Bamboozled by Bethesda

Does it need to be so complicated?

fbb is researching public transport for a holiday in North Wales planned for early May.

Bethesda (taking its name from the main Chapel in the village and located on the A5 south of Bangor) owes its existence to the now-closed slate quarry of Lord Penrhyn who owned most of the land to the northeast of the main road.  The A5 marked the boundary of the noble lord's land and thus most of the town and all of its pubs (!) lie on hillside terraces to the north of that ancient highway.

The town was served from Bangor by a branch on the erstwhile London and North Western Railway's network - a line which closed to passengers in 1951 early in British Railways ownership, with sporadic freight hanging on until 1963.

Today, bus services are in the hands of Arriva and Padarn; offering potential passengers a dose of "healthy" competition.   But does it need to be so complicated?

Bethesda Ogwen Terrace

Bethesda Station Road

Bethesda Penrhyn Terrace

Bethesda Adwy'r Nant

Bethesda Tan-y-gaer

Bethesda Victoria Square

Bethesda Glanffrydias

Bethesda Londis

Bethesda Penybryn School
Bethesda Spar 

are all stops claiming to be "Bethesda" in various timetables.   All but one of them are at, or near, the "centre" of Bethesda.   So what's going on?

Arriva's main group of services are numbered 7 and 67  and run via Tregarth and Rachub to Bethesda (7) and beyond to Gerlan (67).  The 66 is a less frequent "back road" route via Llanllechid.   And one 67 journey follows the same route as Padarn service 6 via Glasynfryn.   In fact EIGHT service numbers are used for three basic routes each with numerous daytime and peak hour variants.   Still awake?

Padarn Bus (having recently taken over the services of KMP in Llanberis) is now a major player in the area and its network of mainly competitive routes is equally comprehensive.

Basically the 77 "covers" Arriva's 7 whilst the 76 parallels Arriva's 67.   Confused dot com?   But both the 76 and the 77 have at least two variants each, depending in their detailed route through Rachub and Bethesda.   Padarn's 6 is a circuitous but infrequent route serving a wider selection of neighbouring villages.

So the innocent visitor has to grapple with a possible 10 timetable stops in Bethesda, 11 route numbers and something like 25 route variations.  Is this REALLY a benefit of competition?   Does this complexity encourage new users?   Will fbb get inextricably lost when he visits in May?   Or will he drive round in the car?

Does it need to be so complicated?

Ave RV! In praise of a bus route.

Ave?   A high church ecclesiastical  term meaning "praise" - say it as "ah - vay"!

But, first,the bad news.

Transport for London's journey planner [www.tfl.gov.uk] is often upheld as the acme of jp technology - almost certainly by those who don't have to use it for anything other than very simple journeys.

Consider a journey from Covent Garden to the Tower of London.   This is what tfl tells you to do ...

...take a three leg Underground journey with two bits of walking, including the lengthy and complex link between Bank and Monument stations - once shown on Underground maps as an "escalator link"; but now masquerading as a "normal" interchange.

Now, a question - actually THREE questions.

As the man says on the antiques programme, "is that the very best you can do?"

Which would you, interested blog reader, prefer?   A three legged troglodite trundle through the dismal depths of Londons "Tube" or, alternatively, a ride on a nice red bus?   If you are a pass-holding OAP there's no contest; the bus is free whereas the underground costs £4. [cheaper with "Oyster"].

Covent Garden to the Tower is a pleasant one bus ride, seemingly overlooked by the much lauded tfl journey planner.   Here is the offer from xephos:-

This is route RV1, started in 2002, designed to regenerate and rejuvenate the developing tourist and residential areas south of the Thames.   Just one simple bus ride and no changes!

According to tfl, the underground route is quicker - 4 minutes quicker and perhaps open to debate - and that's why its algorithms put the RV1 into the background.   fbb understands that the internal gubbins of xephos strives to keep the client on the one vehicle unless such a policy would create a really slow journey.   Almost inevitably a one leg journey will be cheaper as well.

A further bonus of the RV1 is a possibility that you might be riding on a vehicle powered by hydrogen.   Now, some of us "oldies" might have visions of a small thermonuclear weapon concealed in the engine compartment; but we are talking hydrogen gas here, probably the cleanest fuel possible.   If you remember your chemistry lessons (?) you might also remember that hydrogen and oxygen combine to produce energy and a little water residue.   The energy in the Hydrogen bus is in the form of electricty which drives standard electric motors. No stinkypoos from the exhaust pipe and no expensive technology to clean up the particulates - whatever they are!

Two thoughts remain.  At the moment the buses are astronomically expensive - will they ever become cost-effective?   And some are worried about the safety of such a volatile fuel, say in an accident; what happens if it escapes from its storage pods on the roof of the vehicle?   We are assured that "all is safely gathered in", but ...

... The Hindenburg was full of hydrogen! 

Occasional bloggers and those "new to the trade" may not be aware that you can cross reference earlier blogs on similar topics by clicking on one of the "labels" below and at the foot of each blog.  Enjoy your reading!

Blupdates [issue 2]

A selection of updates from earlier blogs.

From "Return of the Whistle Blower" (read again) and "Postscript to the Whistle Blower" (read again)

BREAKING NEWS : T M Travel has announced withdrawal of the three Sheffield night services in April.   Maybe one contributory factor is Travel South Yorkshire's decision not to tell anyone they existed!

from "How to Ruin a Bus Service [Lesson 3]" (read again).

Not only are the harassed burghers of South Northamptonshire unlikely to get a better bus service, they are even more likely to lose what they have already got.  This is an extract from a "budget cuts" page on the County Council website.

A complete overhaul of the way the council funds public transport is also being announced, which would see an extra £1.4 million budget reduction. This would see the end of subsidising unprofitable bus routes while investment would be made in new public transport solutions, which would be targeted at communities to provide more tailored public transport. 

So maybe buy a bike?

from "Ferry Interesting, but Stoopid" (read again) 

Seaspeed Hovercraft started between Southampton and Cowes in 1966 and the business was eventually sold to Hovertravel.  The route was then closed down.  

From "The Numbers Game" (read again) 

A Sheffield chum emails to tell me about a service "0", operated in the 1998 [?] by Mainline (the name chosen by the employee buy-out of SYPTE bus operation and subsequently sold to First).   It was aimed to tap into the weekend "clubbing" life of the Sheffield student population and was in competition with the taxi firms.  fbb is seeking more information and possible photographs.  [but see below]  It was branded as "Bus Zero"

The buses were reported as Metroriders bought second hand from Northern, who, in turn, had obtained them from Greater Manchester.    Maybe like one of these?

In their "Route Zero" guise, they hit the national headlines by having condom machines installed.  Yuk!

STOP PRESS : Received at 1730 on Monday 7th February, just hours before publishing this blog, a picture of a Bus Zero taken at Central Bus Station (sorry, the Interchange) in 1998.  Thank you very, very much to Richard Turner for letting me publish his rarity.

 

And it was "one of those"! 

But service  number "000" is surely lower than "0"?  In any case, Bus Zero does not appear to show any route number in the destination blind space - so it doesn't really count.

From "The Incredible Shrinking Ferry" (read again)

fbb is reminded that the Clyde Tunnel at Whiteinch itself replaced passenger and vehicle ferries; herewith a 1955 picture of the passenger vessel.

And the vehicle ferry.  The location of this shot is uncertain but all the "inner city" vehicle ferries were similar. The vehicle deck was raised and lowered mechanically to match the height of the tide, thus ensuring that the ferry deck was always at road level.   Cunning, eh?

The mechanics are clearer in fbb's pic of a model on display at Glasgow Transport Museum.

The only cross-Clyde ferry remaining runs between Helensburgh and Greenock for passengers only.  Maybe the subject of a future blog?   For motorists, the western Clyde area is now served by the spectacular Erskine Bridge.   

Miscellaneous Mapping Mutterings in 1927

It was ever thus ...

Miscellaneous Mapping Mutterings 1 (read again) contained a clip from the July 1927 map produced by Sheffield Tramways and Motors.  It showed only ST&M services in red added to a Bartholomew's engraved map of the city and its environs.

Astoundingly, in the punctilious days of A.R. Fearnley, ...

...(General Manager from 1906 to 1934) we find significant errors, almost putting today's oft repeated blunders to shame!

Two red lines (centre left) represent the tramways to Crookes (present bus 52) and Walkley (present buses 95 and 123).   But if we look closer ...

... we see that things are somewhat wrong.   The Crookes tram (original red line) is shown as finishing well short of the Heavygate Road terminus (green line); and, as for the Walkley tram ...

The 1927 red line passes southwest of the ponds which formed the present Crookes Valley Park [1]  continuing along Northumberland Road [1], Conduit Road and Western Road [2], then via Heavygate Road to a terminus on Bole Hill Road.  To the best of fbb's fading knowledge neither tram nor bus has ever passed this way before or since!

The correct route is shown in blue via Crookes Valley Road (northeast of the aforementioned ponds), Barber Road and Commonside to a terminus in South Road as this rather aged picture from 1905 shows.

How could ARF's minions make such a blunder?   One possible explanation lies with inaccuracies in the original Bartholomew engraving.  It was always easier to engrave completely new roads than fill and re-engrave the more complicated existing bits.   Keen Sheffielders will espy the new Prince of Wales Road snaking through empty country to the east of the City Centre.   But the thick plottens!

Another map appears in Charles Hall's definitve history of Sheffield Transport ALSO dated in 1927 - this time with the month June added.  And this time the tram routes to Crookes and Walkley (thin lines with bobs on the end) are correct!   Inconsistency rules OK; even under the tutelage of the great ARF.

 

fbb and his chums are unable to fathom which map came first, the Bartholomew one with incorrect routes or the more diagrammatic with correct routes. If the month shown is correct then the worst did not come first.

Perhaps, as a good friend opined, the official line then was "if it's on the engraving it must be right" as, similarly today, we are offered the explanation "well, that's what the computer says".   At least we now know that the celebrated A R Fearnley's team wasn't always perfect.   That may give a little comfort to his 21st century successors.

As a P.S.: the map retailed at 2/- [10p] which was the equivalent of about £12.50 in today's money.   It was probably well beyond the reach of the majority of the company's customers.   A bagwash wasn't that cheap either!

Accuracy - a P.S.

Oh dear, not again!

The Director General of Travel South Yorkshire's "striving for accuracy and the most helpful information for the customer" policy - as quoted to fbb - fails yet again.  See Miscellaneous Map Mutterings [3] (read again). According to bus stops in the Southey Green area of the City, First runs a No. 73 bus every 10 minutes on Sundays.

 

Somebody should tell Tim O'Toole (CEO of First)!   He will be surprised!

There is NO Sunday service on the 73 at Southey Green.

Thanks to www.sy-transport.com for this beauty!

A correspondent also informs me that services 45 and 46 were still shown on electronic screens as departing from stops on Arundel Gate on Wednesday 2nd Feb, three days after the services were withdrawn! Doubtless these have now been corrected; but fbb is intrigued to travel on a service 36 via Shiregreen, as advertised online today (Friday 4th Feb) for a departure from Arundel Gate.

 

No it doesn't and never has done!   And it doesn't go via Brightside either.   And it never quite reaches Fir Vale.  The service does terminate within the grounds of the huge Northern General Hospital complex which doesn't get a mention on the "helpful" screen displays.

Talking of Northern General Hospital and "real time" displays; try finding any on-screen departure times for buses to get you there direct.   Frequent services 47 and 48 do not leave from an "interchange" - mini or maxi - so NGH, despite being a major traffic objective, doesn't appear.    You can go to "ACIS live", if you can find it, but that only gives rudimentary destination information, not intermediate points.

So much for the benefits of the latest technology.  Give us a "timetable book" any day!

Miscellaneous Mapping Mutterings [3]

Part 3 : "Good old Travel South Yorkshire", so say some ...

... others tell the truth!

How does TSY guide prospective travellers to Stannington?   Typing "Stannington" into the "Timetables" box on the TSY web site reveals five entries.   Oddly, but typical of technology taking charge instead of common sense, one clickable line offers all bus services  in Sheffield - but we actually only wanted buses to Stannington   Two of the others are for services from Hillsborough, and one from Malin Bridge so it appears that the 11/11A/12 group is "where it's at, man".

We are getting there.   The 11, 11A and 12 all run to Stannington, it would appear.   And there are maps!   A huge improvement on the rudimentary one line diagrams commented upon before ...

... or are they?  fbb is not so sure that they are much better.

These efforts, derived from a piece of  (presumably expensive) software by a Swedish firm called Kartor, are geographically accurate but carry no road names and only rudimentary stop information.  They are, in effect, not much better than a wiggly version of the former straight line offering.   Disappointing.   Also ignored; (a) is the fact that the 11A is an evenings and Sundays only portmanteau route and (b) the Acorn Drive "loop" is only served by half the buses on Mondays to Fridays.

Or, you could, perhaps, find the competing service, the Supertram Link 2 from Malin Bridge tram stop and running via a different route around Stannington.   It's not easy to find; are you looking for 2, SL2, STL2, S2 or ST2?  But on that leaflet you don't get a map at all - nothing other than a list of roads with Stannington itself shown in the wrong place!

So go away and work it out for yourself!   And if you get off at SYT's "Stannington" you'll have a good mile to walk before you get to anyone else's "Stannington".

TSY does publish area books - referred to earlier with reference to Totley - or more correctly DID publish area books.   It has been decided not to continue these.   No wonder, because this is the best "map" that can be offered therein of the Stannington routes:-

Obviously out-of-date (no Supertram Link) but about as helpful as a chocolate teapot!  No replacement is planned, so we are stuck with fragmented and inconsistent information.

Also available, at SOME city centre stops, are so-called "spider" diagrams of services departing from that point.  fbb has no record of the "Spider at Snig Hill" (sounds like a title of a Hammer Horror Movie) but the bits of the spiders' web are usually presented in route number order with absolutely no reference to geography.   This is fbb's guess as to what one for the Snig Hill stop might look like.

Not much help there, then.

As a final struggle for useful information, the harassed visitor to the City of Steel might well arrive at the bus station - sorry "Interchange" - and seek a map showing the buses to Stannington.   Here's a snippet of what he might find:

 Another lovely "spider" map, but there's NO Stannington!   That's because the services to Stannington don't use the bus station.   But the map itself demands a closer examination; and then provokes the comment, "are they having a laugh?"

Assuming, speculatively, that "North" is conventionally at the top of the map, then reality differs signifiantly from this diagram:-

The 14 (Loxley) runs to the North of the "Blue" (Malin Bridge), which is a tram.
The 14 and 77 both serve the Hillsborough Interchange.
The 35 continues via the Hillsborough Interchange to city and shows 37 in the opposite direction.
The 66 and the missing 78 both run via Owlerton (to the right of the map) exactly following that dark blue line.
The 57, 58, X57 to Stocksbridge have been condemned to roam the ether for evermore, banished to utter darkness and ignominy.   They, also, serve the Hillsborough Interchange!

And why is the tram there anyway?   Like the Stannington routes, the trams do NOT serve the bus station and involve a reasonable totter to the city centre.   But, apparently, you can't totter to the 11, 11A or 12!

fbb has exchanged emails with TSY and even travelled to Sheffield - at his own expense - for  a meeting with the department concerned.  Recently he has been told by the Director General (the big cheese himself; but electronically, so maybe actually from a "minion"?) that TSY always strives for accuracy and is committed to providing the public with the best and most accurate information possible.  (!??)  fbb has offered his system-wide map (for a very small consideration) to TSY and offered to train staff to keep it up to date.

Consequence: a friendly felicitious fobb-off!

Oh yes!   And the 95 goes absolutely NOWHERE near Shalesmoor or services 14, 66 and 77! 

Miscellaneous Mapping Mutterings [2]

Part 2 - the Truth is Out There

We left our tale of cartographic complication with the South Yorkshire PTE maps of the early eighties - maps which died a death in response to the turmoil of deregulation of the bus industry in 1986.

It is nearly 25 years later, so what is available now?  Of course, solid, reliable and traditional Ordnance Survey produces its world famous 1:50,000 Landranger series of maps, characterised by their pink covers; descendants of the once-standard "one inch" maps.   But these do not show public transport.

Services on-line like Google Maps go one better; they include bus stops and links to timetables.  But here is no actual route information. Indeed to get the bus stops on screen you need to use a big enlargement which would make adding routes rather pointless.

The associated satellite view can give some further geographical clues; showing whether you are in urban our country areas, for example.   And if you are fortunate enough to know the route, then recognising individual stops is possible with care.   The impressive Google Street View will identify local landmarks, so you can spot where to get off IF you have the privilege of  trendy modern mobile phone.

But what about public-transport-specific mapping services?   Transport Defunct (aka Transport Direct) follows the same style as Google - you can have stops but not routes; whereas most Traveline regions offer stops AND routes - although the route lines can be a little crude as here for Stannington on the Traveline Yorkshire site... 

Again, there is no information about route NUMBERS on the map although the diagrams are linked to small chunks of timetable.   It's a start, but nothing more.

So far, then, we have yet to find a usable map of ALL bus routes in Sheffield.  A newcomer to the city may want to plan a journey to meet a friend; or a potential house buyer might want to know what sort of public transport provision is available.   We must keep searching!

Since November 2010, Worst Bus (sorry, fbb keeps typing that incorrectly, must be some subconscious urge!) and Stagecoach have been competing on the Stannington route.  Needless to say, each produces a very useful map, but in each case totally ignoring the services of the other.   First, First ...

... which, for example, ignores the tram at Malin Bridge 'cos that's run by St*g*c**ch and we don't admit to their existence.   Then, we have the offering from that Perth based conglomerate ...

... which is actually easier to follow but, of course, ignores the routes of its Aberdonian compatriot.   Of the two, Stagecoach is much the "cleaner" design.   Less helpful, in fact not helpful at all, is First's "Overground" map.

All the disadvantages of the First network map (see above) compounded by poor representation of geographical truth.   So that's all, company-wise.

Even the key enthusiast web site at www.sy-transport.co.uk can only manage a less than satisfactory "spider" which ignores the trams.   They, apparently, deserve a separate map.

Note, in particular, the pink loop (Supertram Link) via Stannington, the diversions via Deer Park Road but no loops via Acorn Drive.  [Stannington is shown top left]

Modesty forbids mention of the only map (currently) to incorporate all buses and trams in Sheffield ...

... but it is a "thing of beauty and a joy for ever".  [John Keats, "Endymion" - for those of a literary bent.]

With competing, but slightly different, services and a growing number of  route gyrations, the simplicity of the 1960s and 1980s maps is gone for ever.   But the map produced by fbb, that shrinking violet of public transport opinion, is simply not available in printed form.  [Up-to-date on-line version available here.]

So, faced with the paucity of properly published paper-based provision, one would expect the guardians of all things omnibological (?) and ferro-equinological, Travel South Yorkshire, to publish the definitive network map.

Episode three of the thrilling saga will reveal all...

Bet you can't wait!