please empty your brain below

DG,

thank you.

initially, i wanted to say "Why on earth are you ignoring what's going on in your capital city / home town", but after reading this - i am sat here with a moment of relief/normality, with my morning tea and oatmeal that i normally do reading your blog, and it's nice to have this moment when i'm not thinking about the mess in the outside world (Ealing) that i'm about to step out into. So thank you.

(But how the hell this is going to effect the world's view on London considering the Olympics are here next time next year, i'm sure you'll have a view on that soon...)

Bus ticket machines where you have to choose the operators? That has to be one of the most user-unfriendly innovations ever.

It wouldn't have killed the people responsible for this to have come up with a revenue sharing scheme or a smartcard system, or even just said to the operators, "if you want to use our shiny new busway, you are going to have to reach some sort of agreement amongst yourselves over inter-available tickets"

Part of the problem is that in the provinces, the sorts of people who waste money on this sort of thing wouldn't be seen dead on buses, so they have no idea whatsoever about usability issues, or anything at all really.

After a sleepless night of having my nerves fried by a night of gangs burning down cars around me it's strangely reassuring that your latest post is about some busway in Cambridgeshire.

Max

Unfortunately bus companies are not allowed to collude over fares - they would get in trouble with the competition authorities.

Robert Turner,
While this is, in essence, true, there are ways round it now (I think the law was amended relatively recently).

Oxford has recently introduced a system of not only interavailable ticketing between the 3 main operators there, but even co-ordinated timetables on some routes, while Southend has had interavailability of certain tickets between the main operators for years. So yes, with some imagination, passengers could benefit and the competition authorities would still be placated

Nothing like a good bus journey to take your mind off your troubles. Enjoyed the video. Still don't understand how the buses glide along though.

Would be interested in your comments about London's burning.

http://beehive.thisisessex.co.uk/default.asp?WCI=SiteHome&ID=12889&PageID=101642

I think a trip to Cambridge should be on my list in the next week, to rise the new Busway before it either cracks up, floods or someone gets knocked down at a crossing. Thanks dg for getting there at the start and writing a report. Amazing how Local Councils waste the public's money.

As for geoftech wondering how children and youths running wild on the streets will affect the Olympics, well fortunately the public have short memories with news, and soon forget events once a new "big" story comes along. I'm assuming that the UK authorities will have cleared the hooligans of the streets before next year!
Paris had much unrest in the suburbs a year or so back with rioting and cars being burnt, but people still visit Paris.
I do think that in the UK we should use water hoses and tear gas to clear these youngsters off the streets quickly.
Hopefully it is peaceful in dg's part of London. Enough digression.

I grew up in Longstanton, so this is particularly fascinating to me.

Yesterday 24th September I at last got round to going to Cambridge to try the guided bus. However I wanted to try to get there using my Freedom Bus, so he's how! Piccadilly Line to Holborn, Central Line Holborn to Epping, bus Epping to Harlow, bus Harlow to Bishops Stroford,,bus Bishops Storford to Safron Waldren, bus Safron Waldren to Cambridge. then of course the guided bus Cambridge to St Ives, a nice little village, lunch there and then return home, got back after midnight! Next time I'll buy a ticket and get the train direct London to Cambridge.











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