Arriva seems to have retimed the 130 services to the extent that you find drivers having to stopover at convenient places for longer that is ideal. Then, there’s having to go slower than usual to keep to the advertised timing points, a legal requirement. Seeing this does make you wonder if things have gone from one extreme to the other. There was a time when such considerations were far from being observed with the bus timings suffering as a direct result. Some people must consider that the only road works relating to the Alderley Edge Bypass to be a major upheaval. While there can be no doubt that there’s potential for major disruption, you do have to ask if there has been overcompensation.
The same thing affects the 27 too, it seems. If you want to get from Knutsford to Alderley Park, you have to deal with a much reduced service level. The question arises is whether this is temporary or not. One would hope that it is the former and not the latter but you have to wonder in these times when austerity has been trumpeted by a new government. Who knows?
Tags: 130, 27, Alderley Edge, Arriva, Bowers, Buses, Cheshire, England, Knutsford, Macclesfield, Manchester, Nether Alderley, Road Works, Timetables, Traffic, Wilmslow
The current spate of road works continues. As if the attentions given to the A34 aren’t enough, we have gas network works blighting Macclesfield and the Broken Cross roundabout is the latest victim. Because of the need to rip up part of Gawsworth Road, one side of the roundabout is shut with temporary traffic lights controlling things. That they alternative between the three other roads leading into the roundabout is little consolation to anyone joining a queue at Henbury. It cannot be good on Chester Road either but I have not passed that way so I cannot confirm the situation. Saying that, things haven’t been so bad from the Fallibroome Road side but you can escape around by Upton Priory and the B5087 if needs be. If I were driving this way everyday, I’d be very tempted to find another route until all is over.
Needless to say, bus services like the 130 Macclesfield-Manchester, the 27 Macclesfield-Knutsford and the 19 Macclesfield-Prestbury are getting caught up in all of this and it was particularly bad on Friday evening. So, it’s very much a case of keeping an eye on the real-time bus tracker to see how things are going because things are almost certain to veer markedly away from the timetable. Let’s hope that this doesn’t go on too long because it is having a major impact. Do the people who plan these things realise what disruption gets caused?
Update: Traffic didn’t seem so bad when coming home through Broken Cross this evening. Have people decided to divert around the roadworks?
Tags: 130, 19, 27, Arriva, Bowers, Broken Cross, Buses, Cheshire, Disruption, England, Henbury, Knutsford, Macclesfield, Manchester, Prestbury, Road Works, Timetables, Traffic, Upton Priory, Whirley
Since the Wright-bodied VDL’s and DAF’s that underpin the 27 Macclesfield-Knutsford service were brought into use, they have sported a Cheshire County Council specified navy and orange livery. This morning, I spotted one of them wearing a new silver, yellow and green livery, of the same kind that was brought into use by Cheshire East Council. Repainting of buses mightn’t sound a priority activity but I suppose that paintwork gets shabby over time and there’s never any harm in changing colours while you are freshening up things.
Increasing capacity is of higher priority than painting things and that brings me to the sight of double decker buses on the Macclesfield-Bollington route. When I first moved to Cheshire, the route benefitted from the introduction of new Plaxton Mini-Pointer bodied short wheelbase Dennis Darts. At the time, they stood out in a fleet full of Mercedes minibuses and old arthritic Leylands, Lynxes and Olympians. Since then, the world has turned and Dennis Darts are the dominant type with double deckers and other longer single deckers being in the minority. With that in mind, it is interesting to see the 10 getting larger capacity vehicles of an age older than those brought into service back in 2000. It’s always good to see more people using buses but it would be better if they got to travel on newer vehicles as well. That increase of passenger numbers must have helped the 130 too and an increase in usage is apparent to eyes that remember how many used to be on those Leyland midibuses that were operating on the service ten years ago.
Tags: 10, 130, 27, Bollington, Buses, Cheshire, Cheshire East Council, England, Knutsford, Macclesfield, Manchester, Wilmslow
When Cheshire East Council launched online bus tracking for routes 27 and 130, it looked like a step in the right direction and that still is the case. However, there caveats regarding the supplied information that need attention. To my mind, it seems that not enough of the buses operating those route have trackers installed or turned on. What we cannot expect is that every bus connecting Macclesfield with Knutsford or Manchester is tracked because that may mean a restricted pool of buses for initiative such as what Cheshire East Council have in operation. Breakdowns and maintenance can mean that the usual buses are unavailable so untracked vehicles have to be tolerated. Nevertheless, I am getting the impression that not enough are being tracked and that makes the tracker little better than a rolling bus timetable. Another thing that I have spotted is that it doesn’t take account of cancelled services and there were plenty of those during the recent run of arctic weather. In a nutshell, things need improving before the tracker is truly dependable and my only hope is that the general extent of usage will convince the council to do just that and maybe even expand the service to other bus routes.
Tags: 130, 27, Bus Tracker, Buses, Cheshire, Cheshire East Council, England, Knutsford, Macclesfield, Manchester, Real-time Web, Timetables
The first full working week of 2010 was a hectic affair after the previous weekend’s snowfall and that during the early hours of Tuesday morning. Many a website was being hammered in the search for travel information during the disruption and this one was no exception with it getting as many hits in a week as it normally does in a month. The past week has seen things calming down though there have been problems in places. One of these has been the A537 between Macclesfield and Buxton and the 58 was being diverted even as lately as today because of snow drifts and troublesome road conditions. However, the Cat and Fiddle webcam shows a clearance from the way that things were not so long ago. Hopefully, the run of normal Atlantic weather will continue to normalise things even it means getting wet from time to time (or was that nearly all of the time?). The sad part might be having to find another talking point but anything’s better than seeing people getting hurt on ice.
Tags: 10, 130, 27, Arriva, Bowers, Buses, Buxton, Cheshire, Derbyshire, England, Knutsford, Macclesfield, Manchester, National Rail, Northern Rail, Road Conditions, Weather, Wilmslow
