BUS services could be set for a complete overhaul.
An Environment Department report questions whether the States-owned fleet should be replaced and whether a private company such as Island Coachways should continue to deliver services while contracted to the States.
‘As things stand, it has to be recognised that the existing fleet will require replacement in the next few years.’
Warranties are running out on the current buses and more people are using them, leading to more wear and need for greater capacity, the report said.
Environment wants to use a competitive tender to appoint consultants that would analyse the island’s needs and recommend the way forward for the next 25 years.
The most recent five-year contract between the department and Island Coachways runs out on 1 January 2012 and the States previously decided that from then it would have to be competitively tendered.
Today’s report lays out some of the questions that must be considered for such a tender:
‘Should the States continue to provide a subsidised bus service? Is the contract to be operation-only or supply and operate? And is capital infrastructure provision and land and buildings to be included in the contract?’
They suggested alternatives including renewing the contract with Island Coachways or restricting the contract to organisations that provide a full service including the fleet and premises.
Another option was for the States to take full ownership.
It said consideration should be given to the stricter environmental demands placed on vehicles now and the fact many people saw the current buses as too large.
Disabled and elderly users also need to be taken into account.
However, it said replacing the fleet with smaller, greener vehicles was not a straightforward option and that only certain vehicles could operate in Guernsey.
‘And without some form of assistance the bus services would most likely be patchy and exclusive to certain individuals in the community.’
Treasury and Resources said the report fitted in with phase two of the Fundamental Spending Review. This envisaged net savings of £3.23m. over five years.
‘The department hopes that, in the future, there will be a reduction in the amount of public subsidy required for scheduled bus services without seriously undermining or reducing the quality of the service,’ it said.
Article posted on 6th November, 2009 - 2.29pm
19 Article Comments
These fine low-floor buses should not be wearing out already. UK mainland buses (the bread-van minibuses of the 1980s excepted) usually last about 15 years in front-line service, and then carry on for several more years as school buses, open-toppers, etc. Guernsey’s buses are narrower than UK ones, and replacements would have to be specially made, unless narrow Solos are ordered. Re the capacity issue: would Guernsey’s roads be suitable for longer buses?
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Why waste money on repairing something that isn’t even broken?!
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I am surprised that they need replacing. But if they are going to be replaced, please please make them smaller. More buses but smaller buses would seem to make sense given the size of our roads. Reducing times between pick-ups would encourage more bus use.
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Something else that should pay its own way. Whatever happened to the principle ‘user pays’? I don’t think I’ve ever seen more than three or four passengers on the buses at any one time on the 6A route in St.Martins. It would be interesting to see the figures (independently audited) on how many passengers are carried and the cost of each passenger’s subsidy paid for by the taxpayer.
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TL if you make the buses smaller you’ll need more of them. More buses means more drivers more fuel more mechanics more everything ….. and therefore a lot more cost.
More costs spread over the same number of passengers would need a greater subsidy to break even – I thought the all seeing all knowing Tribal told us we should be getting rid of the subsidy not increasing it ….
Beaufort I can quite beleive that you often see the bus practically empty in St Martins. I can also tell you that quite often I get on it at the top of the Grange and it’s standing room only ….. just because you see it empty doesn’t mean it’s been empty all the way around …
Starscream it may not seem broken to you but it does to others … if you live somewhere with a direct bus ever 30 minutes great …. Not so if you’re out in the sticks, there’s only on bus every 2 hours and it takes you on a magical mystery tour half way around the island to get where you want to go …
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Tony
Would it not mean if we had more buses then people might use them more? less people using cars, which is what we want? maybe even a better service to areas that are lacking.
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in the past buses have served me well and have equally been a right pain at other times, but all that aside ,the principle of the states having invested (given away) millions of pounds to the present company ,then scrapping it all and spending another fortune on reports to take us through the next 25 years, well duhh it smacks of the guernsey telecom thing again (you know sell a profitable company cheap and with a healthy bank balance to boot)we have’nt forgotten that one yet. i think maybe a rift could have developed between the states and the owners ,or maybe they are getting too expensive even for the states to run ,oh and at the time that coachways appeared a small group of very experienced lifelong busmen suggested to the states that smaller buses be run on shorter time schedules all over the island as a kind of hop on hop off thing (didnt want to know) watch this space and keep your hand on your wallett
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Good I hope these huge buses get taken off the roads! I am surprised there hasn’t been a fatality yet with these things flying round corners on our small roads. It will only be a matter of time until someone gets seriously injured! The other day my wing mirror got completely swipped off even though I have a tiny car and had stopped dead to let the ugly bus pass. Did he/she stop? NO course not! Hate the things. The smaller intransit ones are much more suited to Guernsey roads.
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Regardless of what Tribal may have concluded, I would be happy to see the subsidy continue or even increase if it meant that we had a fully functioning, well used bus service.
A bus service in an island of this size does not need to be run as a profitable business. The provision of a bus service helps the island by reducing car use (especially during rush hour). That is worth subsidising.
So more (smaller) buses? Bring it on, provided that the service serves the needs of the population and encourages better usage of the service.
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Whilst smaller more frequent buses seems a good idea if you stop and think it really isn’t
For one thing smaller buses would lower the average number of passengers per journey …. at the moment the maximum on a bus is what, 40 , 50 ? And the minimum is 0. If you make the buses smaller the minimum is still 0 and the maximum is now only 30 or 40. So the average passenger figure would have to drop !!!
BCB as for encouraging bus use … let’s face it , everyone who actually really wants to use the bus currently does. Do you really think people are going to give up their car ( parked for free in town ) for a bus just because it goes every half hour rather than every hour ? ….. at the moment when I catch an afternoon bus it is nearly always full ( with me standing ). Make the bus smaller and chances are I won’t even get on it, and some people who currently sit will have to stand … great incentive … so what if there’s another bus going 15 minutes later? Or do you think they should run 2 smaller buses at the same time , one behind the other ? At peak times the bigger buses are already full, replacing it with 2 smaller buses only gives you 10 extra seats or so and inconveniences twice as many of your existing users – some of whom I can imagine going back to the car as a result …
Arapaho – you are never going to get the States to take advice from people at the coalface over accountants in suits armed with statistics ….
If any of you think you can replace 30 or so large buses with 60 or so small ones, if you have somewhere to park them all, if you have the garages and mechanics to service and repair them, and you can recruit twice as many staff to drive them, and can do all that for the same or less than it costs now then I look forward to seeing your successful tender for the bus services in 2012 and wrestle it out of the money grabbing corporate hands of Island Coachways.
Or perhaps we should just let the States run it all themselves … because we all know how efficiently they do everything else …
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It really is the right time now for this weak and vacillating States to grab the bull by the horns and introduce pay parking at North Beach/Salerie and other major car parks. The money from this must be used to continue funding the bus service at the current levels and then to improve on it.
Commuters and others have been getting away for too long with Scot free parking in a big, handy car park that. If this valuable public resource was in private hands they would certainly have to pay a price for the privilege of using it.
Let’s slay this free parking sacred cow once and for all or forget altogether the notion that we somehow have have a traffic and transport strategy in place. At the moment we don’t!
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Tony
It is easy to dismiss an idea but I don’t think you have fully thought it through or used enough imagination.
More buses also opens up the possibility of more routes – meaning that the system is more flexible and provides what people need. You don’t just need to provide extra buses following on behind existing ones.
It also allows bus routes to be concentrated where the need is – so that in the rush hour there can be greater bus density nearer to town. This avoids the problem of a bus that has come from Torteval being full by the time it gets to the Grange – you just run a local rush hour bus for the outskirts of town as well as the Torteval bus. After the rush hour that bus can be reallocated wherever it is needed.
And I’m not sure how you can say that everyone that wants to use the bus already does. Most people plan their lives around what is convenient. You make things more convenient and people will change how they organise their lives. You could say that everyone that wants to recycle already does so, but the evidence from the UK is that kerbside recycling produces a big increase in recycling, simply because it is easier than before.
No system is perfect, but these suggestions are worth investigating.
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TL I have thought it through … but I dont actually need any imagination. The sort of routes you envisage were proposed in the integrated transport strategy agreed to by the States some 5 years ago – pretty much double the frequency everywhere and extra peak services to the outskirts of Town. The problem isn’t a lack of imagination, its having to live in the real world and implement it. The strategy was integrated in that it was supposed to be funded, and reduce traffic levels, by the introduction of paid parking. Which the States in their wisdom have decided to reject time and again … makes you wonder why they agreed to an “integrated” strategy that relied on it.
And again may I say that smaller buses means more costs !!! At peak times, if you make the buses significantly smaller, you will still need twice as many. Twice as many small buses need twice as many drivers, burn twice as much fuel, need twice as much servicing and repairing as the larger buses they replace. And in the short term at least all this would have to be done with no more passengers. Even if you ignore the cost of a fleet of 60 smaller buses rather than 30 larger ones, where are you going to get all this extra money to run them ?
You could double the fares, but then that is hardly an incentive to use the bus. Or you could finally introduce paid parking – but can you really see the States actually agreeing to it ? And anyway the last proposal would have seen it cost the same to park your car for the day as catching the bus – again not much of an incentive.
Yes we should do our best to encourage people to use the bus, but at the same time there are better things to be spending taxpayers millions on at the moment. As I see it, right now smaller buses are a non starter. I can see the long term advantages, but the short term disadvantages are too great to be ignored.
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Beaufort
User pays? If only!! As someone who has no children, hardly ever uses facilities such as Beau Sejour, Candie, churches, beaches, bathing pools, cliff walks etc, and who also has private health insurance, my life would be considerable cheaper (financially) if the “user pays” principle was applied to all areas of life. I don’t think the extra 50p or £1 on my bus journeys would make too much of a dent in the several thousand pounds that I’d save each year in tax and social security payments.
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Tony
Any connection to the Bus Co.?
AS taxpayers why are we always expected to take it that all these companies ( Bus,Electricity, Post) are run as efficiently as they can be and that the level of subsidy is really needed. Only a true competitive tender will provide the answer. Jersey have it right (with the buses) on this occasion, Is a flat fee of £1 and £1.50(peak time) really so awful. Stop giving a meaning less subsidy where the reciever will simply just ensure there costs just meet.
Competition is the only answer
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Tony – fair enough. my knowledge of what has been considered/rejected/fudged/half-baked in the past is not as great as yours. I certainly agree that an integrated approach is required.
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Paul indeed Jersey do have it right as regards their bus service. So it may be more expensive than ours but I for one wouldn’t mind this if we did actually have a proper service especially at peak times. The timetable as it stands at the moment is ridiculous. Also schools should have a proper service dedictated to them.
Competition would certainly shake things up and encourage more bus use.
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Totally agree with TL.
However the bus service in Jersey is, in my opinion, great. For once the other isle seems to have got it right (with Connex). Fares are slightly higher than here (£1 or £1.50 depending on length of journey), but the service is more frequent, more punctual and runs later into the night. The buses there are packed.
Dedicated tourist routes in Jersey mean that tourists don’t “clog up” commuter buses and that commuters don’t have to take longwinded routes around the tourist attractions. Also with the tourist buses at £2 the island’s visitors are slightly subsidising the year-round bus users.
All in all a great system in Jersey, but one that could be delivered over here by the current Island Coachways / Environment Department partnership rather than going to the trouble and expense of tendering for a new provider.
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Pardon me for butting in from the other island… but while there’s a lot to be said for our bus service over here, the fact that (aside from the Airport route) not one bus runs north or west of Liberation Station on Sundays is not ideal. It also took a while to persuade Connex that the original proposed fleet of 33 buses was nowhere near enough (they now have something like 50 on public services, plus another 20-odd kept for schools work, some of them scraped together from the old JMT fleet and upwards of 15 years old). And some of us still think that making everything run to/from St Helier isn’t clever.
Like you we are going to have real problems getting replacements (the States bent the rules to let the Nimbuses on the road – even they were too wide): this is one occasion where we probably need to (gulp) work together to get viable numbers for orders.
(But if working together with us is too hard to stomach, we’ll let you work with Shetland if we can have Orkney :))
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