Tag Archives: Cheshire East Council

Somehow, Arriva has come into the possession of an Optare Solo (admittedly, it looks a bit tiddly on a route normally operated using full size Dennis Darts and the occasional double decker but never underestimate how many can be fitted into these buses) with a sign on board dating from the days of Chester City Transport. It’s like a vague memory that the erstwhile municipal operation had at least one bus with Cheshire County Council “Cheshire Rider” livery and this, with its dark blue paintwork, might have been one of them. That recollection leads me to wonder if Arriva has the bus on loan from Cheshire East Council, especially with the local authority’s logo featured on the sides of the vehicle.

This week, it has appeared operating 130 services between Macclesfield and Manchester and carries signage publicising the real time bus tracker that has been available since the end of last year. The strap line goes something like “to find out if the 130 is on time, go online”. With that sort of livery and the mention of Cheshire East Council, you’d expect the bus to have a GPS tracker but I have seen little evidence of that so far. Maybe, it’s one of life’s little ironies.

It also has appeared at the same time that Arriva has updated the 130 timetable to cope with all the upheaval that the A34 bypass and associated works has brought to Alderley Edge and Nether Alderley. Adding to that is what is happening in Macclesfield with roads being dug up all around the town to replace old gas mains. It’s like everything is happening all at once but we’ll have to hop that they stop up soon enough.

Yesterday, I was in Macclesfield bus station awaiting a 130 and one did come in from Manchester but that wasn’t to be my bus. In fact, it was to be a double-decker that arrived at the bus stance only minutes from going back out again. It’s destination blinds said Manchester and the route number was still 38 but that soon enough was changed to 130 and we were on our way once the bus driver sorted himself out. As we departed, that earlier bus moved into our stance and must have been the next departure. Now, I suppose that what we were watching were the machinations of rest breaks, dealing with delays to services and such like, the bread and butter of operating bus services that work along congested roads like the 130 does.

The Nether Alderley road improvements are adding to that and bus services are getting disrupted. This morning, it looks as if the 09:15 from Macclesfield never ran and that those waiting for it had to content themselves with the 09:45 instead. Yesterday morning saw a tailback along the A537 from Monk’s Heath traffic lights most of the way back to Henbury. It seems that reversing lorries may be doing hell as they start to draw in foundations for the road widening works near the Monk’s Heath junction itself. All in all, it looks as if this will be part and parcel of travelling that way over the next few months and that the bus tracker will be needed more than ever. Let’s hope that it actually gives us real times too and not just the timetable.