Thursday 28th November 2024
Readers may recall a blog in August describing an unusual situation north of Bedford where competition had broken out between Grant Palmer and Stagecoach on a bus route between Bedford and the village of Harrold.
On the face of it the situation on route 25 didn’t seem to make sense not least as Stagecoach began running the service in August under contract to Bedford Borough Council, and what’s more were running free of charge to passengers for the first few weeks due to late registration of the service with the Traffic Commissioner. Grant Palmer, which had been running the service for the Council, was continuing to run its journeys as a commercial venture which in some cases were at similar times to those operated by Stagecoach.
That’s how it seemed back in August, but I can now shine a light on the background which helps to explain how this odd situation arose.
Grant Palmer had been running the fairly limited service between Bedford, Clapham, Oakley, Carlton and Harrold (including some journeys extending to Rushden) under a tender since 2011 including a re-award in 2017. Over that time the company introduced additional journeys on a commercial basis as well as investing in smart new Enviro200s to improve the quality of service for passengers.
Step by step it invested in providing an improved offer including two morning peak journeys which received ‘de minimus funding’ from the Council.
After another two year extension the tendered journeys were up for renewal again in July this year but rather than invite bids from bus operators in the normal way through tender documents, the Council announced it was carrying out a “review of rural funded provision” and invited Grant Palmer to agree an extension through to March 2025.
Such a short extension was unappealing to Grant Palmer as the company had planned its vehicle and driver resources which included continuing the de-minimus peak journeys and all the commercially operated off-peak journeys as far as Harrold.
To continue operating the tendered journeys out to Rushden via Harrold would mean acquiring buses and recruiting drivers which couldn’t be justified for such a short term contract. The logical thing would be for the Council to discuss with the Grant Palmer team how its desire for having links to Rushden via the small hamlets north of Harrold could become part of a longer term package dovetailing with the journeys Grant Palmer were running commercially.
Instead, Bedford Borough Council approached Stagecoach with the same offer of a short term contract until next March but instead of asking the company to only operate the tendered journeys to and from Rushen, the Council contracted it to run journeys which Grant Palmer had been running commercially to Harrold and the two morning peak hour ‘de-minimus’ journeys.
So, whereas it appeared when I travelled on the route last August, Grant Palmer had begun competing with a tendered operation (which didn’t make sense to me) the reality is the Council is using public funds to contract Stagecoach to compete with Grant Palmer.
Which doesn’t make sense either.
In the meantime, Grant Palmer improved the service offering from the end of September by increasing the number of commercially operated journeys to an hourly off peak timetable until after lunch. Even better, further journeys were added last weekend including a Saturday service, as the new timetable below confirms.
Meanwhile a meeting of the Council’s Rural Affairs Committee on Monday evening received the much anticipated “Bus Services: Review of Rural Funded Provision” report which recommended the following:
This encouraging confirms the wasteful competition will be coming to an end and Grant Palmer’s commercial initiative with route 25 can continue to prosper. And who knows, if the company is successful in gaining the tender for the one bus operating journeys to Rushden the service might end up integrated together again.
It looks like good sense has prevailed and in the context I noted the Review report also explains the Council has investigated the idea of introducing DRT for its rural area but concluded this wouldn’t be appropriate.
On a similar theme, Cheshire East Council has recently carried out a review of its ‘go-too’ branded DRT two bus operation introduced in October 2021 thanks to £1,260,000 from the DfT’s Rural Mobility Fund. The review also looked at the Council’s longer established FlexiLink operation which is restricted to those aged over 80 or with accessibility needs and have no other public transport option.
Readers of these blogs will not be surprised to know the report confirms the average number of passengers per journey on ‘go-too’ is 1.3. The report explains this “reflects the rural and sparsely populated nature of the operating area and the relatively low uptake of the service by local residents. Analysis of the total passenger numbers for the year-to-date and total operating hours available (with both vehicles operating and allowing for driver’s statutory rest periods) shows that an average of 2.5 passengers were carried per operating hour.”
On the other hand the report explains the Flexilink set up with its restricted criteria for eligibility, a traditional booking system by phone or email (no app) and ten vehicles in use, manages 4.1 average passengers per journey and 3.2 per operating hour. So, unsurprisingly, the recommendation is from the end of March 2025, when the DfT’s £1.26 million runs out for ‘go-too’, then Flexilink will become available to all age groups and have its operational hours extended to replace Go-Too with a fare of £4 for fare paying passengers and the ability to book by app or phone.
Let’s hope passengers will be able to book a journey to suit their needs with so many more people now eligible to use the Flexilink service, as well as the recent withdrawal, in September, of two circular rural routes serving the area based on Nantwich where passengers were advised they could use ‘go-too’ as a replacement.
“Popular”, at 1.3 passenger per journey! Yeah, right.
Roger French
Blogging timetable: 06:00 TThS
Comments on today’s blog are welcome but please keep them relevant to the blog topic, avoid personal insults and add your name (or an identifier). Thank you.
BusAndTrainUser 
I think the Grant Palmer ’25’ timetable shown should be headed “Mondays to Saturdays” rather than “Mondays to Fridays”?
Roger G
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It says underneath the timetable no service on Saturdays, so I assume not. That seems to be a thing north of London, a bunch of routes in Hertfordshire are Mon to Fri only.
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I think Roger G is referring to the second GT timetable, which says no service on Sundays or Bank Holidays, abd I agree it should be headed ‘Monday to Saturday’..
Jeremy
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Ah got you – yeah looks like they updated the one I was referring to and didn’t amend the days of operation. I’ve just checked their web site and its correct now.
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Have added the updated timetable to the blog with a reference to now operating on Saturdays too.
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We will have to see assuming the government funding actually materializes what the local LTA’s do with all the funding they are supposed to be getting
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Hopefully not waste it on DRT schemes!
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Latest report from DfT on passenger numbers seems to indicate that the £2 fare cap has had negligible if any impact on passenger numbers. They have climbed a bi but are still only at 87% of Pre Covid levels
Investing in better services might offer better value than a fares cap
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Worryingly, the journeys per head data appears to be riddled with errors:
Hertfordshire passenger journeys are up from 20.9m to 23.3m while journeys per head are down from 17.3 to 9.6.
Essex passenger journeys are up from 32.5m to 39.6m while journey’s per head are down from 21.4 to 12.9.
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unfortunately the DRT bandwagon rolls on, Leicestershire are replacing three rural services with DRT and at the same time increasing the vehicle requirement for similar services from three to six, whilst neighbouring Rutland are replacing most of the county network with DRT and axing the 747 Uppingham – Leicester and the Uppingham – Stamford service. All of the work is being given to Lincsbus without going out to tender as they don’t have time to do a procurement exercise. The only reported comment at the Council meeting to approve this was that the existing Lincsbus operated services were unreliable and booked DRT’s did not appear.
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The 747 and the Uppingham-Stamford routes are being retained, the latter at a reduced frequency. It’s the R2 and R4 that are being axed. Full details at:
https://rutlandcounty.moderngov.co.uk/documents/s29676/Report%20No.119.2024%20-Transport%20Network%20Review%20-%20Appendix%203.pdf
KCC
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Apologies to anonymous at 0845 – the main report does axe the Uppingham-Stamford route, contrary to what the Appendix stated.
KCC
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The 747 from Uppingham to Leicester isn’t being withdrawn, largely as it is a Leiecestershire tender not a Rutland one as most of the service is within Leicestershire. In fact it has just been retendered, though Rutland may have provided some funding which may affect the timetable being awarded if that has been cut back.
I believe Rutland will be down to one normal bus service, the R1 between Melton & Corby plus the LCC tendered 747 to Leicester with the rest of the normal network replaced by DRT and just a few school buses on top.
Leicestershire haven’t yet actually announced what they are doing but I believe it is not as simple as you make out, there are some new DRT areas going in and corresponding changes to bus services but it isn’t as clear cut a replacement as you may think.
Dwarfer
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I have seen that Centrebus have written to Parish Councils on the 747 route to say that Leics CC will be tendering for it with 3 options (and inviting representations):
What a change from 40 years ago when the then joint operation with Midland Red East brought Cambus VRs into Leicester!
Ian McNeil
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Presumably Grant Palmer are now operating a saturday service since some journeys are M-F only but they ought to alter the heading of their timetable.
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It’s now been updated to refer to Saturdays.
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Ah another spanner in the works, The Transport Secretary has Resigned so who knows whether the policy will change again
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Metroline has surrendered the 242 service
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Not surrendered … it is / was a commercial route with a de-minimus financial top-up from Herts CC.
Metroline decided that it simply wasn’t worth running any more. To be fair to them, it has been on borrowed time since before Covid.
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Do you use this route? I do and it’s actually a fairly busy service, despite the lower frequency. You remove this route and there is no convenient route to Brookfield Centre from Waltham Cross, about half of Cheshunt plus the villages would have no service at all, many school kids wouldn’t be able to get to Goff’s School plus it’s the only reliable route Cheshunt has. For a town of 45000 and growing, it is shocking! Arriva are woeful here too, if for some reason the 242 disappeared, I would just walk to Waltham Cross where the buses are actually useable or the local station and I don’t even have to pay! Many people would just drive or stay at home which is not good. Hoping Central Connect takes over. Fed up with the crappy unreliable 251 and 310. People wonder why buses are in decline, this is why, constantly cutting out the routes and journeys that are assumed to be carrying air but they really aren’t. The 242 used to be a comprehensive service and essential for east-west journeys, privatisation killed it. You cut the branches to save money but in reality the whole system suffers. Metroline’s actions suggest to me franchising and public ownership is the future (they are running routes from 5 garages in Manchester from next year!) and I hope Hertfordshire does it sooner rather than later. We certainly need more routes not less. Aaron
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The service is being retendered by Herts as you would expect for a service of this local import. Busy doesn’t always mean commercial for all operators (staff pay & other costs, available vehicle running costs & other variable aspects) and not all operators have the skills and desire to develop work like this. Hopefully this will find an operator with the desire to rebuild what was and could be a largely commercial proposition if the right solution is found.
In many ways the issue is actually the presence of franchising rather than the lack, the route runs from a depot otherwise entirely based on London contracts by an operator whose business model globally is around franchises/contracts and don’t have the top end interest/experience in commercial work (there may well have been some local/middle management who kept it going but it was never a focus) to develop it. If this were elsewhere in the county it may well have turned out differently but as it runs along the London border there have been few local operator to see the opportunities when they were there. Sullivans would have been logical geographically but given their recent London issues may not be in a position to take it on and otherwise the alternatives have to come some distance to get there so costs inflate whilst it passes Metroline’s Potters Bar depot.
Dwarfer
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Thank you for your insight. I get costs have gone up and staffing is still difficult but as a country we really need to sort out the local transport urgently and if such long lasting routes are struggling something is very wrong. The 242 only required 2 vehicles in recent years, a bare minimum. It should be imperative to fund proper bus networks given climate change and to improve health and opportunities. Also as someone who lived in North London and now in Cheshunt, the county boundaries are a big problem for providing effective public services and need to change to reflect the built up area. It never made sense that the 242 wasn’t a TFL route nor routes to Hammond Street or Upshire given the short road distance from the cramped Waltham Cross terminus. The buses would be really popular here if the 217 and 317 came out this way. Apparently they were well used (at a similar level to Enfield) when both areas were part of the London bus network properly. So I don’t really agree franchising was the problem, but rather cutting off adjacent towns where most people would interact with London frequently. Constant chopping and changing to routes pushed people away too. Privatisation was always going to be a race to the bottom. Also, if TFL can do well in Debden and Borehamwood, why not here? As I say I hope Central Connect fully take over as they seem to care and their services to neighbouring areas have improved the overall networks. But longer term, London buses really should be seen around both Cheshunt and Waltham Abbey, like there were a long time ago. Aaron
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The New timetable has been published, It reduced the service to hourly
I thought that they would have provided an hourly service to Potter Bar with additional hourly buses to Brookfield
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UNO are taking on the 242, Service to Potters Bar vincreased to every hour
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Re the 25/s . To me the earlier “commercial” timetable shown didnt look as if, time wise, the GP service significantly competed with the Stagecoach on. The new timetable, while appearing enhanced seems to clash closer on departure times. I wonder if Roger would like to revisit in 2025 especially for the late afternoon departures for schoolday loadings
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Stagecoach East were recently re-awarded the tendered Bedford services. From 31 March the tendered 25 will be slimmed down to 3 Rushden-Bedford rounders (plus early/late shorts) per day.
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