Saturday Variety

Relief Sophistication Replaces Shelter

Yesterday afternoon a celebratory event took place from 2pm to 4pm with live music and dancing. The  crowds turned out on this sunny afternoon to enjoy the entertainment, tea, coffee and cakes. Mrs Chris Winfield spoke about the work that had gone on over the years from the germination of the idea to what we see before us now. Mr Peter Mander (Chair HPC) spoke about the problems that had been faced but overcome, from soon after the old building was demolished and how well the various professions had worked together over the past 12 months.

The above report from a couple of years ago was penned as a result of a big village celebration in Hathersage. The event thus celebrated was ...

... the opening of the town's new public conveniences.

Needless to say these waste disposal cubicles offer a poorer and lesser service than the old facilities, now demolished. Google Streetview reveals their last gasps of breath.

There were separate sedentary stalls for separated sexes, separated by a superb shelter for general use and for passengers awaiting First Bus service 272 to Sheffield. The ex shelter space still provides a pleasant seated area but unprotected from precipitation, which is not unknown in the wilds of the peak district!

It was Twitterer Matt Kitchin who was ecstatic about a new and stylish shelter in Hathersage.

Overwhelmed by the architectural and environmental delights of the luxurious new shelter, Matt may have been unaware of the paucity of personal protection provided for passengers comparing new from old. A small wind tunnel with seating for four seems a poor replacement.

There is a small bonus however. Hathersage now has its own chippy, located in the white painted building revealed by a somewhat ancient Google Streetview ...

... located literally round the corner from the inadequate shelter. And if our readers doubted the inadequacy of the wooden appurtenance, they should only look at the collection of passengers waiting for that 272 into the city.

Were a Derbyshire downpour to develop, that lot would not fit in the new glazed gazebo - but they could have congregated cosily under cover in the old shelter!

The big consolation, at least from fbb's point of view, and speaking up for the weak-bladdered community of old crocks, is that the toilets were replaced, not just bulldozed into oblivion or sold off as accommodation for yet another tourist grot shop!

For those who may wish to instate a pilgrimage to test the new toilets and celebrate with residents by chomping into a portion of cod and, Hathersage is west of Sheffield and a very pleasant ride out by bus.

Hathersage's claim to fame is that adjacent to the church will be found the grave of Little John, companion of Robin Hood.

It is worth a visit if only to see how well the site is kept, to bring a frisson of excitement to the town's visitors. 

There is slight evidence that the occupant of said grave was very tall for his era, and Hoodies will remember that Little John's unusual build gave rise to his jocular name. Chortle, chortle!

Sadly, there is no plaque on the chip shop in Scunthorpe where Elvis worked for many years after his "death".

Livery Delivery No 237

In times past the Civil Engineering section of British Rail (before everything was privatised, subcontracted and made more expensive) adopted a "livery" of grey and yellow, dubbed "Dutch" by enthusiasts.

It is, indeed, true that trains in the Netherlands have shown a preponderance of yellow in their "livery", usually paired with blue.

fbb was last in the Netherlands over 60 years ago and cannot really remember the livery back then. He has a shadowy though that it was a mud green shade ...

... but he definitely does NOT remember the "squiggle" logo from back then.

The word livery comes from French as do most things of sophistication. Stuff (food, clothing) that was provided for servants was "livree" - disbursed and de-livered. At some stage the word became used for the design of staff clothing and the idea migrated to the style of painting on carriages (horse) and later railway.

The modern theory is that "Livery" should indicate ownership and impart a sense of quality and purpose to the vehicle, thus (as someone once said) creating desire.

It used to be guiding principle that "livery" should enhance and uplift that shape of the vehicle, choosing colours to aid recognition and define quality.

Undoubtedly the Great Western Railway's chocolate and cream hauled by a spotless and shiny green "Castle" was the best at desire creation.

Some of today's paint styles are intrinsically less satisfactory, maybe emphasising ownership, but hardly wowing the punters.

Anyway, Netherlands Railways has just revealed a new version of their livery.

... which, to fbb's jaded eye, looks a right dogs breakfast; trying to be trendy and failing to be anything. It will be interesting to see a whole train out in the open. Perhaps the old man's views will then change.

Exmoor Coaster - A P.S.

Correspondent Roger was out and about on the day when the open top service wasn't. He reports that monochrome locally photocopied leaflets were available on both buses that he experienced.

They are not pretty (better folded?) but at least someone has done something to counteract the corporate incompetence. No sign yet of the real thing.

Talking Of Livery

The class 800 trains (with potential for cracks in their yaw dampers??) are making an occasional appearance in daylight as part of their testing regime. The plain blue livery looks really boring and unappetising. Perhaps there is a large cupboard full of sophisticates First Group vinyls just waiting to be glued on.

Let's hope so.

Whoops! Got It Wrong?

It was only yesterday that fbb wondered about the wisdom of increasing fares in South Yorkshire via the back door of Travelmaster. As well as being sneaky, it seem immoral when the bus companies are prevented from changing their fares under HMG's Covid funding.

Anyway, it's not happening.

fbb suspects that the men from the ministry ...

... ably played by Deryck Guyler or Wilfrid Hyde-White and the glorious Stinker Murdoch, have telephoned and "advised" against such a move. Travelmaster will never admit that ...

But there is a veiled threat in the press release, namely, "when this is all over, expect stonking fares increases."

Now that will be a really good way to encourage people back to the bus!

A Prince And Princess from Peco

Peco have had a couple of goes at manufacturing locomotives, both for N gauge. The Jubilee 4-6-0 was a trail blazer in the development phase of N as a fully-fledged system; the Collett 0-6-0 more recently.

Recently the company has announced its latest loco, this time for OOn9 (narrow gauge). It is to be a model of the Festiniog Railway celebrities Prince ...

... and Princess.

Peco will make the body and the chassis will be from Japanese manufacturer Kato. This is a really sensible decision as Kato already makes sophisticated chassis and motors and Peco is a dab hand at plastic moulding.

CAD "renders" have been released which give a guide as to what the model will look like ...

... and it looks a cracker!

The development of "ready to run" models for narrow gauge is a feature of the modern industry and this very tiny loco will be well received by the narrow minded modellers.

The estimated price of £150. It would be a very nice Christmas present for a modeller seeking to re-create some of the Great Little Trains Of Wales!

More bits and pieces tomorrow.

 Next Variety blog : Sunday 6th June 

Fares Fair And Unfair?

A Jolly Good Idea

We all know that evening travel by bus has slowly but inexorably declined to the extent that evening services are now pretty much non-existent outside of urban areas - and headways are a bit thin even there. fbb well remembers a Sheffield Transport manager, way back in the late 1960s, bemoaning the fact that "it's hardly worth running buses until the pubs turn out".

Rebuilding bus services is going to be difficult, especially as officialdom had done its darnedest to persuade passengers that instant death will be an obvious consequence of a bus ride!

So Go Ahead in the north east has gone ahead with the above cunning plan. Boss Martijn Gilbert is enthusiastic ...

... although, to be fair, it would be unusual to issue a press release saying, "my plan was an utter disaster." This is what he did twit:-

fbb is not sure that a few extra pax on evening buses will do a great deal for pollution or congestion and, whilst 14% sounds impressive, without definitive statistics we cannot really judge its success. 14% of 10 passengers is less than 1.5 and surely he doesn't mean that evening revenue overall is at a break even point?

Maybe he means that the 14% extra bums on seats is bringing in as much money (i.e. not much) as was clattering into the piggy bank BEFORE that reduced £1 fare was introduced.

Too early to tell.

But there is a germ of an idea. 

If Minister Shapps wants to encourage chaps (and chapesses) to go back to the bus, why not up the Government sub a tad and offer everybody half fare until, say the end of August. The results might surprise everyone.

Meanwhile On The Railways

One of the headlines on the Great Britsh Railways press release (although it had nothing to do with the Williams/Shapps "strategy") was to make available season tickets for less than weekly or monthly use.

Not such a big deal. How if you are travelling three days a week? There is a huge panel on the home page of the company web site.

BUT ...

You’ll get 8 undated one day passes, giving you total freedom to choose when you travel, exclusively available on our contactless smartcard, The Key. Register for your Key smartcard now so you’re ready to commute your way. 

... despite the hype, you need a "Key" smart card AND, when you scroll through the lengthy set of FAQs ...

... you find it isn't quite as Flexi as it ought to be.

Why not simply sell a "carnet" of actual tickets for travel at any time. Aaagh, that would be too simple and you might lose a bit of revenue now and then.

And if you don'y use up all your 8 journeys in 28 days you have to APPLY for a refund and it will cost you £10 to get it.

Why can't the 8 journeys be valid for ever?

And its get worse.

If your Southeastern journey is wholly within the Transport for London Zones 1 an 2, e.g. a really obscure run from New Cross to Charing Cross on the dotty blue line ...

... you cannot buy one at all.

Thanks a bunch Mr Shapps.

Why make it simple when you can make it unfathomably complicated?

Outdated At Oxford

A Twitterer spotted this on his Oxford local bus.

He said that the children go free offer was no longer available. If you look VERY closely you cna just about make out mention of children.

fbb does not think children go "completely free" all the way to London or maybe they do - or more correctly did. Either way the tweet tells it readers that they don't any more and the car card should have been removed.

Edinburgh Tours Check List

fbb had a quick look at the confusing prices offered for a tour of Edinburgh, £8 if the bus is yellow and £16 if the bus is red. No change since the recent blog on the matter.

And it is still twice as expensive with one child ...

... on the brightly coloured Bright Bus (First Bus in an orange skin!).

Maybe Lothian Transport tours are unsafe?

Confused.Com?

Above is an illegible paste up of 28 tickets (those valid for one day) available to residents of South Yotkshire of which no less that 13 can be used in Sheffield. For those blog readers (mayhap small in mumber?) who are interested in the detail, the panel can be enlarged with one click.

Is this REALLY the way in which the industry is aiming to attract the motorists out of their cars and on to a pollution reducing, congestion reducing, stress reducing (?) bus?

The problem is that each operating company has its ideas as to how to keep the passenger on their routes. Surely it would be simpler if there was some sort of joint company owned by all the existing operators that marketed a set of multi-operator "rover" tickets?

Ironically, there is!

It is called "Travel Master".

But every ticket they sell is more expensive that any operator's ticket. And ...

Travelmaster prices are going up from Monday next, so will be even more expensive than operator only tickets.

But this is weird. The operators are not allowed to change their fares as part of the bail-out deal with HMG. But, it appears, Travelmaster is not an operator of buses so receives to Covid subsidy - so they CAN increase fares.

A small but significant fares increase via the back door.

But why, pray, does Travelmaster have to charge more than any one operator.

And why does a day's travel cost 40p more in the smaller towns than in Sheffield? And why does the Travelmaster cost 50p more if you want to use a tram as part of your travel. (City Wide with tram £5.30, City Bus without tram £4.90).

The reason is simple. The operating companies charge different prices for these different combinations of service area and they wouldn't tolerate a loss of even a penny of revenue.

And why do we have a South Yorkshire connect at £7.40 and a South Yorkshire Connect + (plus!) at £9.20?

Travelmaster are anxious to explain what good value they are; and generally how lovely they are.

Do people actually CARE how their prices compare with other areas.

Some of Travelmaster's comparisons with other purchases are dodgy in the extreme.

Of course, it is only £2.44 a day if you use your ticket every day of the month (unlikely?) and, were fbb still young enough to be caring for his children, he would wonder where a "kids meal" might be only £2.69.

Even the old crock fbb knows what a "latte" is (milky coffee); he has even been known to nosh a "Big Mac". A Big Mac is £3.19, by the way, NOT £4.89 which is a "Big Mac meal".

A latte at McDonalds is usually less than £2.

fbb cannot fathom what a 6" Meal Deal is - but the youff of today may know! (STOP PRESS - see below)

But these comparisons are pointless. "What shall we do today, daddy?" "Well, Torquil, you can either ride on buses all day OR have a 6" Meal Deal"

What would make sense for South Yorkshire would be a very simple zonal fares structure based on the four towns and the Peak District. Possible day prices are shown below.

One zone

(one of Barnsley, Doncaster, Rotherham, Sheffield, Peak District)

£4.50

Two zones

£6.00

Three or more zones

£7.50

All operators sell them and keep the revenue. It would all work out in the wash in the end and might, just might, attract more customers to bus travel.

STOP PRESS

After hours of patient research on-line, fbb has discovered that a six inch meal deal MIGHT be a "sub" ...

... but it's only £3.59 not £6.99. fbb is a footlong with meatballs man, of course!

Sadly, Boris' Back Buses plan hardly mentions fares - all posted far away in the far too difficult box. Most European cities can manage it, so why not UK?

And please do NOT claim success for London which, despite Oyster and its clones, still does not have a simple fare structure. Just try to explain pink card readers!

London doesn't even have the same fare between the the same points with bus, Underground and National Rail all charging different prices for the same simple product, e.g. a journey from, say London Bridge to St Pancras.

BUS      £1.55

TUBE     £5.00 or £2.40

RAIL     £3.40

Potty!

 Next Variety blog : Saturday 5th June  

Poor Printed Publicity Provision ...

... So Do It Yourself!

Since lockdown, the fbbs have kept in touch with attendees at their two Christian meetings (monthly on Sunday, fortnightly on Monday) by delivering (by post or by hand) a four sided A5 leaflet combining a secular quiz, some Biblical questions and a (very!) short "Thought".

Also included in the envelope is a "best wishes" card with a personal note from Mrs fbb. Delivery is eagerly waited each month.

Each leaflet has a letter of the alphabet as a "theme" which was the basis of the Sunday's Best meetings. We are now second time around - hence "D". (click on these extracts for an enlargement)

They are created on a very old computer system running very old software (first introduced in 1991!). But it is easy to use and surprisingly flexible.

The leaflets are printed on a cheap ink jet printer (cheap printer, expensive inks!) with surprisingly good results.

They are on tinted paper which reduces the chance of colours bleeding through from the reverse page. About 50 copies go out each month, mostly to folk who do not attend church; some to supporters and "prayer partners".

Why is fbb telling you this?

Because creating a full colour leaflet (DIY) is not difficult. Printing a full colour leaflet (DIY) is not difficult.

Here follows a lesson on print technology. (YAWN!)

Gone are the days when a little man assembled bits of metal type and printed from them. Gone are the days when your newspaper was printed on a huge machine using "hot type".

Older readers will remember the industrial aggro caused when the Press wanted to introduce Web Offset printing.

A youthful and higgerant fbb though it was a system invented by Mr Webb. The "web" is, in fact, the roll of paper. "Offset" means the printing "plate" rolls its image onto an intermediate roller (that's the "offset" bit) which rolls the image onto the paper.

For long runs, "offset" is the cheapest in terms of actual printing costs, but you need a separate machine to make the "plates" - so, overall, prices are remarkably similar. Gone are the days when colour printing was horrendously expensive compared with monochrome.

The latest technology is "digital" printing. In very simple terms, this is the up-sized high-tech version of what fbb does to print his leaflets. The design is created on a computer and sent to the printing machine and out comes a full colour leaflet!

A digital printer is just a big, sophisticated, colour copier.

If your leaflet design is posh and outsourced from plush offices ...

... in London W12 ...

... all you have to do do is poke the computer file into the machine, press go and leaflets issue forth. You might want to add a paper folding machine if your print numbers are large, but young Gavin could fold small numbers of leaflets in a hour or so.

The point is that, in the overall cost base of a large bus group, DIY is not expensive.

So why doesn't First set up a print department in, say, Bristol, to handle in-house leaflet production for Wales, Cornwall, Bristol and Wessex?

We have not been told why First Kernow leaflets are still not available, but the man from No 15 is known to have sweat blood to get his design job done "on time" - or as "on time" as the folk at Camborne would allow.

But somebody, somewhere has used, not expensive print technology, but a good dose of common sense.

Correspondent David, who lives  Minehead way, reports that, at the weekend, folk were grasping "partial" leaflets for the Exmoor Explorer ...

... in full and glorious colour ...

So well done that man (or woman) who had the sense to do a bit of photocopying or even colour printing!

Back in the days of fbb's youth, Sheffield City Council ran a large Printing department ...

... now a block of posh new offices.

Back in the days of metal type-setting, the folk there were more than capable of printing and assembling Sheffield Transport's timetable books.

One of fbb's modest contributions to the Public Transport Industry was to produce, in the mid 1990s, the first full-colour 96 page timetable book for Southern Vectis (and possibly in the whole of the UK). The covers, cartoons by Rupert Besley, had been in colour for some time. Below is a sample of fbb's timetable pages - each service with a route diagram!

The really scary part was getting the "imposition" right. This is the technical term for arranging the 96 pages in printed blocks of 16 such that they would appear in the right order and the right way up when collated and trimmed.

In the case of the Vectis book, the "imposed" pages then went off to a processing company to created the files which then went on to a printer for, you guessed it, printing.

Nowadays those intermediate processes are much easier - with clever software to do the job for you. fbb was then at the cutting edge of new technology!

He is still using the same basic software but with a few modest upgrades over the years.

So if you are having trouble with getting your leaflets printed ...

Do It Yourself

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Snippets

More money for London!

Of course HMG is underwriting ALL bus services at the moment. The deal with Transport for London has a bit more too it because the "grey suits" at the Treasury are not happy with the way Mayor Khan is running the shop.

So there are further conditions with this latest tranche of bail-out money.

Readers should remember that Andy Burnham, Mayor of Manchester, wants to reduce fares to the London level, increase frequencies and run the buses all by himself, getting rid of those nasty commercial companies who make huge nasty profits!

He says very little about how it is going to be financed but using London as an example is perhaps NOT the best way to convince his supporters!

 X52 - Look At Its Lovely Livery

The X52 is one of the Jurassic Coast group of routes which, this season, stretches from Axminster to Poole as the map on the side of this open topper shows.

The X52 open top buses run from Bridport to Monkey World.

But the livery does not have the "panache" of the man from W12, so it is either a cheap job or something cobbled together at Weymouth depot.

Single Deck Mystery Resolved

Thanks to correspondent David (as in timetable leaflets post above) the presence of a single deck service 21 bus from Buses of Somerset ...

... deputising from an open topper is explained

One of the two open-toppers on the route was taken out of service on Sunday and sent to Bridgwater for mechanical work. The Sunday operation was consequently a bit of a mess but by Monday the full service was operated albeit one duty used a single deck.

Which begs a tricky question. If First want this route to be a high profile money grabber aimed as the well heeled visitor market, should they be running a service, which needs TWO open toppers to keep to the timetable, WITHOUT a spare?

Slapped wrist for not knowing this....it was all available online!!!!!!

Admonition accepted, David. As all our readers know, fbb spends most of every 24 hours trawling through Facebook pages on the offchance he might read something relevant to one of his blogs!

Of course he does - NOT!!

The planned fares blog MAY appear tomorrow.

 Next Peculiar Price blog : Friday 4th June