Is Your Journey Really Necessary?

Every time I go to Mountain Ash, I feel as though I'm stepping back in time slightly. Last week, I definitely did, because I found this handy information display on the bus stop at the old Bruce Hotel. No, your eyes aren't deceiving you. Even though the photo isn't very clear, that's definitely a timetable for Spring 2003. It's been a long time since a Shamrock bus troubled the people of the Cynon Valley (thank God!)

In 'What Do You Want?' – 'Information!' , I told you about the getting-blood-from-a-stone-like process of trying to find out details of bus services in England when I was phoning from Wales. That was nearly six years ago. I've no idea whether things have improved since. I might give them a call when I can face another uphill struggle. Subsequently I've highlighted the inadequacies of the Traveline Cymru website, and the paucity of information on bus company websites. The situation is exactly the same once you log off and return to the Real World. In my local area (Aberdare), Stagecoach drivers occasionally have timetable booklets which passengers can pick up. Occasionally… However, these – by definition – list only the Stagecoach services. The various buses operated by Globe Coaches, N.A.T. Group, First Call and other local companies don't merit a mention. In fact, unless you happen to see one of these buses while you're out and about, you probably won...

We're chatting in the pub about public transport in general, and I was reminded of a news story from some years ago. It stuck in my mind because Shamrock Travel were notorious in South Wales even before this. The court case made the local newspapers and the TV news, unsurprisingly: Bus driver drank cider while at the wheel

I've never been a 'city' person as such, in spite of living, studying and/or working within fairly easy reach of Cardiff and London during my life. When I was growing up, getting to Cardiff was a long and very complicated expedition by bus (there were no trains from Aberdare until 1988.) Mother always hated the drive into the city centre, so we used to visit Swansea out of preference. That was where we did our Xmas shopping every year. Cardiff was an occasional necessary evil, best avoided if we had the choice. Now, in 2013, the train to Cardiff takes about an hour. On the other hand, you can get to Swansea from Aberdare, but it takes ages, involves two different companies and at least one change of buses. There's no possibility of getting there by public transport if you're working normal office hours, and you can forget any idea of getting home after the shops close. (See A Letter to the Editor 6 .) So it goes… Even when I was at university only an hour away from...

A word of warning: If you thought Space was complicated, wait until you start thinking about Time. As Cypher says in The Matrix , 'Hang onto your hat, Dorothy, because Kansas is going bye-bye.' Most scientists will point out that what we call 'time' is merely a way of rationalising the implications of the Second Law of Thermodynamics – the famous one about Entropy tending to a maximum. This means that the energy in a closed system will spread itself out evenly over time. In layman's terms, it means that complex systems inevitably break down into simpler, more stable elements, as the energy involved in holding them together dissipates. Elaborate structures decompose into their component parts. A pint glass dropped onto a solid surface (such as the tiled concrete floor of this pub) will shatter into a hundred pieces. The energy stored during the process of creating the object is released in a small 'explosion' of kinetic energy (as the pieces fly around the pu...

This one was written in April 2002, and sent to the South Wales Echo , who declined to print it. It's a follow-up to the earlier (published) A Letter to the Editor 1 . . On September 27 last year, you printed a letter from me in which I suggested that Shamrock Coaches had developed a Stealth Bus, invisible to all forms of detection. I am pleased to report that I have just returned from a Public Enquiry into Shamrock Coaches at Rhondda Magistrates' Court, held over three days under the chairmanship of Traffic Commissioner David Dixon. The experience has been, to say the least, enlightening. During the enquiry, Mr Clayton Jones wove a tangled web of conspiracy theories involving various arms of the Vehicle Inspectorate, Rhondda Cynon Taff County Borough Council, the police, head teachers of schools throughout south Wales, the Traffic Area Office, and a powerful supercomputer, which is apparently situated somewhere in Pontypridd and has the ability to alter time and space. I suspe...

I used to be a prolific letter-writer to the local press. This one was published in the South Wales Echo . It appeared on my day off, so I didn't know it had gone into print until the following day. Apparently the lads in Mulligan's (our lunchtime local, in Cardiff) laughed so loudly when they read it that Jeff and Laurie (my work colleagues) were surprised I didn't hear them from my house, some twenty miles away. Your little jibe (Editorial, September 21) about buses running on time made me wonder about the parallels between UFO sightings and bus non-sightings. Both UFOs and missing buses are frequently reported by a wide cross-section of the public, regardless of their age, gender or religious background. Both phenomena used to excite a great deal of interest by local newspapers and TV stations, but are now largely disregarded. Reliable witness testimony is usually met with disbelief, if not outright scorn, by the bodies concerned with their official investigation. UFO ab...