School buses registered as local bus services

[edwin_m]

I would imagine the method of payment would have to be reasonably available to anyone who wants to use the bus. TfL can argue that anyone can get an Oyster, and TfL is covered by different rules anyway.

 

[34D]

To expand further, from https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/revised-statutory-guidance-on-local-bus-services

Schools and works services may be local bus services if the users pay a separate fare but do not need to be registered if someone other than the bus operator is responsible for arranging the journey, and the journey is not advertised beforehand to the general public, and all passengers travel to or from the same place, and passengers pay the same fare no matter how far they travel

 

[PG]

In my territory (north yorks county council) some school tenders are allowed to be registered as scheduled services _if_ the operator provides capacity over and above the contract stipulations.

Other tenders (example, a primary school one I know of) state "this service must not be registered with the traffic commissioner" or similar words.

That is quite common with local authority transport contracts - on the one hand they realise they'll likely get cheaper tenders if operators are able to claim BSOG but on the other hand have to consider the safety angle of permitting any member of the public (eg sex offenders) to travel on what is ostensibly a school bus, especially so with primary pupils.

 

[AnonymousUser1]

In my territory (north yorks county council) some school tenders are allowed to be registered as scheduled services _if_ the operator provides capacity over and above the contract stipulations.

Other tenders (example, a primary school one I know of) state "this service must not be registered with the traffic commissioner" or similar words.
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one would assume that in the case of services for primary and special schools, this is a safeguarding requirement and consequently i'm sure the tender values will reflect this.

 

[poshfan]

Avoid school buses like the plague if you value your sanity.

 

[Rhydgaled]

Interesting develpment, what happens with these services when the schools are on holiday?
If they are school specials then they wont run but if (as stated) they are 'normal' services then they will have to run incurring the extra costs associated with them but not actually raising any revenue!

There must be a market from normal passengers or else the company has made a bit of a mistake.

Can't they just advertise the journeys as running on schooldays only?

My local operator does exactly that with some services. Other services run different routes (diverting to serve one school or another, and in one case leaving earlier and taking a more direct route to be at the school when needed) on schooldays only. There's also one route, and a couple of duplication workings on another, which run college days only.

I've been looking into some of the school services in the area recently due to threats of service cuts. There are still rather a lot of school-only services which aren't general public bus services and I was thinking that openning up these to the public might be a good way of maintaining (or improving, some areas served by the school services don't have regular buses at all) bus services while making cuts. I suppose it depends on the buses having spare capacity for the general public though.

One thing that supprised me was that a number of schools have fairly wildly different start/finish times to each other, wheras the three colleges are all 9am-4pm I think. In one case the school and college (close to each other) started half an hour apart I think, which makes it impossible for the (roughly hourly) to serve both effectively.

 

[edwin_m]

Sometimes the difference in school start/finish times will allow the same bus to make trips for two different schools.

I'm not sure combining school and general community buses makes that much sense. School start times are too early for pensioner passes and for many shopping/leisure users, but probably a bit on the late side for work commuters, and the shops and jobs aren't necessarily in the same places as the schools. And as mentioned many potential passengers would not wish to travel on a bus that is primarily used by schoolkids.

On the other hand if a bus has to do morning and afternoon school runs it is available for shopping etc journeys during the day at marginal cost.

 

[northwichcat]

One thing that supprised me was that a number of schools have fairly wildly different start/finish times to each other, wheras the three colleges are all 9am-4pm I think. In one case the school and college (close to each other) started half an hour apart I think, which makes it impossible for the (roughly hourly) to serve both effectively.

That's one thing that's changed in Cheshire recently.

The High Schools have generally changed their days to have starting/finishing times closer to the local primary school times with shorter breaks to compensate, so there isn't a high school next to a primary school where the finish times are different by 30 minutes.

In terms of colleges Sir John Deanes and Mid-Cheshire are about 10 minutes from each other and now have shared buses. It works by, in the morning the bus usually goes from it's origin to Mid-Cheshire via John Deanes and in the afternoon it starts at John Deanes and then goes via Mid-Cheshire to it's destination.
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On the other hand if a bus has to do morning and afternoon school runs it is available for shopping etc journeys during the day at marginal cost.

Depends what type of bus is used. An old 70 seater double decker used on a school/college contract isn't what's needed on an infrequent village service. It may even be cheaper to send the same driver back to the depot to switch the decker for a minibus.