Convenient Cafe Created?
fbb has referred recently, and again less recently, to the fact that the Wightlink waiting room, which one included a caff, is now just a spartan room full of uncomfortable wooden benches.
As the fbbs returned home last Thursday, the old bloke was observing the new electronic barriers. The wooden hut as seen above, he thought was a ticket office.
But it is a snackery!
The snag is that it is outside the gateline but, as the Island Line trains run every 40 minutes and the ferries every hour, the train connects sweetly with the boat only once every two hours.
It does mean that, if you arrive for a ferry on the "wrong" hour, there will be a jolly 27 minutes to wait for the ferry. A snack or two might assuage the tedium and hard benches in the waiting room.
The advertised connections for the London train are now poor although a quick sprint (from the front of the scrum to alight) is workable for those more agile than the fbbs. The xx07 ferry arrival is optimistic but mostly OK.
Tramstitution
The City transport operator in Bern, Switzerland, operates copious buses ...
... trolleybuses ...
... and trams ...
... throughout the city.
The main routes are very frequent and very busy. A particularly busy bus route is the number 10.
That looks like every 5 minutes Monday to Friday daytime; the route runs from ...
... Ostermundigen Ruti in the East ...
... via the city centre ...
... to Koniz Schliern ....
... in the South West.
The route has recently been equipped with shiny new electric buses ...
... which would seem to satisfy the environmental enthusiasm of Bernmobil!
But not so fast.
The decision has been made to turn this bus route into a full tram route ...
... and works has already started at several road junctions.
fbb intends to keep a bloggers eye on the project whilst wondering when we might see a more purposeful drive to re-tramming busy routes in more UK cities.
P.S. The change from a green livery to red with the use of the name 'Bernmobil' took place in year 2000.
An overview : but be aware - the ;language is Swiss German, very different from German German. In case you wondered, there are several dialects of German spoken in Switzerland! It is way beyond fbb's 'O' level standard!!
It lasts leas than 4 min - so enjoy!
The Solution Is Cereal Boxes
To prevent unrealistic lightspill, fbb will be glueing bits of his Honey Nut Cornflake box (now empty) on various walls of the muddy station building. But he will need to minimise the obliteration of the Hornby moulding, which, for a toy, is excellent.
More to follow.
Tomorrow; back to the Isle of Wight.
Ride A Bus Rydabus blog : Monday 19 Oct
