please empty your brain below
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Excellent article, as always. It’s easy to forget about the human cost of changes like this.
(One thing though - Potters Bar is on the East Coast Mainline, not the West Coast Mainline).
dg writes: Fixed, thanks.
Matthew | 13.11.17 - 7:09 a.m. | #
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It's an odd thing regarding who takes responsibility for passengers who recklessly have to travel across a local authority boundary. Suppose the sixty commuters using the 298 to travel to work in Cranbourne Road Industrial Estate were all residents of Greater London, living south of junction 24?
Roger French | Homepage | 13.11.17 - 7:18 a.m. | #
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But we can afford to 'invest' at least £56,000,000,000 in the craziness of HS2 as currently constituted.
Ken | 13.11.17 - 7:27 a.m. | #
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You can't get to Luton anymore, that finished in April.
dg writes: Can.
The school routes are packed well before Potters Bar (I think the school relocated from Islington, Lady Nugee aka Emily Thornberry sends here kids there), there is little local traffic within Potters Bar to and from the school.
Still anon | 13.11.17 - 7:42 a.m. | #
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Cross boundary buses are a problem all over the country when different councils take different funding approaches. Derbyshire nearly stopped funding buses a few years back meaning services into (and co-funded) by Greater Manchester would have died. Thankfully they relented, but surely there has to be a better way...
Andrew Bowden | Homepage | 13.11.17 - 7:55 a.m. | #
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@BusAndTrainUser had pictures last week of all the relevant buses at their far flung termini. He also chronicled an epic bus jaunt from Brentwood to Slough, which IIRC took just under six hours.
Lorenzo | 13.11.17 - 8:01 a.m. | #
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Sorry DG pesky UNO bus, or as Priti Patel would say - you misinterpreted my clarification.
Still anon | 13.11.17 - 8:08 a.m. | #
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Indeed - however in Cambridgeshire, the buses from Haverhill (in Suffolk) to Cambridge are better than many of those within Cambridgeshire itself, because some level of council funds Stagecoach to run the services so that Haverhill can still exist as a town and have residents...
Kirk | 13.11.17 - 9:23 a.m. | #
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Loving the UNO bus London day ticket. It's an interesting version of London...
London day ticket £4.00
Gives one day’s unlimited travel on route 614 between Barnet and Queensbury.
ap | 13.11.17 - 10:35 a.m. | #
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When I rode up to Cranbourn Rd there were three of us on the bus. The driver duly did the right thing by making an announcement about the impending cut. A lady didn't hear it so I explained what was happening. She wasn't happy - "how will people get to work?". OK it's not the busiest stretch of road but clearly people do use it - people boarded on my return trip even though it was off peak. I was a tad surprised there weren't intermediate stops to better serve the housing estate but bus stops seem to be spaced further apart in the Shires than in London.
In terms of history there was an evening and Sunday service to Cranbourn Rd until Nov 2010. I assume that was the last time HCC caught a "financial cold" in terms of funding cross border services.
I understand the politics and money in all this but it's yet another example of our buses getting worse. If this was a train service there'd have been questions in Parliament about removing a rail service in Hertfordshire. As it's a bus no one cares.
PC | 13.11.17 - 11:07 a.m. | #
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Some reciprocity and common-sense is clearly needed for cross-boundary services, otherwise the logical conclusion is 50+ (however many LAs there are) little islands of bus provision. But in this case I can see fully why TfL don't see going further than the town centre/rail station as anything to do with them
David | 13.11.17 - 11:43 a.m. | #
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@Ken While I agree scrapping the whole HS2 scheme if trains cannot run through onto HS1 (and thus Europe), I suspect that:
1. TfL has no say on this funding whatsoever;
2. I doubt the amount is really this big;
3. Will this sum be allocated to where you want if not there;
4. Someone has to be benefited from this fund and I wonder how the money will be distributed.
Patrickov | 13.11.17 - 12:12 p.m. | #
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More pedantry about the northernmost bus stop: although TfL maps show a pair of stops at the top of Dugdale Hill Lane, I can't find any sign of a bus stop flag looking on Streetview, so does this count as a stop? If not, the northernmost stop would be the Laurel Avenue stop on Mutton Lane.
Don't underestimate how lazy schoolkids can be. Loads of them use the bus just to get to Potters Bar station; TfL had to divert an extra afternoon bus (692) via the station just to meet this demand. I think a lot of them travel up from London by train, otherwise I'd question why TfL are going out of their way to provide free travel between a Herts school and a Herts railway station.
Leo | 13.11.17 - 1:07 p.m. | #
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"I'd question why TfL are going out of their way to provide free travel between a Herts school and a Herts railway station."
Exactly. Not fussed at this cut whatsoever.
Mark | 13.11.17 - 3:45 p.m. | #
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It's this sort of thing that shouts loudly why TfL must never take over rail franchises that serve beyond the Greater London border. They are just not interested, even though it is often London ratepayers who benefit from the services. We don't all want to head into town, some have jobs in places like northern Potters Bar, Watford, Borehamwood and so forth.
Geoff | 13.11.17 - 4:42 p.m. | #
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Totally agree with Geoff. Travel patterns don't neatly accord with an arbitrary boundary line on a map !
Paul | 13.11.17 - 5:21 p.m. | #
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Pedantically speaking, isn't the westernmost bus stop Warminster Station, as detailed in the 2014 London Reconnections Xmas Quiz? https://www.londonreconnections.com/2014/2014-lr-quiz-answers-winners/
Stuart | Homepage | 13.11.17 - 5:24 p.m. | #
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The once a day extension of the 313, and the school routes 626 and 699, are presumably of some (albeit limited) use to local residents of Dugdale Hill Road wanting to go into Potters Bar or beyond, as well as the schoolchildren for whom it is primarily intended.
"why TfL must never take over rail franchises that serve beyond the Greater London border"
That ship has sailed, I think - Crossrail to Shenfield and Reading, Overground to Cheshunt and Watford Junction.
In any case, unlike buses, there is statutory protection for rail services, so even if it was practical to do so, the Overground could never be curtailed at Turkey Street, for example.
timbo | 13.11.17 - 5:27 p.m. | #
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Geoff - can't agree with your conclusion. TfL (and LT before them) have run cross boundary bus, tube and rail services for years. Whether we like it or not there has always been a mixed funding formula for such services with variations on fares, zones and ticket acceptance. County councils have long paid LT / TfL money for cross boundary services. Cross boundary bus routes have been progressively cut back since the 1970s due to falling demand, more people owning cars in the home counties and then bus deregulation in the 80s.
The real problem here is the vicious assault on local authority funding by central government and the lack of statutory protection for a vast range of useful public services. TfL has no more of a bottomless piggy bank than anyone else. The fact that both Essex and Herts County Councils have turned off some funding has meant the loss of part of the 167 and 298. There are strong rumours that the 166 between Banstead and Epsom is due for the axe as Surrey are strapped for cash and the route is out for retender now so costs will go up. The residents of Surrey may have to mount the barricades again as they did to save the 465 service to Dorking.
It's a minor miracle that more TfL routes into Essex, Surrey and Herts have not been axed or been severely cut back. I suspect DG will be making more "last" bus rides and writing articles over the next couple of years as this isn't the end of financial pressures on bordering authorities nor TfL.
PC | 13.11.17 - 6:08 p.m. | #
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I add the missing "why does this matter since no one lives north of Potters Bar"
Mike D | 14.11.17 - 12:41 a.m. | #
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And I think PC has the point: "County councils have long paid LT / TfL money for cross boundary services." And I suspect TfL give a reasonable deal on them too.
But when they stop funding, as Hertfordshire have here, TfL rightly stop operating that part of the route. It's the same in the rest of the country.
As much as I am pro a national transport operator and helping others out, the current constitution is such that TfL have to be accountable to the tax payers of London. And funding buses for workers and school children wholly within Hertfordshire isn't accountable.
Kirk | 14.11.17 - 8:06 a.m. | #
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TfL bus routes going more than a few hundred metres outside London
Bucks/Berks: 81
Herts: 107, 142, 258, 292, 298, 313, 331
Essex: 20, 167, 375, 397, 462, 498, 549
Thurrock: 347, 370, 372
Kent: 96, 233, 246, 428, 492, B12, R5, R10
Surrey: 80, 116, 117, 166, 203, 216, 290, 293, 403, 404, 405, 406, 407, 411, 418, 434, 464, 465, 466, 467, 470, K3, S1
diamond geezer | Homepage | 14.11.17 - 8:37 a.m. | #
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Wonder how many ex-London services come within the London boundary?
David | 14.11.17 - 1:06 p.m. | #
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@David
If you mean how many routes come into London from outside, then these can be traced from the London Local Service Permit bulletin (hidden somewhere on the TfL website).
A problem for operators running into London is that they cannot accept Oyster, since it requires a different technology to that used in the rest of the country (ITSO). This mitigates against running within the TfL area, though there are particular points, such as Kingston and Uxbridge, where several routes still cross the boundary. But elsewhere - routes from Hertfordshire to Enfield, for example - truncation at or before the boundary has taken place, Arriva's 402 from Tunbridge Wells to Bromley being a recent such curtailment at Sevenoaks.
Nameless | 14.11.17 - 2:25 p.m. | #
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Is this why the 142 and 258 have been won by London Sovereign from Arriva Garston? If these routes are cut back the garage is still near to the route. This follows the pattern of service reductions for road works which almost invariably end up as permanent reductions. The fare freeze is costing far more than any other cutback in finance.
Nameless 2 | 14.11.17 - 8:31 p.m. | #
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@ Still anon
"I think the school relocated from Islington"
It did - but any children who attended the Islington site will now be over fifty years old.
timbo | 15.11.17 - 5:20 p.m. | #
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