Wednesday 16th October 2019
Xplore Dundee, the National Express owned bus company in Dundee, launched a brand new airport express coach service back in June linking the city directly with Edinburgh Airport via the A90 and M90.
Four months on I thought it was a good time to take a look and see how it was doing so took a ride north from the airport earlier this morning and was pleasantly surprised and suitably impressed at how well it’s doing.
Airport services are notoriously hard to build custom for as they lack regular customers day in and day out; it takes a huge effort to get the service known in the marketplace and persuade passengers flying in and out of the airport to change their travel habits.
This airport service, numbered X90 (although not prominently displayed), runs seven days a week every ninety minutes with an end to end eighty minute scheduled journey time meaning two coaches are needed to run the very intensive 24/7 service – with just one return journey missing in the middle of the night.
Fares are reasonable for an airport service of this kind at £16 single and £22 return with advanced booking rates of £12 single/£18 return and other discounts for students and families. Scottish concessionary passholders travel free.
The X90 departs from stance E right outside the entrance to Edinburgh Airport’s terminal building, although the shelter is dominated by advertisements and promotional posters for First Glasgow’s route 600 I wrote about back in July.
There is a timetable for the X90 displayed together with fares information.
I arrived in good time this morning to watch the 08:20 arrival from Dundee which came in at 08:12 and an impressive 22 passengers alighted.
The driver supervised the unloading of luggage from the lockers and then got straight back in the ‘cab’ to load up the twelve of us waiting for the departure at 08:30.
I was a bit surprised to see a farebox by the entrance door of the coach and was relieved to see a contactless Ticketer ticket machine by the driver who confirmed cash was taken (as well as bank cards) and put in the box and reassured me change was available if needed.
It all seemed a bit of an odd arrangement if drivers carry cash for change giving to have a farebox. Still, none of the eleven other passengers paid cash either as most had an advance ticket or a concessionary pass so the farebox was an irrelevance.
We left spot on time at 08:30 with a local radio station playing quietly on the driver’s in-cab radio and made our way via the A8 to the M90 and were soon crossing the new Forth Road Bridge.
The road layout means it’s easier for Dundee bound buses and coaches to use this route rather than the newly classified ‘bus and coach only’ old Fourth Road Bridge.
The coach was presentable and comfortable. Leg room was adequate. There was a toilet on board but no usb sockets nor wi-fi showing its age but it was a smooth non-stop journey, literally, all the way to Dundee where we arrived 70 minutes later at 09:40.
I noticed we passed the southbound coach on the M90 after exactly 35 minutes travelling indicating the 80 minute scheduled timing looks to include a generous ten minute allowance for delays. We hit the outskirts of Dundee exactly one hour after leaving the airport at 09:30.
As we arrived at the terminus in Dundee which is at a stop midway between the train station and main city centre bus stops, there was already a good crowd of about 18 passengers waiting to board the next departure at 10:00.
The arriving driver jumped out to help unload luggage for those from the airport and load luggage of waiting passengers while a fresh driver got in the cab to check tickets calling out those pre-booked should come on board first. It seemed a slick operation.
Twitter followers with local knowledge advise the service has been doing so well that duplicates have run in the afternoons which is very encouraging to hear.
Xplore Dundee certainly seem to be on to a winner with the X90 and a few more months of growth will no doubt see a frequency increase to hourly – certainly by next summer I would think. It’s heartening to see a new market being developed successfully especially as I didn’t detect a major spend on promotional collateral for the X90.
Indeed I was flummoxed trying to find out about the service on the Xplore Dundee website with nothing about the service on the home page and to find the timetable I needed to know the route number for the Find A Timetable tab, which I didn’t know, so first had to Google search that!
At Edinburgh airport I noticed when exiting both the domestic and international arrivals just past a stylised map of the Airlink network you’re directed to the exit towards the tram terminus and then have to walk back via the bus stops for Lothian’s 200/400 and 100 Airlink routes before reaching the X90 stance.
At least the X90 is listed on the information displays inside the terminal though, if you look hard enough.
I also noticed if you turn right from arrivals rather than as directed left, you reach a more convenient exit right by stance E and interestingly pass by a ScotRail ticket vending machine (TVM) which is programmed to sell tickets to all stations and checking Dundee brought up an inclusive bus and train ticket using the Stagecoach 747 to Inverkeithing on its route to Halbeath Park and Ride. Ironically the TVM idle screen makes reference to ‘Xpress’ – the branding used by Xplore Dundee!
I doubt many passengers would spot this TVM, let alone use it for what is now a longer and more expensive journey to Dundee involving a change from bus to train so perhaps not surprising the X90 is doing so well.
Whilst at the airport last night and this morning I also tried out Lothian’s new tri-axle E400 buses recently introduced on their Airlink 100 route which runs frequently between the airport and city centre.
These really are massive beasts – more tri-axle mega sized Enviro 400s – and their new livery definitely gives them a classier presence than previously.
I travelled into Edinburgh yesterday evening and enjoyed the mood lighting upstairs until spotlights suddenly came on right above my head sitting in the front nearside giving a feeling of being rather under a floodlight – especially when they got even brighter when we stopped at a bus stop and the doors opened.
The new interiors have done away with tables in favour of more plush seating with a deep red patterned moquette which looked a little dated when I first saw it but grew on me as I travelled and the seats were certainly very comfortable…
….except the back row of five on the upper deck which were far too upright and very uncomfortable.
At the front of the upper deck there are five single seats on the nearside which makes for a larger circulation area at the top of the stairs.
The lower deck has a large offside luggage rack as before, although I understand there are plans to extend this as it’s slightly smaller than previously existed. It looked pretty big to me but I know passengers are wedded to more and larger luggage in their travels than ever before. The buses also have centre exit doors.
As with Lothian’s previous batch of tri-axles there are two large monitors at the front of the upper deck with one giving next stop announcements including, uniquely, sign language as the audio plays out, while the other has more generic marketing material as well as airline departures from the airport and estimated arrival times at upcoming stops by the bus, although last night this was erroneously showing the next journey rather than the current one.
I travelled back to the airport earlier this morning just as it was getting light so had the opportunity to see the livery close up. It’s classy.
It’s definitely an improvement on what went before and I noticed the new brand colours have been followed through to signs and posters at the airport as well as the ticket office by the departure stance.
I bought my £7.50 return ticket, which is good value, on Lothian’s mobile app and luckily spotted these are only valid once activated for five minutes so held back activating until I was confident the bus doors were opening and I could step aboard.
Unlike First’s route 500 from Glasgow airport which takes the motorway and runs fast into the city centre. Lothian’s Airlink runs limited stop along the A8 past Edinburgh Zoo and Murrayfield stadium among the stops observed. Journey time is half an hour and it’s a fairly swish ride utilising bus lanes for much of the way.
I would imagine the interior could feel slightly claustrophobic on a very busy bus at peak times, but both my journeys last night and this morning were lightly loaded and I enjoyed smooth and comfortable rides on two very impressive looking buses.
Roger French
Unsurprisingly the interior layout is similar to the GWR and LNER versions of the same class.
On the all important seat comfort issue, it may all be in the mind (and for all I know the seats may all be the same, albeit with different moquette) but I found these Nova 1 standard class seats very similar to LNER’s Azuma and better than GWR’s IET …
…. with the first class seats more disappointing being akin to GWR’s and not as good as LNER’s.
Neither class of seat felt as good as I found on the loco hauled CAF built Nova 3 coaches I
Like the Nova 3 coaches there are plenty of tables as well as airline seats.
The middle three coaches (B, C and D) have eight ‘tables for four’ with coach A having four tables as it also has a universal accessible toilet although there’s no wheelchair space in coach A.
The two wheelchair spaces are in coach E where the first class seats can be found and where there’s also another universal accessible toilet.
I’m assuming the same arrangements for passengers using wheelchairs apply as explained in my Nova 3 review, that is, standard class passengers and their companion may use the spaces in first class and I guess strictly speaking miss out on the complimentary refreshments – which only amounts to tea, coffee, hot chocolate, cold soft drinks and biscuits/crisps/cake in any event.
I found the upright position of the first class seats rather too upright while the laid back option was a bit too laid back. I’m probably being far too finicky though!
I understand it was its first day out in service having done at least two weeks worth of testing ‘out of service’ so I was a bit surprised it had begun it’s revenue earning life in an undressed state.
I sat in coach E on my trip from Leeds between York and Newcastle and back this afternoon and was never asked to show my ticket – not even when served with refreshments, which seemed a bit odd.
The electronic traffic light style reservation system was also not working so old style cards were inserted into slots on the seat backs.
There are two three-pin sockets and one USB socket under each pair of standard class seats with each first class seat having both types of socket at the rear of the arm rests.
There was Wi-fi but I couldn’t get it to register on my smartphone so gave up.
… and vertical luggage racks at the coach ends.
The standard class seat back trays are quite something …
… as is the snazzy carpet….
The driver seemed to open the doors and it was noticeable as the Newcastle bound train pulled into Leeds how long it took between the train stopping and the doors opening – almost thirty seconds. It was better at other stations. The train manager seems responsible for closing the doors.
These Nova 1 class 802 trains are a great improvement on the class 185s they’re replacing not because there’s anything wrong with the 185s as a train, it’s just they’re out of their depth and lacking capacity for the job in hand.
Roger French
TfL’s next round of reductions to bus routes servIng central London begins tomorrow. This one is much less extensive than in 
Notices letting everyone know about the 48’s demise are stuck to the bus shelters in London Bridge and all reference to the 48 has been removed from the bus stop flag and timetable case. The notices explain the options of catching a newly extended 388 as far as Hackney, but as that routes uses Bethnal Green Road instead of Hackney Road between Shoreditch and Cambridge Heath, the suggestion is to hop off a 388 (or 149) and on to a 26 at Bishopgate (late correction on the notice by the look of it too!).
Route 55 is the main alternative for the 48 once you hit the junction of Old Street and Shoreditch High Street as it parallels the 48 all the way to Leyton and as mentioned above will now continue on to Walthamstow Central.
I noticed the bus stop route number tile removal contractors had already been along the route taking any reference to the 48 down and shuffling all the other tiles neatly along and up so the blank appears in the bottom right, but as always they left a few random bus stops untouched which I’m sure they do deliberately just to create anomalies and wind people like me up.
I bagged the upstairs nearside front seat, with the offside seat already occupied by someone even more fanatical than me who was obviously going to miss the 48 so much he was videoing the whole journey for prosperity on his mobile phone through the front upper deck window; so that made at least two of us, as well as the driver, making the full journey through to Walthamstow Central.
We passed Liverpool Street at 10:39 arriving at Shoreditch Church at 10:44 which turned out to be six minutes ahead of our scheduled 10:50 departure. But it’s all about headway in London rather than strict adherence to a scheduled timetable, so we pressed on with no word from the controller to check our timings. We probably now only had about ten or a dozen on board as we continued north along Shoreditch High Street before turning east on to Hackney Road where we joined parallel route 55 (as well as the 26 which had been with us since before Liverpool Street) and pass close to Hoxton Station on the Overground East London line to Highbury & Islington.
A bus on route 55 overtakes as we stop to pick up a passenger and I was expecting we’d shadow each other for the rest of the journey except when we arrive at Hackney Town Hall at 11:00 the inevitable “the driver has been instructed to wait at this bus stop for a short time to help even out the service” announcement comes over the PA.
‘A short time’ turns out to be four minutes and as we reach Hackney Central Station a minute further on at 11:05 I notice we’re still four minutes ahead of the scheduled departure time of 11:09.
Another bus on route 55 passes us as we round the Clapton Pond roundabout to head east again at 11:13 (scheduled time 11:18) keeping our sedate pace along the Lea Bridge Road and with around a dozen on board losing ones and twos here and there and gaining ones or twos who eschew the 55 in preference to us instead.
Our scheduled arrival was 11:45 so we made it to the Walthamstow terminus twelve minutes early and as a 48 was just leaving back towards London Bridge, my bus went to join two others on the allotted layover stand with a departure back south for my bus not until 12:01 making for a rather generous 28 minute layover!
At Walthamstow there were more posters explaining the 48 would soon be a route of the past giving details of alternatives (including the 26 and 388 which go nowhere near Walthamstow of course) and a new 55 timetable panel was already in situ, but no mention on the bus stop flag – presumably another contractor does that.
I’d also spotted at London Bridge the spider map hadn’t been updated but the ‘where to catch your bus’ panel had….
… whereas at Walthamstow Central, bizzarely, the opposite was the case with a new spider map (minus the 48) but a yet to be updated ‘where to catch your bus’ panel.
Perhaps a different team look after central London to the suburbs, and yet another team do spider maps to the ‘where to catch your bus’ panels team. That would explain it.
The task for the conference’s regular workshop session immediately after lunch was topically for the young managers to come up with three benefits of a “London style” franchise model for running buses, as well as three disbenefits. The report back after the group discussions brought forward an interesting selection of ideas which included…….
There’s a good connection with Plymouth Citybus route 11/11A which runs from Plymouth to Padstow via Bodmin and Wadebridge.
The bus also arrived on time (at 14:05) for the 14:07 departure and it was good to see a busy bus with a fair few already on board and thirteen passengers in addition to myself making the connection from train to bus.
Route 11/11A operates hourly (two-hourly on Sundays) but back in 1976, I’d have had a long wait to get to Padstow arriving on a train at 13:50 as Western National’s route 575 left Bodmin Road station (before it got renamed to a Parkway in 1983) at 11:30 then nothing until 16:00.
There were also departures at 07:50, 09:55, 1650, 18:20 and 20:20 with a summer only extra at 13:30 on Saturdays. So not particularly convenient bearing in mind there was once a railway plying its way along the route to Wadebridge/Padstow many years ago. Today’s hourly bus is definitely an improvement.
In Padstow I switched to First Kernow’s picturesque route A5 for Newquay branded as part of their Atlantic Coaster network for bus routes around the coast to Lands End and Penzance.
I caught the 15:35 departure from Padstow, one of nine daytime journeys (ten in the summer) giving a roughly hourly service.
…. but the views from the top deck are amazing……
We left Padstow with about fifteen on board and picked up another half dozen or so during the eighty minute journey which is quite spectacular taking in a number of Cornwall’s north coastal beaches accessed by precarious narrow lanes and some steep twisty inclines.
Back in 1976 I’d have only been able to get as far as Constantine Bay about twenty minutes after Padstow on the four journey a day route Western National route 574 – and indeed would have had to catch the last journey of the day at 15:25 too.
No chance of getting as far as Newquay with Western National. Constantine Post Office would have been it. However it may be the neighbouring Southern National bus company also ran between Padstow and Newquay but sadly I don’t have their 1976 timetable to check. I doubt the service was better than today’s A5.
My early evening connection on Friday wasn’t particularly well timed catching the 17:35 route 93 from Newquay (it continues to Truro) arriving St Columb Major at 18:00 then having a 38 minute wait for route 95 on to Wadebridge.
This would have been another journey served by Southern National as the Western National map inside the timetable book unhelpfully indicates there are no bus routes – you’d think NBC good practice would have insisted a coordinated map and timetable book for Cornwall in those so called halcyon nationalised regulated days!
After an overnight stop off I headed north from a bus busy Wadebridge on Saturday morning along the coast via Polzeath and Port Isaac on the four journey a day scenic route 96.
Two journeys a day on this route seamlessly continue to or from route 55 at Delabole back round to Bodmin via Camelford and Wenfordbridge including the first journey I caught which left Wadebridge at 08:35. This finally arrives in Bodmin at 11:21 giving an almost three hour round trip with some short breaks in Delabole and Camelford.
We took only four passengers on the 96 including a surfer who got off in Polzeath where we also paused to wait time, the driver explaining during busy summer months he can often be seriously delayed meeting traffic on the very narrow roads.
Five passengers travelled on the 55 which included a diversion along the route due to a road closure in St Breward.
This time we weren’t so lucky on the narrow roads meeting a tractor and trailer necessitating our driver having to skilfully reverse for about a mile.
I can’t make a comparison with 1976 as this was still Southern National territory but my guess is the small villages served on the 55 probably had about the same level of service.
From Bodmin I took route 27 through to Truro. This double deck hourly service doesn’t take the most direct route clocking up a journey time just under two hours and taking in Roche, Stenalees, Bugle, Penwithick and St Austell.
It even takes in a trip around the Cornwall Services on the A30.
Comparisons with 1976 are tricky as the 27 is an amalgam of two separate former routes (527 and 529) which ran on this corridor serving the aforementioned via points in a more logical order. But the combined routes only ran as far as St Austell at the same hourly frequency as today and with no Sunday service whereas today’s 27 has five journeys every two hours on Sundays.
Western National route 532 ran hourly between St Austell and Truro every hour with three journeys on Sundays so a slightly better effort in 1976 almost matching today’s service.
This provides a half hourly service from Truro as far as Penryn then every fifteen minutes into Falmouth ….
…. comparing very favourably with Western National’s route 590 which only ran hourly back in 1976 demonstrating very effectively the important part students play in today’s contemporary bus networks.
I then took a lovely rural route, the 35, from Falmouth down to Helford Passage and back.
This is another route serving small communities along very narrow roads (after its done a an annoying detour of some narrow residential roads in Falmouth where no one got on or off – as well as getting stuck behind a parked ambulance necessitating a long reverse and diversion) and impressively running to an approximate hourly frequency ….
…. whereas it’s predecessor route 563 in 1976 only ran two-hourly with three extra journeys on a variant 564 in the high summer.
Only three passengers travelled south from Falmouth on the outward journey but the return did better with seven on board. I saw a later departure from Falmouth at the end of the afternoon which had a much better load on board. It’s a lovely route.
Even better the latest First Kernow timetable book is a masterpiece in presentation, far better than the 1976 offering, with full colour maps and all routes operated by First included from Penzance to Bude making it more useful than in NBC days.
One small criticism: I’d like to see town maps of places like St Austell and Falmouth where route patterns are quite complex and virtually impossible to work out – something the 1976 book did do well. Although I appreciate these can be found in the separate comprehensive timetable book produced by Cornwall Council but this is not so widely available.
I know First Kernow have a nice map of Falmouth, for example, as I picked up a leaflet aimed at students on the U1 which contained one.
It would be good to include this in the main book too.
Aside from that, 43 years on, Cornwall Council working with First Kernow are providing a bus network that’s never looked so good. Well done to all concerned.
But outdoing that in the bus route brevity stakes is the aforementioned Rosso operated 13 which also runs to a circular format and scheduled to take just two minutes to reach the furthest bus stop away from the bus station in New Hall Hey and a relatively generous four minutes for the ‘return’ continuing around the circuit back to the bus station.
I reckon at six minutes for a round trip Rosso’s route 13 holds the crown of being Britain’s shortest bus route …. unless readers know different?
Intriguingly the first bus stop I came across was on the opposite side of the road to the anti-clockwise loop the bus now takes, so not surprisingly found a prominent notice explaining this was no longer a bus stop.
There’s just one other bus stop served exclusively by the 13 in New Hill Hay – just by the level crossing for the East Lancs heritage railway.
Back at the bus station the 13:50 departure arrived from Burnley on its previous journey on route 8 a few minutes ahead of the 13:46 scheduled arrival and I was initially surprised to see a double decker allocated.
The driver had time to enjoy a short cigarette break then climbed back on the bus ready to depart at 13:50 and promptly closed the doors. Luckily he saw me in the queue of passengers waiting for other buses indicating I wanted to board.
To say he was surprised is an understatement. He asked me where I was going in an incredulous voice obviously not expecting any passengers to actually ride an hourly bus route that takes around three minutes travel time to reach a destination!
I explained I’d just come for the ride round and popped upstairs as I heard him mutter something about ‘having to do a school run after this’ – hence the double decker, I assume.
We reached the first stop on the anti-clockwise circuit around the business and retail park at 13:53.
After a short pause there we continued back round to the bus station arriving on time at 13:56. Job done.
There’s not much more to say about the journey. If I hadn’t had a Transdev Daytripper ticket it would have cost me a flat fare of £1.60 which I assume would be for the whole circuit although the driver wasn’t very forthcoming on that. Probably because no one has ever been daft enough to do it before.
Before leaving Rawtenstall I took a look at progress on building the long awaited and desperately needed new replacement bus station sited directly opposite the well worn, long expired current edifice.
The new bus station looks good both architecturally and from a practical user viewpoint.
Metroline, the Singapore based ComfortDelGro owned bus company, which operates a large network of bus routes for TfL across north and north-west London has been in the news recently as they roll out an expensive new fleet of 67 all electric battery-rechargeable double deck buses. Having read glowing coverage in the trade press, I decided to take a zero emission bus ride with industry colleagues yesterday afternoon.
The buses are being introduced gradually on to both routes as they are delivered and passed fit for service. The first BYD/ADL bus began operating on the 43 between Friern Barnet and London Bridge on 1st July with that route currently about 80% converted to all electric running. The first Metrodecker appeared a few weeks later on the 134 (North Finchley to Warren Street) on 19th August with that route currently having around 20% electric bus operation.
Introducing electric buses is no easy task; it’s not like topping up your mobile phone battery by just plugging it into any handy three-pin socket overnight. Recharging a fleet of buses can mean a whole new sub-station and associated infrastructure having to be installed, as happened at Holloway garage back in 2017 when Metroline first began running BYD ADL Enviro200 electric single deck buses on route 46.
First impressions of the new Optare Metrodecker were very favourable with a brightly lit entrance area in front of the driver’s cab.
But just past that is a rather odd back lit panel on the stairs which only serves to highlight the ‘official’ (very) small print notices. I would have throught something better could have been arranged for this eye-cathing welcome space?
… and some of the workmanship around this area was noticeably slapdash on both the offside and nearside.
… whereas the Metrodecker uses a darker material for the plastic type panels….
As befits London it’s all a bit clinical and utilitarian – not particularly welcoming – and there are some odd mouldings here and there on the Metrodecker …
Bearing in mind the amount of money spent on this whole electric project – the infrastructure and the vehicles themselves – why oh why is the seat comfort and layout on both vehicles so poor. It reminds me of Thameslink – where billions have been invested in infrastructure improvements and new trains yet seat comfort for passengers is dire.
… not exactly inviting on that back row of five is it? And not much room for legs when all four of the double facing seats are occupied but, that’s pretty good compared to the abomination at the rear of the BYD ADL described below.
It’s not often we get to travel on a brand new loco hauled inter-city train in the UK, but that’s what’s quietly being rolled out across the Pennines right now as First Group’s Trans Pennine Express franchise soft launches its fleet of thirteen smart new Spanish built Nova 3 trains.
On my sample ride from Leeds to Manchester this morning it was noticeable how most passengers opted to travel in the front two standard class coaches (D and C) behind first class (E) which were quite busy with the rear two coaches (B and A) almost empty. Old habits; but I’m sure it’s a different story at peak times and as more new trains are introduced passengers will quickly learn to spread out along the platform and be ready to board through the single doors situated at the ends of each coach rather than double doors located one-third/two-thirds of each coach as applied on the Class 185s.
There are a very welcome fourteen tables seating four people in coaches D and C, eleven in coach B and six in coach A. And in even better news, most tables in D and C align with windows.
Sadly it’s not possible to achieve this consistently in coaches B and A.
There’s a largish luggage rack at the ends of each coach and a small toilet at the ends of coaches B, C and D.
The universal access toilet is in Coach E, and in a new development, Trans Pennine Express have located a space for a wheelchair and companion either side of the central aisle in Coach E, the first class coach.
Passengers using a wheelchair (and any companion) will receive complimentary coffee and a biscuit even if paying only standard class fares in Coach E but will have to upgrade to first class “to receive the full catering offer” I’ve only ever received a coffee and biscuit when travelling first class with TPE so I’m not sure what the “full catering offer” actually is. I doubt it’ll ever be worth upgrading for.
The first class coach E is well laid out with thirty comfortable seats (much comfier than on the Azuma/IEP trains) in 2+1 style and again offering many more seats than on the Class 185s. You also get a lighted lip at the window end of the table; just for show as it doesn’t really light anything up.
There’s a bike storage area for four bikes at the western end of coach B and when these spaces are not reserved (which they need to be – no just turning up with a bike) they can be used for buggies (there are also tip-up seats) and luggage storage.
There are large information screens at the ends of each coach and a rolling PIS text type roof mounted screen over the gangway doors and in the middle of the carriage.
The screens were showing the usual next station information and other stuff; but teething problems meant the current displayed time was off-puttingly an hour slow and no details were given of onward connections at stations when that screen appeared in the cycle. Obviously teething troubles with the systems.
There are automatic audio announcements over the PA before and after each station which are clearly audible.
During the current phased introductory period of the new trains TPE are doing their best to match up seat reservations made on a Class 185 with the same designated coach and seat on a Nova 3. Inevitably this won’t always work re forwards/backwards window/aisle specifications though.
There’s a usb and three pin socket (with the single pin on top) in the middle under each pair of seats and Wi-fi is available although wasn’t working on my journey in some of the standard class coaches. Where it was working it was labelled as CAF rather than TPE, but again something that I’m sure will be sorted as the trains settle in.
Leaving the train is through the end of coach doors where there are two big, bright buttons to press.
There’s a catering trolley service although it didn’t come round this morning between Leeds and Manchester, but this may be due to some earlier problems with the train diagram this morning – the train got seriously delayed in Leeds on its way to Scarborough due to a passenger being taken ill and was curtailed at York so the journey I caught had only begun in York instead of Scarborough.
Once the fleet is fully introduced I look forward to seeking out a suitably bargain priced first class advanced ticket to travel from one end of the route to the other and give all aspects of the service a try. In the meantime there’s just one new train out on one working each day although it’s expected a second will hit the tracks this week.
The 383 may be a backwater north London bus route which takes a circuitous route east of the Great North Road between the Spires shopping centre near Barnet Church at its northern terminus and Woodside Park Underground station in the south, but it’s now the most professionally promoted route in the network.
All the more so as recent ‘trials’ of route branding introduced by TfL during the last couple of years in the Barkingside and Hayes and Hillingdon areas are excruciatingly embarrassing due to their amateurish application. Well designed they’re not.
This new 383 branding introduced by UNO has all the hallmarks of the excellent work produced by Ray Stenning and his Best Impressions design agency. It’s to their consistently high standard.
A lovely stylised route map on the lower back panel is an excellent idea although sadly looks as though it might suffer the fate of being usurped by an advert for a third party company in the frame. Let’s hope not, it would be such a shame to see a promotional bus route map covered up by an advert for a car dealer!
Inside the buses on the 383 are panels to create interest in the local area as well as another geographic route map.
Sullivan Buses – another small well presented bus company based in Hertfordshire who run a growing number of TfL contracts in north London – also use these panels to give background historical information about each route to generate interest.