CityCyclingEdinburgh was launched on the 27th of October 2009 as "an experiment".
IT’S TRUE!
CCE is 15years old!
Well done to ALL posters
It soon became useful and entertaining. There are regular posters, people who add useful info occasionally and plenty more who drop by to watch. That's fine. If you want to add news/comments it's easy to register and become a member.
RULES No personal insults. No swearing.
(I know this has been discussed on tram thread, but actually more relevant here)
This seems credible -
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It works fine, as other bus operators are being tracked correctly. Edinburgh Council pushed ahead with the roll out despite Lothian Buses not being ready. Lothian are now playing catch up trying to convert over 700 buses to the new system. Council & Lothian both at fault.
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...under-22s-could-have-free-bus-passes-withdrawn-for-anti-social-behaviour-4445944
Has been quite a problem in Midlothian. We are losing the bus stop bus time screens at a rate of knots: no-one knows for sure who is smashing them up, but young people with too much time and too little conscience are suspicious. I saw a group of them doing their best to destroy an entire bus shelter last year.
One of the trappings of car-dependent suburbs, with no amenities and nothing for kids to do (and no way for them to travel independently anywhere... until now... let the bird out of the cage...)
Antisocial youth behaviour is what you get with lax planning law - allowing developers to create these car-dependent ghettos with no facilites
Traffic modelling going well then? It’s almost like a motorway-style gyratory and 1600 space car park bang in the middle of a feckin city was a bad idea.
Whoever the officer responsible needs put in the stocks to spend some days in the middle of the gyratory and suffer the consequences of their own making
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The briefing I asked for on the bus tracker app will be 'interesting'. Edinburgh's bus users need and deserve better than this. Utterly unusable.
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(Not just buses)
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Transformation Action Plan Two Year Update - Progress and Next Steps
On December 8, the MTC’s Regional Network Management Committee reviewed a two year status update for the Transformation Action Plan. The update covers welcome results for riders, as well as behind the scenes progress being made.
The update summarizes progress on fare integration, mapping and wayfinding pilots, connected network planning, the groundwork for a regional funding measure and more.
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I am absolutely passionate about public transport, and I am always proud of how both Lothian Trams and Lothian Buses define our city. Edinburgh Trams is exceeding all expectations, with the staff delivering a service which carried over 1 million passengers in August 2023. This complements the 2 million or so passengers carried by Lothian Buses every week. We can be proud of all that the staff in these companies do. The need to ensure the continued growth of public transport in Edinburgh, however, means that these companies must integrate their services more. That’s why in 2024 I hope we will see these companies merge… perhaps into an entity formally known as Lothian Regional Transport! Does that sound familiar?
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https://drscottarthur.scot/2024/01/02/2024-getting-edinburgh-ready-for-the-future/
So a million a month use the tramline and 8 million “or so” get buses in the rest of Edinburgh.
Key questions are -
Have bus numbers gone down? I would assume so as the tram has displaced some buses.
More importantly
Are car journeys and/or mileage down?
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We've written to the Minister for Transport seeking clarity on the future of bus priority measures, following the budget announcement that there will be no direct funding for the Bus Partnership Fund in 24/25:
https://www.cpt-uk.org/media/uuvpg5la/cpt-scotland-to-transport-minister-bpf-jan-2024.pdf
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For nearly a decade systems have been available to deliver key information on bus services but a massive inertia against delivering this
We have aspirations to get Open Bus Data, which could enable freelance developers (AKA spotty teenage geeks having fun with the data) producing handy apps like Real Time Trains and Tracksy only for buses instead....
Passenger, and Padam are suppliers of apps for many bus operators, and some, like Craigs of Campbeltown (West Coast Motors/Glasgow Citybus/Borders Buses(Perrymans) plus Kintyre Express (VERY fast ferries (40 kts 12 pax plus bikes!)) can show the bus type and registration number, what % of seats filled, wheelchair and bike spaces etc, as well as tracking your bus all the way
On Citylink I now see that the ticket machine counts the passengers on with the journey booked, so a driver has a rapid check on seats available (by law ALL coach passengers must have a seat)
Obviously a lot of work still to do but just keep prodding - it took 20 YEARS to get Citylink to add bike space booking on to the seat booking system, and we've still to get National Express (we started on this in 1996!) plus Megabus, and Flixbus offering cycle space reservations on their coach services
I'm keen to see this moving forward so do keep pressing for delivery and aiming boots at subcutaneous lipid agglomerations....
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Hi, the app converts distance into time and unfortunately, due to factors such as diversions/ traffic congestion, the system has to keep adjusting to non-moving traffic without knowing exactly how long the bus will take to get from its current position to your stop. Apologies.
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Edinburgh bus tracker screens not likely to have live updates until 'summer
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https://www.edinburghlive.co.uk/news/edinburgh-news/edinburgh-bus-tracker-screens-not-28767007
News from TEC
Bus stop displays may or may not be showing live info from LB ‘by summer’.
Notionally it seems to be about fitting hardware to all buses!???
PLUS there’s a ‘better’ app coming…
UPDATE
CEC official now saying problem dates back to pandemic when, due to low patronage - and unclear future bus use, LB cut back money for upgrading equipment on buses.
(Previously said that LB needed info for operational reasons and had ‘hoped’ new displays would work with ‘old’ info sources.
Still not really clear what went wrong or why it’s taking so long…
Might I suggest relocating some bus stop displays (or duplicate screens)
These should be installed in local shops, & pubs
A particular arrangement existed well before phone apps at the village of Tarbolton in Ayrshire - in the Commercial Inn (I think the meeting place for the famous Tarbolton Batchelors Club)
Rolling in to the village the bus drivers would sound the horn< and the passengers would finish their beers, and step outside to catch that bus on its way back out from the village
I'd love a campaign to have more 'bus shelters' with beer on draught and a healthy fire in the hearth
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McGill's bosses say bus franchising is 'theft' of business
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https://www.glasgowtimes.co.uk/news/24183062.mcgills-bosses-say-bus-franchising-theft-business/
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Keir Starmer is not ideological and will be guided by what works. Ideologues on both the right and the left have a jaundiced and simplistic view of ownership. They claim that the doubling in rail patronage was all down to privatisation and the decline in bus use is all down to bus de-regulation. Neither is accurate. Rail growth was propelled more by the first order issues I mentioned and by generous taxpayer funding. The economy was also growing which generated more rail journeys as well as road congestion which gave a competitive edge to rail. While road congestion is a friend for rail it is the enemy for buses which get snarled up in slow moving traffic. For every 10% decline in bus speeds, we lose 10% of patronage The only way round it is to mitigate the impact of congestion with effective bus priority.
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https://www.transporttimes.co.uk/news.php/What-is-the-strategy-for-transport-715
Wondering if anyone has any details on the ‘autonomous bus’ incident 3 weeks ago that has caused the use of the ‘autonomous’ mode to be suspended?
This is on the AB1 service from inverkeithing to edinburgh park.
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Booming weekend travel fuelled by tourism and new attractions is spearheading the post-pandemic recovery of Edinburgh’s main transport operator, its managing director has told The Scotsman.
Sarah Boyd said the growth had seen bus firm Lothian reach 90 per cent of its pre-Covid passenger numbers despite many of its travellers now working from home for part of the week. She said notching up 110 million passenger journeys last year – up 17 per cent from 94 million in 2022 – also demonstrated that traffic congestion had not deterred more people from taking the bus.
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Edinburgh Bus Users Group (EBUG) accused the firm of trying to “throw buses out” of the city.
With no obvious alternative location to take the place of the existing bus station, one solution being considered by the council is to use Ingliston Park and Ride. However it is understood this would only be an interim option and officials are already exploring potential sites close to the city centre.
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