract or South Elmsall or Cross Gates

I feel that you somewhat missed my point.

Public transport on evenings and Sundays in West Yorkshire is appalling. Pontefract has one train every two hours from Leeds.

The lack of onward connections in the evening and on Sundays means more people have to drive. The lack of appropriate waiting facilities at Leeds means that there are queues and congestion.

 

[shinkansen1966]

The lack of appropriate waiting facilities at Leeds means that there are queues and congestion.

How about meeting your pick up at another station eg Wakefield Westgate or Doncaster or Coss Gates ?

There are regular inter city train services from Wakefield and Doncaster to many parts of the UK and arranging to meet someone at these, might be more appealing than meeting at Leeds.

There are Sunday hourly trains to Cross Gate for those travelling on the TransPenine route. This could be an alternative to Leeds ?

Happy to help with alternatives pick up stations instead of Leeds. I speak from experience. It's best to get in and out of Leeds by train and arrange to meet your driver pick up at another station - based on frequency of local services and accessibility to destination for the car leg of the trip.

 

[shinkansen1966]

...nor should we be expected to use public transport...

Then continue using your car and deal with the consequences.

 

[shinkansen1966]

I am sure you keep yourself very fit.

Depends if you think walking for 10 mins is being 'very fit'.

Just get on with business of getting myself from A to B by foot, bicycle or public transport. Thinking of mobility here not fitness.

 

[Muzer]

How about meeting your pick up at another station eg Wakefield Westgate or Doncaster or Coss Gates ?

There are regular inter city train services from Wakefield and Doncaster to many parts of the UK and arranging to meet someone at these, might be more appealing than meeting at Leeds.

There are Sunday hourly trains to Cross Gate for those travelling on the TransPenine route. This could be an alternative to Leeds ?

Happy to help with alternatives pick up stations instead of Leeds. I speak from experience. It's best to get in and out of Leeds by train and arrange to meet your driver pick up at another station - based on frequency of local services and accessibility to destination for the car leg of the trip.

Really confused. I assumed this was about eg picking people up to take them somewhere suburban/residential, in which case unless you're very lucky, there will be no sensible way to get there from the station without a car. Please correct me if I'm wrong about any of this.

Are you suggesting the person doing the picking up should instead park their car at Leeds station, and go on the train to meet someone at another station, only to go back to Leeds and go in the car? Because that seems a bit wasteful.

Or are you suggesting they drive (perhaps significantly) further just because (what is presumably) a rather major station has poor car facilities?