Is Your Journey Really Necessary?

I had an email from Transport for Wales earlier this week, outlining their new measures to tackle the plague. They've also published some 'activities' for schoolchildren who are stuck at home – puzzles, word searches, colouring sheets (design your own livery for a train) … that sort of thing. One that caught my eye was an invitation to draw your ideal railway network on a blank map of Wales. It really is a blank map, as well. None of the cities or major towns are marked, so the housebound kids have only an outline of the country to work from. The biggest irony is that Wales did have a pretty decent railway network once upon a time. A century ago, in fact. Have a look at this outline map of South Wales, which I found online. https://images.app.goo.gl/VXTxGwNH7VrEp5RW9 And that's only the area which will be (mostly) covered by the South Wales Metro and its Swansea Bay counterpart. (Assuming the money doesn't run out once the European funding dries up, of course.) I...

One aspect of public transport I've yet to mention is one of the oldest surviving modes: the taxi. I've decided to tackle this issue for a couple of reasons, which I'll discuss in more detail below. Even though we've come a long way from the era of the hansom cab (invented in 1843), the basic principle remains the same as it did in Victorian times. Let's take a secenario from one of Conan Doyle's famous stories: a bloke sits around in Baker Street in a black horse-drawn vehicle, chain-smoking, chatting to the other drivers, drinking tea and reading a paper. Suddenly Holmes throws open the door of the vehicle, leaps inside and shouts, 'Whitechapel, my good man – and ride like the wind!' The driver has done The Knowledge, of course, so finding his way through the foggy streets isn't a problem. Holmes pays him when they reach their destination and goes off in search of whichever ne'er-do-well he's pursuing. Meanwhile, the driver presumably sit...

A friend of mine has recently moved from Aberdare to Talbot Green. I haven't been there for ages, but I do know that it's pretty much at the centre of a large (and growing) area encompassing Llantrisant (old and new), Pontyclun, Beddau, Ty Nant, and the surrounding villages and large new-build estates. It's a couple of bus stops from the Royal Glamorgan Hospital, so there's a 'direct' bus route from Pontypridd to Bridgend, serving the hospital during the day. Situated just off the M4 and twenty minutes from Cardiff by train, Talbot Green Bus Station and Pontyclun Railway Station should be ideal transport hubs. Should … I've been investigating various ways for my friend and I to meet up and have the occasional break from the Valleys routine. I'll go into my findings about the buses another time. For this entry, though, I want to highlight the situation facing rail passengers travelling to and from Pontyclun. Technically speaking, Pontyclun forms part of...

This kinda forms a supplement to my previous entry. That outlined the difficulties posed by having so many different transport operators in South-east Wales, and no overall structure to make ticketing easy and affordable. My friend and I are planning a trip to Caerphilly Castle (weather permitting, of course). Problem: find the cheapest way of doing it. You see, we'd initially have to pay to get from beyond Aberdare to Caerphilly – by bus and/or train – and then pay to get into the castle. Not cheap, as you'll see from the tables below. But luckily for us, I know the area quite well as I've travelled it extensively over the last forty years. I know bus routes have changed – and timetables and fares have certainly changed – but the basic framework is still there. I also get newsletters from the public transport providers, so I get to hear about their special offers. Summer is always a good time for these because it's tourist season. The real trick is to combine as m...

On my birthday three years ago, I was making my regular visit to London when the front page of the Western Mail caught my eye in Cardiff. I can't remember the exact headline , but it seemed that a committee of the Welsh Assembly had recommended an Oyster-style card covering the whole of Wales. The first thing that came into my head was 'What a good idea!' As a frequent visitor to London, I'd found out just how efficiently the Oyster card allows you to travel around the city. I'd also found out how much money it can save you over a period of time. (Or even a single day, when you compare it to the Travelcard.) I bought the paper and read the full story on the coach. The second thing that came into my head was 'What a stupid idea!' You see, the contrast between London and Wales couldn't be more apparent. Greater London is pretty much one continuous, flattish, dense urban sprawl covering over 1,500 square kilometres. It's criss-crossed by dozens of...

About six weeks ago I decided to initiate Operation Motorcycle Silencer for the fourth year in a row. Every summer Aberdare Park hosts the Welsh National Road Races, organised by the Aberaman Motorcycle Club. I don't begrudge it for a second, because it brings a welcome boost to our local economy, it's a chance for old friends to catch up and to make new friends, and it puts one of the finest Victorian municipal parks in Wales firmly on the map. But (as you can probably imagine) it's a fairly loud affair. Even though modern bikes run a lot more quietly than their older brothers, you bring a couple of thousand of the buggers into one place and the noise level soon becomes pretty challenging. As I live literally two streets from the circuit, as often as possible I've decided to spend the Saturday as far from Trecynon as I can possibly be. After receiving a 25% discount voucher from National Express, and with the latest copy-edit running on schedule, it seemed that Lo...

Next week I'm planning a day trip to Bristol, and I need to be a short distance outside the city centre by 12.30 p.m. Considering that Bristol Temple Meads lies on a direct route from Cardiff Central, that should be a piece of piss. Shouldn't it? You might think that – I couldn't possibly comment. To make sure I'm where I need to be in good time (and even that isn't guaranteed, of course), I'll have to arrive at Temple Meads at 1119. That gives me ample time to catch the bus to Bedminster and find the right place. (Any later and it'll be cutting things too fine.) So that puts me on the 1030 departure from Cardiff Central. And here's the problem. To get to Cardiff Central in time for 1030, I'd have to catch the 0922 train from Aberdare – eight minutes before the off-peak fares kick in. (According to raileasy.trainsplit.com I'd have to catch the 0852. I don't know whether they allow a margin of error for changing platforms.) Either wa...

Let me explain … Some years ago, when I first got into the Observer 's fiendish Azed crossword, one of the clues was 'Tonite, in an FM special, the newsroom variety show'. I must have had a moment of inspiration, because I realised that the first four words of the clue were an anagram of the solution: INFOTAINMENT. Anyway, this is a media word for the media itself – the sort of blended news and feature items that make up a typical edition of The One Show . I mention it here, because I spotted a poster on a Transport for Wales train last Monday. It shows their timeline of proposed improvements over the next five years or so. One of these highlights is 'free infotainment'. At which point my blood ran cold. Having spent a lot of time on Cardiff buses in the last fifteen years or so, I have a horrible feeling that the content will probably involve live streaming of the BBC News channel. You see, I think I must have missed the announcement in the papers when...

I spotted this picture in Aberdare Library, and thought I'd share it with you. Could this be the Spring 2019 advertising campaign for Transport for Wales? Or is it a bit optimistic?

Most of the time, at least, the good people at Transport for London really understand how public transport needs to work. (I've got some examples of when it doesn't work, which I'll show you again.) They've announced a new innovation this week, called the Hopper fare. I don't know how it would work in practice, but here's the blurb from the TfL website: Make a journey using pay as you go (contactless or Oyster) on a bus or tram, and you can now make unlimited bus and tram journeys for free within one hour of first touching in. Touch in using the same card on all the bus and tram journeys you make and the free fares will be applied automatically. Hopper fares apply to all pay as you go journeys. You can now travel on Tube, DLR, London Overground, TfL Rail, Emirates Air Line, River Bus or National Rail services between Hopper journeys, and Hopper fares will still apply. Hopper fares will not apply if your Oyster card has a negative pay as you go balance af...

A friend of mine is planning a trip to Poole in Dorset in the new year. (I won't go into details, but it involves stuff that young people do on smartphones, apparently.) Needless to say, she's called on my services as an independent travel consultant to plan out a route for her. Easier said than done. I was in my local library earlier, armed with Stuart K. Baker's indispensable Rail Atlas: Great Britain and Ireland (12th edition), and Ian Allan's companion book British Railways Pre-grouping Atlas and Gazetteer . (Both books are from my personal reference library – Aberdare doesn't have anything like those on the shelves – but I wanted to use the Wi-Fi.) Here's what I've found so far: The Somerset and Dorset Joint Committee (a 'joint' line operated by Midland Railways and London & South Western) had what looks to be a nice route through Radstock, Shepton Mallet, Wincanton, Sturminster Newton and Blandford Forum. That was back in the days o...

Yesterday evening I switched on Radio 4's PM to be shocked by the first thing I heard. The Indian government has announced plans to build a bullet train , capable of reaching over 200 mph, with help from the Japanese. Operating between Ahmedabad and Mumbai, the project is expected to be completed in just five years' time. It was this shock headline that's forced me to issue this public apology to the Indian government today. Several times in this blog I've referred to Wales as having 'a Third World' public transport system. In the light of the news from India yesterday, it seems that it's nowhere near that good. Sorry to anyone living in the developing industrial nations for any offence I may have caused.  

I know I've discussed this subject several times already, but I'm going to revisit it with good reason. Over the past couple of weeks, new bus stop indicators have been erected on routes in and around Aberdare. The main reason for the change seems to be that the new signs include up-to-date contact details for Traveline Cymru. Here are the old and new signs from the same location – outside Aberdare Library – so you can see the difference for yourselves.             I think the new signs look much clearer than the old ones, some of which were really starting to show their age. In addition, they no longer list services like the X55 (Aberdare to Swansea) which were discontinued the best part of a decade ago. But there's a snag. Have a look at the whole signpost. Have you spotted it yet? Yeah, you've got it – there's nowhere for the timetable(s) to be displayed. On the old stands (or a fair percentage of them, at least), there was a rectangular panel at approxi...

On Saturday, two friends and I travelled from Cardiff to London by National Express coach. Yesterday I received a market research email asking for my feedback on the journey. Here's what I told them: I booked three seats on 31 May 2017, to travel on 29 July. Two months' clear notice. We were unable to sit close to each other because a large family was monopolising one seat each (to the extent of placing luggage on vacant seats), and ended up sitting some distance apart for the entire journey. We were travelling light. If we'd had luggage, we would have observed the guidelines and placed it in the baggage compartment – not taken it on board, so it would fill up a seat which someone had paid for well in advance. The British railway companies sell pre-booked seats (not tickets – seats), and National Express would do well to follow their example. This morning I received the following reply: Dear Steve, Thank you for taking time to submit your review. I am really sorry you were ...

A few weeks ago an old friend of mine invited to me to a one-day programme of talks at Swansea University's Singleton Park campus, at which she was delivering the keynote address. I provisionally agreed to go along, depending on public transport and other factors. I did some research online first, of course, before committing myself to what was going to be a lengthy and expensive day out. As it was going to be a fairly late finish, the bus wasn't an option. There hasn't been a direct service from Aberdare to Swansea for about ten years; I can't tell you when it ceased to operate, because it just vanished without any warning one day. (Even though it's still advertised on the stops in Trecynon, good luck to anyone expecting to catch it.) It is still possible to get to Swansea by bus, but – as you'll see – it involves a great deal of fucking around en route. Because they rarely, if ever, venture over the county boundaries, buses in what used to be the eastern part...