Hydrogen Bombs? (mini blog)

Hydrogen's role in decarbonization

Rishi Sunak (Remember hin?)

The former UK Prime Minister was committed to supporting the hydrogen vehicle industry and reviewing guidelines to develop the sector. 

Claire Coutinho (who?)

The former Energy Security Secretary has backed 11 major projects to produce green hydrogen.

Sir Keir Starmer (res, we have heard of him)

The current prime minister has promised to support renewable hydrogen and carbon capture and storage (CCS). Promises, promises!

Jacob Young (no, neither had fbb!)

The MP who chairs the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on hydrogen is in full support of the fuel.

The UK government has announced plans to support hydrogen as a way to decarbonize businesses and transport. The government has also launched a call for evidence on hydrogen and CCS. Hydrogen has the potential to play a vital role in decarbonizing businesses and transport as the UK works towards meeting its net zero targets. 

Meanwhile; In The Real World

After considerable hassle, it would appear that Metrobus' hydrogen fleet may, at last, be fully deployed.

Hydrogen powered buses do not burn hydrogen like you might burn diesel fuel. The technology works like a classroom science experiment in reverse. As a child, fbb made hydrogen in the kitchen using electricity and a suitable solute.

Electricity turns water into hydrogen and oxygen. Commercial hydrogen can be made using a similar process. The gubbins is called an electrolyser.

In a Metrobus, hydrogen and oxygen (from the air) are combined in a thingy to make electricity. 

Seems bit daft to use green electricity to make green hydrogen so that green hydrogen can make green electricity?

But generally the 'sector" is not doing very well.

Herewith a selection of recent news reports.

On the brink!

On the brink again!

Future unclear?

Busted?

No plains, it's plane ...

Or no fly? Ever?

Better in trucks and buses?

So, is hydrogen the super fuel or ...

... a super flop?

Keeping fbb and Mrs warm?

Seems failtly conclusive?

Seems unlikely - anyway, they have recently installed a new g*s b**l*r, but don't tell ... 

... in case the environmentalists glue the fbb's doors shit with the old codgers ouy on the street.

How are EVs going? That's another story which may yet NOT have a happy ending.

Alphabetical Biblical

The rest of the alphabet follows in the leaflet for April. 

How will fbb manage with X? It could be Xerxes, but N to Z will be from the NEW Testament. Xerxes was from the Old!

He will, of course, cheat!

 Next 'Back to the Future' blog : Fri 7 Mar 

First's Frequent Fiddling

The Story So Far

Bus routes from Glasgow via Clydebank to Dumbarton, Helensburgh and north to the foot of Loch Lomond have a tortuous history. The details might well be too much for our readers but they are most certainly too much for the decaying grey cells of your octogenarian blogger.

So let's keep it simple.

Glasgow Omnibus Company, Baillies, LMS (railway!), Central SMT, Central, Central Scottish, Kelvin Central, First Kelvin, First Glasgow.

And that's simple?

Within your author's memory Dumbarton was served by a group of routes departing from Buchanan bus station and running via the Dumbarton Road. They were numbered 130 (etc).

Here us a typical 134 at Helensburgh.

Other routes ran to Balloch on Loch Lomondside.

Locally in Dumbarton things had always been more complicated with a plethora of unfathomable local routes.

Some of them were very local but still a challenge in complexity. How about the journey from Napierston or Nobleston ...

... running via the centre of Dumbarton to Castlehill and Brucehill ...

... just of the Cardross Road and our friend the 134 to Helensburgh. Look at the number of different numbers! What glorious fun, NOT!

Of course, when First's Barbie arrived things got renumbered with routes in a 200 series.

The above is a 205 to Helensburgh.

But things were still imbued with complexity.

In the 2010s, First's craze in some areas was still their Overground brand.

This did not extend along the Dumbarton Road, being a cartographic presentation of frequent city routes. But a new brand was beginning to materialise.

"Simplicity" (Simple City?) ...

... was a scheme to group routes along some main roads to create frequent services. But in the early days of the 1 it was slightly more simple than simpliCITY!

But, in the interest of simpliCITY we had two service 1 routes going to totally different places.

But, at its core were three services each running every 30 minutes; to Helensburgh ( 1  ) ...

... to Balloch via Vale of Level Hospital ( 1 ) ...

... and to Balloch via Bellsmire and Napierston ( 1A ). 

There were two "shorts to Clydebank every hour, also route 1.

Route  1B  was a couple of peak hour extras, copied for a while by McGills competitive service, running hourly from Balloch to Glasgow but not via Dumbarton.

But simpliCITY was not to last, either as a brand or ss a fair description of the routes to Dumbarton!

Here is a later set of maps!

The 1 and 1A to Balloch remain the same but Helensburgh has become 1B; and the peak direct journeys are now 1E. 

Why not 1C, you may ask!

That's because the Clydebank "shorts" have been extended to be a 1D to Mountblow and a new 1C has appeared to Drumchapel.

Glasgow experts will wonder why yet another route to Drumchapel has been added by First. This massive housing estate ("scheme" in Scots patois) was originally served by routes from Central, Midland and the Corporation (by mutual agreement, not competition).

But the 1C, like the rest of the complexCITY 1, 1A, 1B, 1D and 1E, had a special treat for its passengers. It ran non-stop via the Clydeside Expressway. The last/first city centre stops were near the M8 Kingston Bridge flyover ...

... (below bottom right) ...

... then running fast (if the traffic was OK!) to Victoria Park ...

... (below upper left).

This would certainly speed up journeys in the few sparse hours when traffic was light!

fbb should also report that the service 1 complexCITY had eschewed the comparative luxury of Buchanan bus station for stops on Argyle Street (for shopping and Central station) and a terminus in the luxury of Osborne Street ...

... although there was more complexCITY for the buses to get there and even more perplexCITY for the unwary passenger and the bemused visitor to the city!

The city terminus in Osborne Street is hardly welcoming ...

... whichever way you look at it!

The outbound stops for the shops are dismal in he extreme ...

... bring round the back "by the bins" of the in-decline St Enoch shopping centre! You wouldn't want to be waiting anywhere around there after dark!

But, hey ho, by 2019 at least one part of the complexCITY had gone. The excellent timetable that came on an excellent leaflet ...

... shows that the 1C to Drumchapel had disappeared.

In  Friday's  blog we must now tackle the changes that happened earlier this week; assuming, that fbb's brain has stopped hurting.

 Next Hydrogen blog : Thu 6 Mar 

Bradford Bus Bonanza (mini blog**)

Lies, Damned Lies And Statistics

Samuel Longhorne Clemens indicated that the 1st Earl of Beaconsfield said those words above.

We know the people better as Mark Twain and Benjamin Disraeli! In fact nobody really knows who first suggested the statistics are a less than reliable way of expressing anything close to the truth.

So we go to Leeds ...

... or maybe to Bradford!

For many a long year, the bus route joining the two, that is from Leeds ...

... to Bradford, in Corporation Transport days has been route 72!

The route was maintained in the early PTE era ...

... and even had a significant brand!

Then First bought the PTE and Barbie arrived.

The really stunning event, however, was the appearance ...

... and the relatively rapid departure of the "Streetcars". 

Apart from weird buses ...

... there really was nothing new.

Technology arrived ...

... but back in September 2024 (and missed by fbb) something really special happened!

There has been some stunning publicity, although fbb does not know whether printed material was available. The on-line page includes maps of each city. Leeds ...

... c/w super trendy "neon" image, and Bradford ...

... ditto.

This new 24 hour 7 days a week service must be something really, really good. There is at least one bus decked out in matching attire.

Only the night service isn't that good!

Wow! Steps back in amazement! Stunning! First Bus offers a really whizzo bus every hour from just after midnight to 0400, then there is an hour's gap and the "normal" service starts at 0500, later on Sundays.

But it would appear that the worthy denizens of Leeds'n'Bradford have taken to these improvements on the 72 big time!

Here is a headline press article.

Beware statistics!

Beware incompetent journalistic headlines!

Beware over hyped hype!

Beware what happened to the hyperlink!

Beware the danger of facts getting in the way of a good story!

fbb simply did not believe that the 72 had generated a 138% growth in passengers since September.

And it hadn't!

Here is he detail behind the non-event press story!

First Bus has seen a 138 per cent increase in customers travelling between midnight and 05:00am on the first 24-hour service in West Yorkshire.

The round-the-clock operation on the 72 Leeds-Bradford service was introduced last September, and figures for the first three months to the end of the 2024 show that passenger numbers had grown from just over 2,000 in the first four weeks to more than 4,800 in December. 

Kayleigh Ingham, Commercial Director of First North & West Yorkshire, said: “We’re delighted with the growth we have seen on this service, which is clearly appealing to the people of Leeds and Bradford.

“Customer numbers have steadily increased month-by-month and we see this trend continuing in 2025.”

Of course raw percentages could have been deceiving. If 10 people travelled in the month, a 138% increase would man that 13.8 extra people were now travelling. 

First does give us some crude figures.

2000 in four weeks? There are FIVE return journeys journeys seven days a week (ignoring the extras on Sunday morning) for four weeks.

That's 5 x 2 x 7 x 4 = 280 

journeys carrying 2000 pax. 

2000 / 280 = 7.14 passengers per 

48 minute trip.

An increase of 138% means that roughly 9.66 extra passengers per trip were carried in December, a total of 16.8 passengers per single journey on a 70 seat double decker. December is, of course, a busy month for nocturnal shenanigans so the figures may not be so "good" in January and Februrary.

Deserving of hype. Or is the hype ...

... tripe?

More Alphabetical Biblical

  Next First Glasgow blog : Wed 5 Mar