To many buses

Well I'm just glad I've got my car back on the road. 3 weeks of getting the bus to work has almost bankrupted me! The prices were far too high - especially on shorter journeys. I got the bus from across from Oscar Bear's Nursery (or Imperial Pub) on Blackburn Road to the bottom of Lonsdale Street and it cost between 50p and 67p (depending on bus co) and I was actually being charged from the town centre to Church! Some people may think I was being lazy but I have a bit of walking to get to & from the bus stops as well!

One evening I nipped into Ossy Mills and then got a bus from the Palludium at Ossy into town and it cost £1.05!!! I thought I was going to Blackburn town centre when the driver gave me the price!
 
How much is a Gallon of oil...Lucky you don’t live in Blackpool much more expensive up here. Far better by car and it’s better for the environment according to the like of Top Gear.
 
I think that the public transport system is in a mess,full stop. It seems to make little sense for the government to beg and plead with people to use public transport when, compared with the car, it is so expensive, uncomfortable and inconvenient.

I travel quite often between Accrington and Blackpool on the train, and there are times when I cannot hear myself think for the screaching of kids, the bellowing of idle parents unable to control them, dung heads who cannot be separated from their mobile phones and insist on conducting their conversations at a level that includes the whole carriage. Add to this the yobs who have no idea of how to conduct themselves in public and the generally dirty and unpleasant conditions of stations and trains and THE COST and you can easily see why those who can, prefer to drive.

All right, I am getting more cantenkerous as I get older and I am really looking forward to getting my pension book then I can really let rip with the 'crotchety old git' thing. But come on, is standing for ages in the cold and rain at Accrington Station and then being confined like cattle for the duration of the tedious journey, with people that you don't know, and wouldn't want to know even if you did, a viable and desireable solution for the 21st century? I don't think so.

As Proust observes, ' Hell is other people.'
 
My main grumble with public transport is the lack of protection from the elements while you wait for it. Accrington Station (station???!!!) as you said is a classic example. So too are the bus shelters which serve no useful purpose whatsoever as the wind and rain howl through a one sided structure with a slightly overhanging roof. We haven't even got a Fern Gore one right now. It's a case of now you see it now you don't. Sometimes we have one, then it's taken down, then they put one up, then it goes again.
 
Since the council have got rid of pilkingtons buses, we have got northern blue on our route. The state of them to look at are no better than pilkys they too should be sent to the scrap yard.
 
I think Acrylic Bob has hit the nail on the head there. One of the main problems is that people don't use public transport, especially at night, because of the moronic behaviour which seems to exist throughout England. There begins the downward spiral.
 
Has your car never broken down?Does it have to be driven 6/7 days a week for about 10 hours a day over humps n bumps and god knows what else?Even new vehicles breakdown,it's a fact of life we have to put up with.The Accrington Transport buses are newer than the Pilkybuses and are well maintained unlike the Pilkybuses,I should know I am driving for them.
 
My dad still drives for Lancs Utd and has been a driver for over 30 years, be started with the old Corporation. He always used to work the late shifts, but on some local routes it's not safe. Drivers face the possibility of attack, robbery and pure moronic vandalism. Is it any wonder that people don't want to use the public transport if they have access to a car. I heard a snippet of info from a neighbour today. He has been talking with our local councillor, who reckons that there may be a train station in the future, at the bottom of Marlborough Rd area, near the old iron bridge. The council think that if there was a station up this end of town, more people would use trains. We all know that wouldn't be the case. Perhaps if the trains, tracks and signalling equipment was properly funded and maintained, if the trains ran on time, were comfortable, quieter and less expensive they would be used more. We've organised a meeting round here soon with our councillor and the police in order to thrash out a couple of trouble areas. I might ask him exactly how much HBC are going to waste on this potential project.
 
Public Transport is a great thing.Everybody including me would agree that it should be cheaper but due to fuel prices and insurance costs due to the "no win no fee" attitude these days it is barely a non profit business.I'll be working from 12.05 - 23.40 tomorrow on the huncoat route,these evening and sunday services are subsidised by the council.So ie. the council will be paying us a few hundred £sss to run that service on Sunday and i'll probably only take about £30-40 in fares.It's such a waste of taxpayers money.I ain't even gonna go into Blackburn councils deceiving ways and underhand tactics regarding Blackburn Transport, it aint pretty.
 
I don't get this, we used to have a Corporation transport service that served all areas of the borough. Then along came privatisation and Accy decided that it was too expensive to continue to run it. Now they spend our money subsidising the private companies, who, no offence intended mate, run a largely substandard service on knackered buses? And we have, on the one hand, Peter Britcliffe bleating that there are too many buses and on the other, the Government shrieking that we must have more. And this is progress? This is meant to be an example of 'Industry and Prudence' is it? I know what it looks like to me!
 
Thanks Bob,that was my original point,before privatetisation Accrington Transport
coped very well,and provided a reliable service,it was Thatchers obsession to get
rid of the unions that as been the ruin of the bus station.
 
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