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A Day on the Cymri as tuner

8th October 1965, Page 86
8th October 1965
Page 86
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Page 86, 8th October 1965 — A Day on the Cymri as tuner
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rifle Motor Services : a health cure troducing stop treatment THE pattern for the future in passenger transport may have been indicated on September 5 when Crosville Motor Services Ltd. introduced the Cymru Coastliner to ply along the 70 miles between Chester and Caernarvon in the hope of bringing back to the fold those people who have deserted the bus for the car. Certainly the bait is tempting: a modern coach put on to stage-carriage work, but with limited stops—so fast that it matches the express service, and so economical that the minimum fare is not more than 4d.

lts introduction is part of considerable revisions in the coastal services and was timed to coincide with the start of the winter services which, incidentally, my bus-stop companion in Llandudno suggested, start at a "daft" time ("Why, even the hotels are still full. This time the changes have really messed things up ").

Crosville. of course, have heard such things before and expect to hear them again, although they have learnt not to ignore them. They provide plenty of literature to keep people up to date. They also publish timetables and by and large know their public almost down to the last copy. They print 7.000 timetables in the autumn and usually the trickle of sales is steady until the late .spring, when the early holidaymakers take care of the few that remain in circulation. So. in accordance with the familiar pattern, the company printed 7,000 this year. Then came the big shock: within days the Is. publication was sold out!

It is believed to be the first time that this had happened in the Crosville history. So obviously there is plenty of interest in what is happening between the mountains and the sea, although it is early days yet to draw any conclusions about the new services.

brief dip into history is appropriate. The long arm of ille Motor Services first reached out into Wales whilst nind of guns was still dying away at the end of the Second War, but few people realized then that they were moving ito perhaps the most testing of all the grounds tried by 9-year-old company.

his book, "State Owned Without Tears ", W. J. end-Taylor, son of the founder, writes that " fresh capital :asy to come by and so we were tempted by the almost ched area of North Wales and fell. One often wonders would have happened if we had sat tight in our own zompact and rich piece of country, relying on Merseyside

its million population, and let other people have North

S.

at good transport man ever sat tight? Certainly Crosville lot. They gave the Welsh drivers and conductors the nsibility on which they thrived, this including paying elves their wages from the takings and banking the ce, a system that was sufficient to show a small profit.

: by 1939 the Welsh part of the company was becoming a drag. War brought compulsory reduction in services and Crosvillc were happy to prune advantageously, so that they came out of the war with Welsh routes that were healthier than at the outbreak of hostilities. Some restoration of services had to be made, of course. and it was then that Crosville decided on the policy of joining up services into long-distance routes. This worked and provided breathing space.

Now the same principle is invoked with modern trimmings to counter the slump of 20 per cent of passenger traffic in the past five years. There are millions of unprofitable miles of running in Wales. although the coastal routes under review show a marginal profit. depending really upon a good summer. Even so, things were much healthier along the coast a few years ago.

To effect the health cure. an attractive service has been devised along the north coast of the Principality by the introduction of the Cymru Coastliner which,. in the words of the company. is superimposed on to revised stage services—the particular revisions repeating history in that they are based on joined-up "hops ".

Chester to Rhyl twice an hour: Rhyl to Llandudno twice an hour; and Llandudno to Caernarvon three times an hour (5+ hours all the way) have become Chester to Caernarvon twice an hour in 4 hr. 36 min.. whilst remaining as double-deck multi-stop services. The superimposed limited-stop L.1 coach (83 stops, plus a few unscheduled ones whilst the crews are familiarizing themselves with the route) runs hourly from Chester to Llandudno, but only two-hourly to Caernarvon.

Thus, the Chester-to-Llandudno service is now increased by the Cymru Coastlincr. whereas on the least-used part of the route (Llandudno to Caernarvon) the six double-deck buses every two hours have _become four double-deck and one coach within this same period.

The terminals and schedules indicate the economics in operation, hut it is not anticipated that there will be many all-the-way passengers. even on the fast. coach. A study of the ever-increasing popularity of the express service led to the feeling that the motorist would be even more happy to avoid the frustrations of narrow roads that Are crowded at holiday times by leaving his car in the garage if he could have a frequent, fast. comfortable and reasonably economic alternative

over various distances from about a mile, without the need to book in advance.

It will be recalled that at the application hearing in August, British Railways did not object to the service, although the NUR did. Crosville imagine that the railways will hold their long-distance travellers. At present all the stations along the coast are still being used but there are proposals to reduce these to about eight railheads some 15 miles apart which, if maturing, would mean a degree of extra road traffic, irrespective of the .Coastliner service.

A schedule of 3 hr. 28 min. for the coach run and a daily service extending over approximately 17 hours calls for nine coaches that are expected to cover a total of some 800,000 miles in a year. It is interesting to compare this with the fact that the 4 hr. 36 min. schedule of the normal bus would call For the use of about 14 vehicles on an hourly basis. All the coaches are Bristol MW/ECW 39-seater vehicles which represents a slight change from the original announcement that RE/ECW coaches would be used. If demand makes it necessary in summer—and my conductor suggested that this would • be the case—luxury double-deck buses with 55 seats in a 30 ft. body, like those in use on the Liverpool-Caernarvon express service, will be brought into use.

Another point of interest is that the scheduled time from Chester to Caernarvon (via Wrexham) on the X.7 express service is 3 hr. 38 min., the return fare being 18s. 9d.. compared with 3 hr. 28 min.. return fare 14s. Ild. on the new limited stop L.1 Coastliner. On the X.3, 4 and 5 express services along the coast the Queensferry-to-Caernarvon section overlaps and is timed at 2 hr. 57 min. (cost I3s, return), against the L.1, 3 hr. 10 min. (cost 14s. Id.).

Crews Welcome Revisions

The revisions generally are felt to be welcomed by the crews, especially in respect of through running, although only a limited number will go from end to end each day. In some cases it is advantageous to switch crews to link with the normal stage service. Several depots are involved—Caernarvon. Bangor, Llandudno, Llandudno Junction, Rhyl, Flint and Chester.

With the service being designed mainly for the brief-journey passenger there are no scheduled halts for refreshments. nor in fact is there indication of demand. It is possible to buy refreshments at Rhyl bus station. Toilet stops can be made at Prestatyn and Bangor, where brief halts are scheduled on most runs. • c?6

The route. hugging the coast as it does, is normally free from ice and snow, and although there was a week last year when the Bangor road silted up this was something out of the ordinary, and no undue problems are therefore to be anticipated in the colder months. In summer the traffic conditions can play havoc with schedules, bottlenecks at Abergele and Llandudno Junction being likely to have repercussions over a considerable distance. It is intended that the Coastliner will go right through, whatever the state of the traffic, but it is also foreseen that during the holiday peaks it may be necessary to restore Rhyl and Llandudno as terminals for the normal stage service.

Local dignitaries of the main towns along the route took part in an inaugural run, among them being the chairman of Rhyl UDC, air. W. Elwyn Conway, who has been a Crosville driver for many years. I took part in a standard service run a fortnight after its inception, travelling out on the 14.00 hrs. ex-Chester to Caernarvon, arriving at 17.28, and returning on the 18.02 to Llandudno for an overnight halt before completing the return on the following day.

It was an absorbing experience and with the sun shining brilliantly throughout, the publicity brochure seemed even modest with its descriptive promises of fascinating glimpses into the histories of the Principality, as well as providing views of some of the finest coastal and mountain scenery.

Flint, with its castle built by Edward I; Tynymorfa, where there is a good view of the Point of Air lighthouse which is no longer in use but is retained as a landmark for mariners; and the popular seaside resort of Prestatyn are the prelude to 50 miles of wonderful panoramas. Llandudno offers at one end of its wide, sweeping bay the Little Orme and at the other end the Great Orme, almost 700 ft. high. ;anwy, on the way to Llandudno ion, has the remains of a castle which eplaced by a larger fortress at Conway, f the most impressive of all the Welsh s. Seascapes across Conway Bay to Island and Beaumaris on the Isle of sey are impressive and inland can be the giants. of Snowdonia changing in r as clouds scud across the sky. air, at the entrance to the Menai Straits, ited for its university college and fourteenth-century dral and is followed by the last stage to Caernarvon with iely preserved castle.

tet a young lady from Bangor, but there is nothing either or sinister to follow. After an hour or so she and I the oldest inhabitants of the Coastliner and she told me attracted to the new service, She had decided to take a t to Chester at 13s. 8d. just for the ride and the pleasure day's shopping, the first that she had ever enjoyed in the oman city. "I think that it is splendid ", she said. Then, at any prompting, added "And I intend to recommend my friends ".

:re was also a young Scotsman who will have happy ories of his journey back from Wales. Having only a sh II note, he tendered it nervously towards the conductor sked if it was acceptable. "Quite acceptable ", was the Ise. A 2s. ticket was purchased and 18s. change duly d over. "But I got only I9s. 6d. for a Li in England he Scot. "You should come to Wales more often ", was ply from the conductor, who, incidentally, was operating A end of the route for the first time in 15 years.

stent turnover

turnover in passengers was consistent. Two on, two off, an, six off, and so on; there was a change of crew at an interesting moment at Colwyn Bay as we caught the auble deck that had left 50 min. before us; standing room when shoppers. scholars and workers poured on at udno. the generally busy stretch between there and ay costing 10 min. on schedule that could not be regained:. n exodus at Penmaenmawr. leaving 25 still on board.

On leaving Caernarvon that evening the 18 passengers were mostly holding return tickets to Bangor and beyond. On my return to Chester the following day the conductor made the observation that the demand for change was heavy, bookings being mainly return or large single.

The supplementary and consequential alterations to other services include a speed-up from 1 hr. 25 min. to 1 hr. 11 min. on the Birkenhead-to-Rhyl route, which is now the L.8 limited stop. although it remains a double-deck bus service. Its importance is that it also serves as an advertised connecting service with the L.1, the change-over being made at Queensferry, and thus completes an exceptionally fine set of services. A re-routeing of the A.I-3 and the LI around. rather than across, the Llandudno peninsular meant that Llanrhos was without a local service, hence the introduction of a Llandudno-LlanrhosConway service (M.10).

In a foreword to "State Owned Without Tears", Edmund Vale wrote that Crosville survived all mergers. In 1929 it became LMS (Crosville); a year later it became merged in the Tilling Group; in 1948 it was nationalized into the British Transport Commission, but the general manager and his trusty staff kept their heads. obeying orders with optimistic acceptance whilst sticking to the ideas which the evolution of their own creation had taught them were basic. So Crosville never lost its innate individuality.

Thus today, THC controlled, we find the name perpetuated on 200 coaches. 700 double-deck and 300 single-deck buses: traffic manager. Mr. 1. B. Hargreaves. watches a tidal stretch of the Dee flow past his superbly appointed office that was once a tyre store in the original Crosville garage; and the heart of this famous organization beats in the remainder of this original works which is now laid out in open-plan office style.

I wonder what they are planning about those other Crosville services that suggest themselves as being open to limited-stop treatment.


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