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How important are passengers?

5th January 1985, Page 35
5th January 1985
Page 35
Page 36
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Page 35, 5th January 1985 — How important are passengers?
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

Noel Millier puts Brighton's services under customer scrutiny

THE trouble is that the buses today are run for the operator and not the passenger. Or so some would have us believe. Change, therefore, is necessary to return us to a situation where the customer counts and the actual travel needs are met.

Just how bad are the buses? I decided to pick a town at random, place myself in the position of a stranger and go there and investigate. The names of a number of towns within a reasonable distance of the CM office at Sutton, Surrey, went into a hat and I picked one out.

It was Brighton, so I set oft, for the South Coast. A trifle shamefacedly, I decided to travel to the town by train. My thinking was that a stranger who may never have been to the town and who has unexpectedly to visit a long lost relative may well travel by this mode.

For the purpose of the exercise I pretended to forget that Brighton area transport services are provided by the town's own district council undertaking and the National Bus Company subsidiary Southdown. I arrived at the railway station just looking for a bus to the hospital and not worrying who would operate it.

If I had expected the services to be hard to identify and use I was to be disappointed. Above one of the exits from the main passenger concourse at Brighton's mainline station the legend reads "Buses." Stepping out into the cold, salty air I immediately came upon the Brighton Corporation-operated Churchill Square shuttle-bus and then on to the railway station bus terminal.

The station bus forms a minibus-station with a number of bus-stop bays designated platforms. Finding the relevant platform was easy and finding the number of the bus serving the hospital was also straightforward, Bus stop service information boards include a vertical schematic diagram of the routes and all points served, and give details of the hours operated and minutes past each hour buses serve the stops in question. Unfortunately, the diagrammatic list does not mention the hospital although inquiries revealed that buses 42 and 44 go close by.

The bus number 42 came on time and deposited me at the general hospital. The driver was friendly and helpful, even though a sign told me to tender the exact fare, change was graciously offered. The bus, operated by Brighton Corporation, was clean and comfortable — there was no evidence here of operation with anything other than the passengers in mind.

As I looked around the town centre I found that most main bus stops have the same standard of service information. I found them much easier to read and understand than more detailed timetables.

After checking out the hospital service I returned to the station where I took the twominute shuttle ride (for a mere 10p) to Churchill Square, which is in the middle of Brighton's shopping centre. The station shuttle is operated by rare Bedford JJL midibuses in a multiorange livery shared by two other shuttle routes.

The Brighton shuttle services were launched two years ago as a result of an East Sussex County Council initiative. In addition to the short station shuttle, two routes serve housing, areas on the outskirts of town. The services are supported by publicity and are designed to provide faster than average high-frequency services to the centre of the town.

One shuttle service is operated by Brighton Corporation using National single-deckers and the other is run by Southdown using VRT doubledeckers. All shuttle buses are finished in the multi-orange livery. Publicity, using the livery design, is also used to identify the zonal fare system used on the services.

I used the Mile Oak shuttle from Churchill Square. The bus was a Southdown-owned Bristol VRT. For a fare of 60p I travelled the length of the route. Publicity on the bus included Tube-style schematic route dia grams detailing all stops. All bus stops are treated as request stops and the journey time proved remarkably short. On entering the bus I noticed a "Welcome" sign — almost unheard of on a bus. "Thank you" signs were visible on the way out. Our driver was polite, efficent, young and female.

Shuttle bus stop publicity details the hours of 20-minute and 10-minute frequency operations as well as the fares. Fares from Brighton are normally 60p whatever the distance travelled. Shorter distance riders are carried at 20p or 40p zonal fares within the area at the Portslade (far) end of the route. The system works to provide a fast trip to Mile Oak and Portslade, and short-hop passengers at the Brighton and Hove ends of the route are discovering what for them is a 60p flat fare.

Shuttle passengers are encouraged to use discounted prepayment tickets and are able to benefit from discounts available in a number of shops en route. I found the services attractive and well planned. The journey time was comparable to a car time and the service frequency offers passengers the chance to make a spontaneous decision to travel. The bright new image established shows that the way buses have been marketed in the past does not necessarily point the way to the future.

Unfortunately, later during my stay in Brighton I found areas to criticise. Driving a bus may not be the most rewarding job in the world, yet if drivers are bored it is not a good idea to let the boredom be shown to the passengers.

The second time I took the 42 from the station to near the General Hospital the bus ar rived at its designated bus stop bay outside the station. The driver left his vehicle to call at a local shop. By the time he returned, a few passengers were waiting by the closed doors of the bus. He returned and sat behind the steering wheel reading for around five minutes before opening the doors to allow passengers to embark.

While he is obviously entitled to his break, I felt this driver showed an all too common lack of consideration for the passengers waiting in the cold outside. No seats are available outside and it would have taken very little time to take the fares and allow people to wait on the warm bus.

In fairness to the driver, I must add that he did remember to tell me when we arrived at the stop nearest to the hospital and that he was very quick in handling fares and providing tickets. I wondered whether it would be fair to criticise him for chewing gum throughout the journey and calling his passengers either mate or love rather than sir or madam? I did not mind, but some would.

I did have to look hard to find areas to complain about and passengers I spoke to generally praised their bus services. I did not notice, though, that the bus stop service publicity was uncommon outside the town centre and the conventionally operated services are not as attractive to the casual user as the shuttle-concept buses.

Returning to the railway station, I decided to sample the station shuttle just once more. Unfortunately, this time the crew's attitude made me cross. The Bedford J...IL was almost full and people were still trying to board. The driver was deep in conversation with another driver standing on the vehicle entrance steps and both men seemed oblivious to the fact that people were trying to get past them to enter the bus.

The driver's ticket machine was automatically clicking off the lop fares and he seemed not to need to look at the customers. I thought perhaps he ought to be told that the shuttle "Welcome" and "Thank you" signs on the bus did not mean that he no longer needed to acknowledge his passengers at all.

The rolling stock in Brighton was generally clean and I noticed that the corporation buses were just a little cleaner inside than were the Southdown ones. This could be in part due to a ban on smoking in the municipal buses. As a non-smoker, I approved of the ban, but felt that the publicity posters extolling the virtues of clean air could be like a red rag to a bull for the hardened smoker.

The fares seemed appropriate to the services offered. For example, the 20-minute trip up to the hospital costs 40p and short hops are generally 15. The Bedford JJL midibuses borrowed from Maidstone for the station shuttle were attractive to look at and ride in. I believe this design would do well in a deregulated environment.

The Brighton area transport operators' services are easy to use and generally good. I was impressed by the shuttleconcept services which were launched as a two-year experiment sponsored by East Sussex County Council. I understand that the shuttle buses carry around 15 per cent more pas sengers than the conventional buses they replaced and that off-bus ticket sales have been encouraging.

The future of these services

and the whole jointly run Brighton network must be uncertain in view of the proposed Transport Bill. Particularly interesting will be the emerging of a competitive relationship between Brighton Corporation's bus undertaking and Southdown which may replace the long era of co-operation with direct competition.

The future of the shuttle concept and the image it has developed is complicated by the fact that one of the longer housing estate routes is operated by Southdown and the other by the municipal un dertaking. It will be a shame if that bright new image for buses is lost in the name of competition.

Shuttle does, though, present many pointers to the way future services can be demand oriented to stimulate growth and be secure in the face of competition. Off-bus ticketing must be a feature that will be more attractive for operators and just as attractive to the riders in a competitive environment.

From the point of view of a casual bus user, both operators work well together and have an obvious control of their markets. In future, neither seems likely to be particularly vulnerable to competition from outside, but both must be vulnerable to competition from each other. The size and scale of Southdown's operation in Brighton and its present diversification should make it a clear favourite in a battle with the municipal undertaking if such a battle arises.

The outcome might well rest on each operator's operating costs and staff and management attitudes, although coach competition has shown that operators can work together.

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Locations: Surrey

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