Dave Thorp's Blog

Well there is a major war of the bus firms in the city of Preston and one route Yvonne, Stuart and I use a lot is the 11 route which is slap bang in the middle of the war.

For most of Preston we have one major bus company: Preston Bus. They operate services through most of the centre and immediate outskirts of Preston City Centre and have done for many years. Other networks such as Stagecoach and Fishwicks operate further afield and operate connections to other towns/cities.

However Stagecoach is now running buses on two of Preston Buses routes (although they did already operate buses on most of the 11 route anyway apart from one tiny cul de sac) and are planning to launch services on the 19 and 22 routes as well. Preston Buses general response is to point out the following

1. Stagecoaches fares are inconsistent in areas where they don’t have any competition

Well while this may be true, the fact remains that Stagecoach on the new routes are 10p cheaper for a single fare, 70p cheaper for a return, £1.50 cheaper for a day pass and £4 cheaper for a weekly pass.

Not to mention part of Preston Buses retaliatory tactic is to cover Stagecoaches 3 route as well. However on the 3 route to Penwortham the maximum fare on Preston Bus is £1. On other routes where they have no competition it is £1.10 or £1.40. Pot calling kettle

2. Stagecoach are causing extra congestion in the city by running additional services

That’s fine but surely then, Preston Buses response of adding extra services on the 2 and 3 route is also causing congestion. Or is it only specific buses (namely the Stagecoach ones) that cause congestion cos I thought it was traffic in general.

3. By using Preston Bus, they claim that you are supporting a local business that employs local people who spend their money in the local area so the only people to benefit are Prestonians rather than shareholders

Right where to begin with this one which frankly is a load of Bollocks!! At least 2 of Preston Buses current drivers are from Poland which last time I checked wasn’t all that local.

So Preston Bus employees spend their money in Preston. Well that’s fine but lets just dissect that for a minute. The Preston Bus employees take their earnings. Then they only spend them locally. There’s just a slight problem with that.

Who do they use to supply gas/electric/phone? Chances are not locally. Do they do their shopping at the local market or do they buy stuff from a supermarket? Chances are a supermarket where the money they spend will go to the shareholders of that supermarket. If they go out do they go to a pub owned by local people or one owned by a chain? It is all well and good saying the money stays in Preston, but after they have done even the slightest bit of normal day to day activity and spending the money has still gone to investors in companies. So what difference does it make? None thats what.

4. As a local company Preston bus cares about the local area

We live in the local area. And yet when we complained about Preston Bus 6 months ago they didn’t seem to really care.

They have recently invested in a new fleet of buses which amongst other features including CCTV, A TV screen with Sky Sports (ok the TV screen shows the CCTV but how cool would that be) they have easy access for people with Prams and Wheelchairs. The council have also restructured bus stops to accommodate these buses and raise boarding areas to allow easy access. The only problem…. the drivers don’t park near enough and often park half a metre away without dropping the floor making it very difficult to get on or off the bus. We complained at this… after one driver’s attitude when Yvonne told the driver that it was no good lowering the floor and parking miles away from the kerb was “Well you still got off the bus didn’t you”. Preston Bus didn’t care and whilst things improved for a week or two the drivers still got slack again

5. Preston Bus use cutting edge technology such as “Real Time” at the bus stops which provides up to the minute information on when the bus will arrive

This actually sounds great. Just one problem. Real Time LIES!!!!! It tells you buses are coming when in fact they turned up 10 minutes ago and have been and gone. It tells you a bus is due to arrive… half an hour later it turns up. Even worse…. it seems to have no capacity for if services are diverted/cancelled despite this real time update being the perfect medium for delivering that information.

On one occasion we were stood at a bus stop half an hour waiting for a bus. Real time constantly said one was due. It was only after walking to the bus station after half an hour that we realised that the buses had been diverted away from that stop