Apart from the odd timings in the morning and evenings the biggest change is that one bus an hour misses out Mainstone. It is timetabled to sit at Asda for 6 minutes instead. This is built in so that each bus has a chance to catch up if its running behind. Of course this only works if the bus is only running 6 minutes late!
The downside of this is that the Asda bus stops can get very congested. Any more than two buses at the stop at the same time causes problems. It seems to combat this buses are waiting time at the stop before they turn into Asda if possible. 42947 is seen below on the 22nd. It sat there for five minutes while the driver had a fag break. I was waiting for this bus to go enter the Asda loop and then come back and take me into town. At least I knew it was on its way. Its only possible to take the break here if there are no passengers actually wanting Asda. If thats the case then I guess they just wait time there and hopefully dont get in the way too much. Of course in April the 46/47 gets cut so thats less buses likely to turn up at the same time.
The other slight change is that now buses from Mainstone come into Asda from the bottom rather than from Dover Road around the back. This does mean that I get a bit of advance notice that the bus is coming at my stop, the one after Asda.
The big question though has to be, has it helped with time keeping? My initial experiences seem to suggest no it hasnt. My morning bus to work is now due at 07:52 instead of the 08:01 I have been catching and that was dead on time yesterday, in fact it had to wait at Marjon for a few mins so it wasnt early at Derriford. Trying to catch a bus into town after 4pm my bus was almost 15 mins late from Derriford. The next 15 was only five minutes behind by the time I reached North Hill. On the same day I took the above photo I had to wait over 40 mins for a bus from town. It appeared on the Real Time Display as running 12 mins late and then slowly counted down (and up!) until it got down to 'due' and then disappeard from the screen. The next 15 was then showing as being due in 10 minutes and did eventually appear 20 minutes later. Interestingly shortly before arriving at Estover a Trident double decker was coming back the other way, which should have been the bus I was waiting for in the first place which suggests it turned short somewhere along the way as it certainly didnt come my way.
Of course I may have just been unlucky with these journeys so I will give it time before coming to a full verdict on the timetable.
Related Links
- Ugobus 15 Plymothian Transit Extra
- Death of Ugobus concept Plymothian Transit January 2011
- Ugo the long way round Plymothian Transit October 2010
Elsewhere on the net
- Recent changes have seen Excels back on their familiar service 7, but also stretching their legs onto other routes and they now appear across virtually the entire 'big bus' network Fylde Bus Blog
- Here we see Western Greyhound's Volvo Olympian S455 ATV on the lengthy 510, from Newquay to Exeter PTOTPA
- Today, three of the south's key Go South Coast services are changing. I hope to photograph all of these changes in the next two weeks. Southern England Bus Scene
- Veolia is the other constituent of the forthcoming Transdev/Veolia combine. Veolia first entered the UK under the maligned Connex name … and departed swiftly Omnibuses
- Today is the first day in earnest of Wilts & Dorset’s new X5, the latest of its so-called “cross country” routes established as a sub-brand in November 2011. Not that the X5’s actually new, it’s just nicely repackaged. Dorset Bus Blog
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