Onwards With Loopy Proposals
Historically London's route 140 began operating from Hayes to Mill Hill extended to Heathrow (as London Airport Central) in 1955. The route settled down to tun from Heathrow to Harrow and it ultimately became frequent, offering an approximate seven minute headway.
Then in 2019 there was a significant rejig. The "normal" 140 now starts from Hayes and runs to Harrow Weald.
The original route from Heathrow became the X140 Limited Stop, proposed for the next section of Mr Khan's Superloop.
As with yesterday's X26, the timetable is hardly memorable on most days.
Schoooldays
Non-Schooldays
Satudays
Sundays
Mr Khan is aiming to make the X26 every 15 minutes so there is absolutely no chance of predictable connections with the X140! The route of the X140 seems to be exactly the same as the original 140 so beware, innocent passenger, if you want a stop that is only served by the 140 and you inadvertently get on an X140.
Would a different route number be more user friendly rather than just adding a very small X (see bus picture above?
As ever with his London ramblings, fbb is really, really grateful to Robert Munster who provides the timetables and who, as yet, has not been duffed in by Transport for London for breaking their inviolable code of Timetable Secrecy.
Ian Armstrong's London Bus Routes history pages are also very helpful and packed with the sort of detail that is a bit too esoteric for a simple (?) blog.
The next stage on the Superloop is from Harrow to North Finchley.
The slightly evasive press release from Transport for London suggests that this will be the next section of Superloop to be launched.
Various commentators have surmised that it will be some sort of "X" version of the current 183. This runs from Pinner to Harrow ...
... and on to Golders Green ...
... so the Superloop proposal (possibly., maybe) will be quite different at its eastern end ...
... which has already suffered a "jiggle" and much shortened at its western extremity.
Surely a good reason (again!) for a different route number.
Currently the 183 runs every 7/8 minutes ...
... (very roughly!) so a plan to "X" at least part of it might will be attractive - IF it could really be speeded up.
Way back, the 183 was operated by a TfL created separate company, Harrow Buses ...
... yet another TfL jackpot idea that fizzled out!
The planning team (?) had not yet committing itself to what the actual route and timetable will be; then it will be "out for consultation" and we all know what that means. TfL will do what their planners want, anyway.
If the 183 leg of the Superloop is the next to appear, who knows when the stage round to Walthamstow will exude unhelpfully from TfL HQ?
Experts on all things London point to route 34 as the parent of a new X from North Finchley to Walthamstow.
The current 34 starts from Barnet and joins the North Circular Road near Arnos Grove ...
... then whisks round the busy orbital road to Walthamstow.
Some commentators have suggested that this route might actually be a bit more of an X if it didn't nip off the North Circular to pick up those pesky "passengers" who always spoil transport planners' good ideas. But a possible X34 is well in the future, by which time Superloop may well have been abandoned.
Current the 34 runs every 8 minutes ...
... another frequency that defies most human memories.
The nub of the problem is that "X" services rarely work in London because they get gummed up in the same traffic as their non-X companions. But again (yet again) using an X number for a different route than it's non-X chum seems designed to add confusion to the weary London bus passengers already struggling with the poorest publicity in the UK.
One on-line correspondent has an alternative plan. He says, "Wouldn't a tram route be so much better?"
In your dreams, sir! Of course it would (see again Paris 3a, 3b) but who would be prepared to put up the cash? And without Paris' wide boulevards for reserved track, would London's voters countenance the heavy restrictions necessary on their private motoring. Ditto the bus lanes necessary to make the Superloop really super.
Tomorrow we can complete the loop. But in the meantime, as a break from watching paint dry, here is a YouTube video of Route 183 - speeded up, thankfully. But it does give some idea of the challenges facing the creation of Superloop:d "fast" services.You can wake up now!
But imagine the fun of trying to get a tram service through that lot!
fbb's Coach
Readers may remember the Wellingborough Museum Heritage Days on Sat and Sun last. A coach formally owned by fbb attended.
Now fully restored in its National Express stripes, it was snapped by correspondent David.
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More Crazy Provocation
As "Holy Week" progressed, it was clear that the tension between Yeshua ben Yusuf (Jesus) and the religious authorities of the day was moving inexorably towards a final crisis. The challenge to belief and faith is that Jesus seemed determined to be crucified!
He could have walked away! He could have kept quiet!
But he told a story, a parable, about a vineyard.
Then Jesus spoke: “Once there was a man who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a hole for the wine press, and built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to tenants and left home on a trip. When the time came to gather the grapes, he sent a slave to the tenants to receive from them his share of the harvest. The tenants grabbed the slave, beat him, and sent him back without a thing. They repeated the treatment.
The only one left for the owner to send was his own dear son. Last of all, then, he sent his son to the tenants. But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the owner's son. Come on, let's kill him, and his property will be ours!’ nSo they grabbed the son and killed him and threw his body out of the vineyard.
“What, then, will the owner of the vineyard do?” asked Jesus. “He will come and kill those tenants and turn the vineyard over to others."
Gettit?
Owner=God.
Vineyard=Israel.
Tenants= Jewish authorities.
Servants=God's prophets.
Son=Jesus, killed.
But the real provocation is in the last sentence. The Jewish bigwigs would not survive for long.
Jesus knew what his fate would be but kept going.
Crazy but surely true!
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Next Superloop blog : Wednesday 5th April
Why does FBB get hung up on frequencies. Surely it's better to have a bus on time rather than a pretty click faced timetable. It make perfect sense to have a schoolday/non schoolday variation as we all know what a difference traffic levels are. A bus every 8 minutes......shock horror.......do most of the population actually look at a timetable if the bus is that frequent???? 🙄
ReplyDeleteYou don't need a timetable for a service that runs every 12 minutes! No one in their right minds would actually go and specifically wait for the 14:24 from Hayes Grapes.
ReplyDeletePerhaps FBB would like some education in the management of high frequency services where headway management is the key, not trying to stick rigidly to the working timetable.
As far as I can see, all of the timetable extracts in today's blog do show a regular frequency - the alternating every 7/8 minutes is regular, since the buses run at the same times each hour, and the intervals are consistent - is anybody really worried about 30 seconds difference? A couple of them are actually every 7 minutes or every 8 minutes, so that the times are not consistent for each hour, but the gaps between buses are, at least in theory, consistent. And as the anonymous contributor says, are the passengers particularly concerned when the frequency is that high?
ReplyDeleteWhat is not so clear is whether these new services will actually create any potentially useful new links? I would have thought that their greatest use would be as feeders to trunk radial routes (including railways as well as buses), so that the omission of some stops to reduce journey times will probably be counter productive. The concept would appear to need more thought and planning.