Is Your Journey Really Necessary?

I had an email last week from National Express, offering me 25% off my next return journey. Since I've never been one to pass up a day in London, I decided to book my journey this morning. My first attempt ended in disaster when the site wouldn't even load. (Mind you, I was using the piss-poor wifi in Aberdare Library, so I wasn't especially surprised.) The second attempt at logging into the site via the link in the email was slightly more successful. Unfortunately, the site didn't give me the offer of Cardiff University as a departure point. Cardiff Bus Station closed on 1 August for 'redevelopment', so the National Express services have been relocated to Sophia Gardens. It's about a fifteen minute walk from Cardiff Central Station to Sophia Gardens. National Express expect passengers to be at the departure point ten minutes before the advertised time. That's far too narrow a window when you're travelling into Cardiff by train. The Valley Lines curr...

The South Wales newspapers have run three stories about public transport in as many days. I thought I'd summarise them here. On June 28, Rhodri Clark reported that bus use in Wales has fallen to its lowest since records began in 1982. (The witty headline to the piece alludes to the fact that everyone in Wales – except me, because I know half the drivers by name anyway – will call the man behind the wheel 'Drive' when they get on or off the bus.) In 2013-14, 107 million passenger journeys were made on Welsh buses. This nadir coincided with the Welsh Government's decision to cut subsidies by 25%. Further reductions in services are planned as cash-strapped local authorities struggle to balance the books. I know correlation doesn't necessarily imply causation, but it's difficult not to draw your own conclusions, isn't it? According to the industry body CPT Cymru, some 800 services have been axed across the country. Passenger numbers fell by a further 3.3% in 201...

Last week I had to visit Prince Charles Hospital, the large general hospital outside Merthyr Tydfil. I've mentioned the bus journey previously, in The Last Bus From the Cynon Valley , so I don't need to go into too much detail here. Suffice it to say that it took just under an hour and a half to travel from Aberdare town centre to the hospital entrance. Over a third of that was made up of the journey (Stagecoach route 9) from Aberdare to Merthyr Tydfil itself, calling at Trecynon, Penywaun, Hirwaun, the out of town shopping centre, and Parc Keir Hardie. Once you arrive in Merthyr, there's an interval of 'up to' ten minutes before the 27 bus pulls in. The bus itself takes a circuitous route through the town centre, then travels through the outskirts to the Gurnos housing estate. Once it enters the Gurnos, it seems to travel down each and every street in a strange figure-of-eight loop. (I'd love to see it superimposed on a map. I might try sketching it myself, act...

Ever since bus deregulation in October 1986, a number of small operators have been able to enter a marketplace previously dominated by the National Bus Company (in its many regional subdivisions). As far as the travelling public are concerned, it has been a two-edged sword. The previous state monopoly was overthrown for purely ideological reasons. It was the same free-market 'logic' that led to the privatization of British Rail soon afterwards. Almost… Ask anyone in London (i.e. the 'Westminster Bubble' of politicians, think-tanks and media types) what effect bus deregulation had on services, and they'll tell you: none whatsoever! In the capital, deregulation never happened. Everywhere else, there was a free market free-for all, as I told you in Nice Work If You Can Get There . Initially, at least, deregulation drove prices down as competing operators fought over the plum routes. Eventually, of course, the status quo was resumed. The Tories' much-vaunted 'co...

I still haven't finished working on the second half of my analysis of bus services within the Cynon Valley. I know it's taking ages, but every time I start making progress the companies change their timetables again. The most recent changes I heard about only a couple of weeks ago. It appears that services after the evening 'rush hour' (or what passes for rush hour in the Valleys, anyway) have been drastically curtailed. I'm reliably informed that after 6 p.m. you'll be unable to catch a bus to Llwydcoed, Cwmbach or Cwmdare. That puts these outlying districts on a par with Penderyn, Rhigos, Abernant, Perthcelyn and Cefnpennar, with no services at all on Sundays either. It's always baffled me why there's such a rapid drop in services after 6 p.m and at weekends. Logic would suggest that there'd be more demand for public transport, not less. After you get home from work, it's nice to go out for a couple of pints in the evening. Young people, too, ...

In Nice Work If You Can Get There I recounted the sad tale of the Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway Tunnel. The line through the mountain connected Blaencwm, north of Treherbert, to Blaengwynfi, high above the Afan Valley, and thence to Port Talbot. It was closed in the mid-1960s as part of the Beeching review of the British rail network. As Kerry Hamilton and Stephen Potter pointed out in their book Losing Track (Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1985), the cost of maintaining the tunnel was a key factor in its closure – even though it shouldn't have been a consideration. Suddenly, however, the Rhondda Tunnel is firmly back on the map. There's an ambitious proposal to reopen it to walkers and cyclists, and add it to the network of cycle paths which criss-cross the Valleys. Last night, a meeting was held in Treorchy to discuss the scheme. I'd planned to go over, but the weather forecast talked in ominous tones of snow moving in throughout the day. As it's difficult enough to g...

I used my Oyster Card for the first time last Monday (29 September), on a day trip to London. I've had it for about a year, but owing to cirumstances beyond my control I didn't have chance to use it until then. It still had the initial £5.00 credit from when I first ordered it. After checking out the Transport for London website, I decided to put an extra £5.00 onto it to tide me over. I used the TfL website to add a fiver about three weeks ago. I had an email telling me that it was only valid for seven days, and needed to be 'activated' at my nominated station (Earls Court) before it would be added to my balance. If it wasn't activated, it would be automatically refunded to my bank account. Needless to say, I was travelling nine days later. When I arrived in London, I therefore had to put a further five quid onto my card to see me through the day. I made the most of the card, mind you: one tube journey in Zone 1, and five bus journeys in Zones 1 and 2. To put this...