Hail & Ride sections & conversion to Fixed stops

Writing this part of the post in post-mortem to what I have written months before below definitely felt like a blast, considering I tolled away weeks of time into a spreadsheet that would have been redundant if TfL didn't stop updating the quadrant maps (South East/South West and North East/North West) maps, and not hiding away every possible Spider Map whilst updating few into the more useless format of only containing parts of the routes in question.

Double Consultations

No

Two-in-one, the clickbait would be withdrawal of 168 and 271 but I prefer numbers and calculating any changes, whether I believe they were bad (such as 48's withdrawal) or perhaps positive (I can't mention something within the past 5 years) so without further ado:

One Sainsburys Shopper

There's only three articles which I'll link at the bottom as sources. No timetables of S11 nor S13, but maps in the 1990s by Mike Harris contain the route. No photos of buses at all. Only one photo of P15, with a few timetables archived.

So as far as history goes, these pair of routes (S11 and S13) has went under the radar. Though there are clues which are rather astounding.

School routes... expensive not?

I'll just point out the fact routes 673 685 689 were almost four times cheaper using the same buses as their main route they were joint bid with, whilst also sharing a schedule. As opposed to not sharing a schedule, and having it's own new bus.

The 689 accepted bid in 2018 was under £20K. Lowest single bid was £100K.

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Among my first posts on this blog was regarding capacity on 3/322, back then the 3 didn't sport microwaves on wheels and 322 was low frequency and is currently high frequency. 

Though the question still stands. The answer would've been something along the lines of 'if it's not overcrowded then it's fine' with finer wording to make it less daunting. The question would naturally have been 'should there be extra provision for school capacity?' For the 3 it could be argued, I'm still of the opinion Croxted Road shouldn't have one route but I'm thankful in the climate the 3 hadn't received a frequency cut yet.

Whilst the 322 has the issue of vehicle size constraint.

So what does this have to do with school routes?

DLA273 (Y473UGC), Tulse Hill

Enter 690, the only school route close to me for several miles. It's a route which has it's origins from nearly 90 years ago as the 5, being restructured into a 189 which on it's last days of life died to the common public as it became a school route from the girls school in Earlsfield then terminating at Brixton.

It's section to Norwood spawned off the back of the atypical garage journeys which became permanent through the decades until the current day, however it previously had live garage journeys to Walworth (WL) for a short time prior to moving to Norwood (N). This route was 689, identical to current 690 in every road except using Tulse Hill instead of Dulwich Road and Norwood Road north of Tulse Hill Station. The 689 died in 2011 on contract renewal, as the less favoured routeing between 689/690, and thus 690 kept the #689 running number whose duty entailed a first afternoon trip terminating at Clapham Common before running back to the school to go full route, with another bus covering one full trip. Not long after the Clapham shorts died, making it a 2 trip morning and 2 trip afternoon route. To throw a curveball not mentioned earlier, 689 did get cut to Tulse Hill briefly as the sole 689 was run from Brixton (BN) but returned to going further to West Norwood.

Then the pandemic gave a list of routes extra buses for social distancing, the 690 was one of them, Arriva London South's suite of school routes had extras from Abellio.

Then the question was brought to the table, with empty V690s frequenting Acre Lane. I myself observing nothing different from the Norwood end though...

...traditionally it's been the quieter end. At most there'd be a dozen but as time went one, a handful became a few, then barely visible, then a few again.

Sutton Croydon done

absolutely definitely Purley in December 2019, zero doubts at all
disasters before November

Routes 439/S2 tender awards delayed back to coincide with other Sutton routes rather than being awarded not long ago around July wasn't suspicious per se as it was a sign of some change of plan in the consultation. Boy oh boy is there changes.

Sutton in 2009

Sutton

The people of Cheam and Ewell receive an uplift in service from every 30 but no Sunday service to every 20 plus a Sunday service, except it's no longer called 470 but will be S2, and won't go further than St. Helier. Whilst 470 was undoubtedly indirect to Morden (for the Northern Line) let alone Colliers Wood which it's the only route to link to from the areas it serves for now.

The S4 I'm surprised but equally not impressed that it was changed. From a perfect split with S2/S4 both terminating in Belmont to S4 being truncated west of Sutton but keeping it's eastern extension to Waddon Marsh it largely retains it's original routeing.

Vendetta against Short Workings

yo dawg I heard you liked speed lines

All of a sudden the thought was raised; instead of wholesale frequency cuts, shorten the offending Central sections on part-frequency. So my thought process from that became: "how would it look like?" Through maths and numbers, trying to deliver similar PVR cuts through the technique of short workings.

The frequency cuts we had in the end of August on the 28th and continuing on with September for 59/253/254 and 13 yet to come along with other potential victims. How would these sometimes drastic but reversible frequency cuts could've looked, had the capacity in outer London and apparently irrelevant inner London not be sacrificed for the woes of hard-hit Central London?

Better the Network 1.2, since it's an addendum not meant to be included in this series.

Expressa 2

Expressa 2 - Bus Upgrade Plan

I'd recommend you don't click this before reading the previous post Expressa, or this will be propaganda material no different to East Germany.

Upload postscript: If I do another long post like this I will commit seppuku.

Expressa

We have 4 express routes; 607; X26; X68; X140 as well as express sections on normal routes; 96; 132; A10. It's a far cry from London's peak.

How many do other European cities have?

Pro tip: Hong Kong is the boss, funny, as that's a pre-British controlled metropolitan area.

Better the Network: Express Routes.

Here we go.

Only 5% power of Singapore

Note: Usage of any photos on this blog isn't permitted where no name is present (meaning it's mine, ©Unorm), or an All Rights Reserved symbol © is present. If you desire to use a photo, you must contact the original author. In my case, you should contact my Flickr. 

Whereby a name is stated and no © is present, the photo is Some Rights Reserved and may be used in accordance to the license. 

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Unorm Lambeth/Southwark review

I've decided, 'before Transport for London make it, following the Croydon one, I'll save myself from the despair of waiting it and fantasize my own delusions.' This is the very delusion. The delusion I've spent my entire damn March on drawing maps alone.

I should preface that some of the areas would fall under other borough's jurisdictions but the routes enter one of these two boroughs.

The beginning of a new world.

Warning: This is very long.

Also yes this was uploaded on April Fools but I assure you it's not one, I just worked my entire March on this is all...

The foreshadowing to come...?

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Better the Network: Night Tube Buses

Impossible

The night tube bus routes ending was a shame as they brought more to the table than simply interchanging with a station of a Night Tube. For example Clapham Junction's nightlife effecting the 319 and Sutton's cries and woes for the loss of N213 into Croydon brought back in the form of the 154.

Can they be bettered?

Short answer: Yes

Long answer: Yes for the most part with some No's so read below as to how it could be made more useful than simply connecting to a Night Tube whose service has been suspended during the pandemic. Though truly that depends on if it's possible as everything can't be done under the same blanket thought because that failed with the likes of having double decks one size as if one shoe fits all which it doesn't and this is just filling in space so you just click 'read more' so just do that whilst I explain how I dislike random holes in an otherwise perfectly plain and simply done job since it's really just OCD, the same applies here because one logic applies to A but another logic for some reason applies to B and you have just express routes mainly down to decisions before TfL's existence and/or woes by Harrow and the need to save the quids.

the North

humbler South

Bold title I'll take the mantle of moving forward...

One from nice | The 68s

Might or might not have touched on it but internally I dare say I struggle now that the topic is revived with the 4% mileage cut TfL propose in the next 3-4 years to cut down expenditures, no blaming in that aspect. Good thing it slowly died out of minds the moment I finish this post up, eh?

So with my pride swallowed, I try to investigate the variety of ways this can be executed. With the opening statement being 68's split (with 68A [468]'s birth) intended to be at Herne Hill rather than West Norwood. Fun facts eh, too bad 40 decided to outright leave for Dulwich.

I'm questioning why I've done this but I've put the effort in anyways so I've seen it through to the end.