Going Loopy At Luton (Part 1)

fbb Suffers Computer Outage

Fortunately this was not a second version of the CrowdStrike versus Microslop event of a week ago. This was probably Colin or one of his staff tripping over a wire in the Server Room in the company's offices on former railway land at Watford.

fbb's "devices" were happily reporting connection with the server but, sadly, also reporting that although connected to the gubbins, the gubbins was not connected to the interwebnet.

This encroached somewhat on blogging time hence today's posting is split into two parts.

Part One : A Is For Arriva

The majority operator between Luton centre and the the Airport is Arriva with eight buses an hour running direct Monday to Saturday. These come through from Dunstable and use the Busway.

Route A

At just ten minuted from Luton bus and rail interchange to the airport bus station this is the quickest (not quite!) and easiest link to understand.

Route F70/F77

It is joined on the busway by Arriva F70 nd F77 from Milton Keynes, routes that we met a while back. Until recently, these terminated at the Interchange, but have now been extended.

The bit of busway south of the interchange is not "guided" but it does whisk, unimpeded, under the A6 as per this Google Earth picture.

Here is a view of the bus only road from the A6 bridge.

Should that taxi be there? Here are the signs at the unimposing end of the busway ... 

... where everything joins the ordinary road network for the dash to the airport terminal.  F70/F77 follow the same route; and readers will remember that Arriva; presentation of the timetable is potty ...

... looking like four buses an hour rather than two.

In a weird quirk of timetabilation, route A is given 10 minutes for the journey from town to plane but the F70/F77 only gets a paltry 8 minutes for exactly the same stops and route.

Maybe F70/F77 buses are crewed by faster drivers or have turbo charged engines?

Maps of the busway routes have yet to be amended to show the extension of the F70/F77.

No rush chaps! Notice that the above on-line map shows route A as calling at Luton Airport Parkway station.

It doesn't, or, at least, Traveline thinks it doesn't!

It is all a bit loopy!

Route 757

Before moving on to the loopiest of loopiness, fbb should record that Arriva (trading as Green Line) ...

... runs every 30 minutes from London to the Airport ...

... and on in to the town. The 755s form Monday to Friday "commuter" journeys NOT via the airport.

There are several London stops well explained on the high quality map.

Now every 30, this service was once every 20!

Routes A1, A2

Additionally, National Express runs A1 and A2 coaches giving a half hourly service from common points. NEx offers a very poor quality map ...

... and a rather poor timetable layout. ...

... with too much "white space" making reading the times more difficult.

The coaches are nice, though,

In addition to the A1 and A2, there are many longer distance services that run via the airport. National Express claims it runs an average of three coaches every hour.

 To Be continued Thurs 26th July.