Hertfordshire welcomes another two new bus routes

Saturday 25th November 2023

As highlighted in my recent blog about Hertfordshire’s new bus route 908, two further new routes began in the County on Monday this week so I took a ride on that first day to see what they bring to the network.

Route numbers used are 721 and 725 rather than in the 900s.

Timetables on the Intalink website show both routes being part of the fledgling Connect Herts brand (as the 907/908 are) but I didn’t see any other references either on bus stops or on the vehicles, which were all in Arriva’s standard aqua blue livery.

The introduction has meant a substantial extra commitment for Arriva with six vehicles needed for route 721 and five for route 725. Oddly, the former runs only on Mondays to Fridays while the latter is a Monday to Saturday operation.

The number 721 has a logic in that much of the route supplements the long standing route 321 between Luton and St Albans which then continues south to Watford whereas the new 721 heads west to Hemel Hempstead. A coordinated timetable between both these half-hourly routes has given a welcome 15 minute frequency in both directions on the common section, which makes it even more odd the 721 doesn’t run on a Saturday.

Between St Albans and Hemel Hempstead, departures on the 721 are fairly evenly spaced with Arriva’s half hourly route 302 (16/14/16/14 eastbound and 20/10/20/10 westbound) albeit, slightly different routes and journey times are taken as will be explained shortly.

The number 725’s logic arises from much of its hourly route between Rickmansworth and Welwyn Garden City (via Watford, St Albans and Hatfield) duplicating the hourly 724 on its long haul from Heathrow Airport to Harlow. At Welwyn Garden City the routes diverge with the new 725 continuing to Stevenage (via Welwyn and Knebworth) supplementing the recently introduced hourly route 908 while the long standing 724 continues via Hertford and Ware to Harlow.

Timing coordination varies on the common sections depending on direction. From Welwyn Garden City to Rickmansworth there’s a perfect half hourly departure between the 724 and 725 but in the other direction from Rickmansworth to Welwyn Garden City the 724 is just 10 minutes behind the 725 for the 88 minute journey. Indeed, the journey time varies too, as each takes a different route between Hatfield and Welwyn Garden City and the 724 has a five minute pause in St Albans.

Between Welwyn Garden City and Stevenage there’s excellent coordination between the 725 and 908 with half hourly departures from bus stations in both towns although slightly different routes are followed between Welwyn Garden City and Welwyn. In Stevenage the 725 continues beyond the town centre to terminate at Lister Hospital where it enjoys a generous 29 minutes layover whereas the 908 terminates at the bus station,

Timekeeping observed on both routes on Monday seemed pretty good except for my first journey on the 725 – the 09:50 from Rickmansworth to Stevenage.

The bus didn’t arrive into Rickmansworth until 09:50 from its previous journey – 18 minutes late – which I’m guessing was after encountering heavy traffic during notoriously congested peak time roads in the M1 and M25 area near Bricket Wood.

We therefore left ten minutes late and it was soon obvious passengers boarding through Croxley, Croxley Green and in Watford had all been waiting for the 724 which online tracking showed was one minute behind us. They all alighted on the common section of route.

At Watford Junction bus station the 724 caught us up and left ahead of us while waiting passengers boarded us. I knew it was the 724 as it was a branded bus for the 508/509/510 (again).

The 724 is limited stop with a list of bus stops additional to the timing points shown on the online timetable…

… but there’s no such information shown on the 725 timetable but I’m guessing it must be similarly limited stop on the common section as we passed at least a dozen passengers waiting at various bus stops along the way with their hands out looking puzzled as we sped past them.

Stops had all been updated to display a 725 number along the route and as far as I could see timetables were on display.

Certainly they were at Stevenage bus station.

The busiest section of route was between St Albans and Hatfield helped by a dozen students attending the University some of whom had boarded in Croxley and Watford thus enjoying quite a long journey for their studies.

All told, around 30 passengers travelled which on the one hand is very good going for a new route’s first morning but on the other hand the journey on route 724 must have carried 30 less passengers. I hope Arriva have taken account of the potential abstraction in this new network when submitting their bid to run the new service.

From Stevenage I repositioned myself to Luton and caught the 13:31 route 721 to Hemel Hempstead. 12 passengers boarded in Luton travelling south, two of whom alighted locally in Luton, but most carried on to either Harpenden and St Albans and we picked a few more up in the former.

The bus itself looked as though it had previously been used on an airport service (possibly the 724) as it still retains the luggage pen on the offside behind the driver which isn’t really appropriate for the type of service it’s now on.

It doesn’t look as though this route is limited stop as all stops in Hertfordshire had the number 721 added and as it supplements the all stops 321 it would only cause unnecessary confusion to do so. Although the little sticker alongside the number 721 states “including limited stop services” which confused me again.

Neighbouring Luton Council hadn’t updated the bus stop plates at Luton Interchange but it was good to see the timetable departure list had been done.

Real time signs also included departures on the 721 too.

In St Albans the bus emptied out and I also alighted to have a look around while the bus waited for 12 minutes (eight minutes scheduled stand time and four minutes more because we arrived early). I appreciate the need to coordinate times with the 321 and 302 as explained earlier but it’s not going to encourage passengers to make ‘cross St Albans journeys’, which this route now offers, with such a long pause time.

I even had time to take a few photos, pop into M&S and use the toilets on the first floor and surprised the driver when I got back on the same bus!

The continued route taken to Hemel Hempstead is via St Albans Abbey station and the St Stephens and Verulam residential areas before taking the A4147 through Leverstock Green and direct into the town centre along the A414 taking 22 minutes rather than the longer route via St Albans City Hospital and Adeyfield taken by the 302 which takes 33 minutes. (See my annotated map of St Albans below.)

We only carried four passengers between St Albans and Hemel Hempstead who could have used other routes but once people get to know how much quicker this more direct option is I reckon it’ll attract more passengers (including abstraction from the 302) but also new passengers from the St Stephens and Verulam areas to and from Hemel.

In another development from Monday, route 302 was extended to terminate at Hemel Hempstead railway station providing an extra link to the town centre and Adeyfield area as well as a new link to Leverstock Green.

Both the 721 and 725 offer welcome boosts to inter-urban frequencies across the county as well as some new direct links. Hertfordshire does well for north/south links by rail but buses play a key role providing east/west links so it’s good to see these being improved.

It’s early days but it’s not clear to me where the branding for this expanding network is going.

I think the time has come for Arriva to ditch the once iconic Green Line brand it still (sort of) uses for route 724 but it’s so watered down now to be an embarrassment. Instead Arriva needs to work with the County to develop the fledgling Connect Herts brand to make it higher profile rather like TrawsCymru in Wales.

A more eye catching livery would help – I’m not struck by the one introduced on route 907 and there also needs to be a consistent policy on route numbering (700s or 900s?) and whether routes are limited stop, or not, to avoid confusion,

It would also be good if the County’s excellent online maps could be updated to include the new routes and maybe even some printed promotional leaflets, timetables and maps produced and widely distributed.

I hope the enhanced frequencies do successfully grow the number of passengers so when the funding runs out these new additional routes are financially sustainable.

Another county introducing new bus routes is Oxfordshire. Three new weekday routes will begin on Monday (27th) but a couple of MWF or TTh shopping journey type routes got going earlier this month which I’ve had a ride on but I’ll report on these shortly. For tomorrow’s extra bonus new bus route blog we’re back in London trying out TfL’s very first completely new Superloop route – the SL10 between Harrow and North Finchley – which begins today.

Roger French

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