With all the noise that there is about the closures of Heathrow and Gatwick due to the heavy snow that hit the south over the weekend, it is worth remembering that other parts are affected as well and that more snow hit the southwest and Wales today. For instance, Wales seems to be seeing disruption to its train services and MerseyRail is running a Sunday service tomorrow to ensure resilience (how’s that going to work with folk going to work and about their business?).
There may have been snow in the Manchester, Stockport and Macclesfield areas on Friday night but local buses and trains seem to be running well. The way in which we have been feeling the effects of what happened on Saturday are in the form of train cancellations and delays with Virgin faring worse than CrossCountry from what I could see. Macclesfield town bus services are being operated as are those to Crewe and Manchester. We may have to take care where we walk but that’s the extent of what the cold weather has done to us in the town.
A recent trip to Glossop confirms the same sort of conditions. Most buses seem to be running there too and trains seem not to be missing a beat. Good accumulations are there to be seen in the surrounding hills but any roads that I saw were clearer than the pavements by their side. Apart from greasy soft snow, the only real ice was to be found on a bridleway and that needed footwear with spikes for it to be crossed. Otherwise, busier routes could be negotiated though some needed care in order to do so.
Ireland hasn’t escaped the snow either with a heavy fall this evening having closed Dublin Airport to arrivals and departures until at least 23:00.The general Dublin area seems to have had quite a dump of the white stuff too, much as the southwest of the country did over the weekend. That has made road conditions tricky in usually mild parts such as the county of Limerick; the town of Newcastlewest is badly affected by ice due to the very low temperatures.
All in all, I could see folk in Britain and Ireland welcoming a wet Christmas if it took away the snow and ice that we currently have. With all the excitement of white Christmases in previous years, who’d have seen that coming about? After all, I suppose that it’s harder to enjoy a visual feast if you feel that your normal way of life is disrupted.
Tags: 10, 130, Arriva, Arriva Trains Wales, Buses, Cheshire, Cold, Crewe, CrossCountry, Derbyshire, Dublin, England, Glossop, Ice, Ireland, Limerick, Macclesfield, Manchester, MerseyRail, Newcastlewest, Northern Rail, Road Conditions, Snow, Timetables, Trains, Virgin, Wales, Weather
The current round of snow is having quite an effect on the transport network in some places. Thankfully, Macclesfield doesn’t seem to be the worst hit though there must be a considerable snow covering on the hills not far from the town and Buxton cannot escape either. The A537/A54 are closed to traffic so things cannot be good up on the heights. If it’s like what we got at the start of the year, they’ll need snowblowers to clear roads.
Bowers are unable to offer the full service that they usually do and the 27 Macclesfield-Knutsford route was only operated for part of the afternoon and it looked as if the same applied to the 19 Macclesfield-Whirley-Prestbury service. They are based in Chapel-en-le-Frith so that cannot help them. It’s one thing to struggle to get buses out from a depot but it’s another if drivers cannot get there in the first place.
From the bus tracker, Arriva seems to be able to keep the 130 Macclesfield-Manchester service going though there are delays and thoughts of them persuaded me to work from home today. A look at their latest update conveys to me the impression that we are getting off more lightly than some other places. They have created a summary in PDF so as to stop people hammering the website like they did at the start of the year.
One look at an update for the north of England confirms that a number of places cannot be served by rail, even, and Northern Rail has details on its website too. Sheffield is but one badly hit area and a work colleague of mine has a foot of snow covering his garden! No wonder First cannot run buses around the city. Northumberland and parts of east Yorkshire are taking the brunt of the weather and the disruption by the appearances of things. All in all, it seems that the weather is getting the better of the railways in places.
Ireland may have a maritime climate but it too is feeling the effects of the cold spell. Though most trains are running (only Docklands station in Dublin is not getting a service this evening), if subject to delays, the Irish Rail website is getting hammered. That may be due in part to the problems that Dublin Bus and Bus Éireann are having. The former’s services stopped around 20:00 this evening and the latter has been struggling to run services up and down the east coast of the country, to point that 19:30 was the end of operations for the day on many of them. The severe weather pages of the Irish Department of Transport are another calling point for general information, particularly about road conditions and any gritting.
Perhaps unsurprisingly given its reputation, Scotland has got a right blast of the arctic conditions with even Edinburgh’s Lothian Buses being unable to offer a full service. The mixture of hilly terrain and hefty snowfalls must be at the heart of the problem but one only can imagine how much more challenging it is in the Highlands though train running problems are happening throughout Scotland.
Though numerous, what I have collected here is only a sample of what is happening out there. Maybe, it is too hard to keep on top of it all when you have a day job in another profession but I’ll see if I can share what I can on here.
Tags: 130, 19, 19X, 27, Arriva, Bowers, Bus Éireann, Buses, Buxton, Cheshire, Connect 19, Derbyshire, Dublin, Dublin Bus, Edinburgh, Ireland, Irish Rail, Knutsford, Lothian Buses, Macclesfield, Manchester, Northern Rail, Northumberland, Road Conditions, Scotland, Scotrail, Trains, Weather, Yorkshire
A sunny morning was enough to send ideas of improving on my Buxton photo collection into my head and me off on a spot of local travelling. The pondering carried on and designs on traveling to Bakewell came on steam too. They were strong enough to get me picking up a £10 Wayfarer ticket from Macclesfield’s train station before hailing a very full service 58 to Buxton. Much to my surprise, most stayed on it until Buxton itself because I might have expected most to disembark on the way up Buxton Road before leaving Macclesfield.
The day was largely grey by the time that I reached Buxton so no Buxton photos for me then. Inspection of bus timetables sent the idea of going to Ashbourne into my head. After all, it is a part of Derbyshire where I hadn’t gone before and a cloudy day is a chance to see somewhere new. A lack of sun and a chilly breeze were enough to send me onto the next service 42 (like the 58, also operated by Bowers). Along the way, the day cheered up again and I was surprised to see it leaving the A515 for a narrow lane but this was the deviation that serves the pretty place that is Tissington village. That was the only time that it left the A515 until Ashbourne was reached with the terminus being a collection of stances that passes as a bus station.
After spending an hour around a sunny Ashbourne and sampling a little piece of the Tissington Trail, it was onto the last stage of the journey: the 108 from Ashbourne to Macclesfield operated by Clowes with the support of councils in Derbyshire, Staffordshire and Cheshire. That service left with just two passengers on board but more were to join in Leek and near Bosley so it didn’t stay that empty all of the way. The route stuck with the A52 for longer than might be expected and there were some strange twists and turns before it passed Cauldon to join the A523 at Waterhouses. From there, it was all direct through to Leek and Macclesfield though it started to feel before Leek came into view.
All the buses on which I travelled were well used though none was as full as the Optare Solo that took me away from Macclesfield in the first place. That was the one conveying young families along with the now habitual contingent of bus pass holders and others like myself. In fact, all services were used by both young and old alike with the 42 dropping off some Indians in Tissington.
With its YJ05 registration, the Optare was the newest bus that I used and the age profile of the others was such that they dated from the mid/late 1990′s. Both were Mercedes midibuses that once were common around Macclesfield with a P-reg one operating the 42 and an M-reg one working the 108. Ride on all of these, even the older ones, was better than on some recent journeys between Wilmslow and Macclesfield on Arriva’s 130. In fact, the Clowes bus still retains its welcome sign and seat upholstery from its time in Arriva hands.
All buses operated pretty much to time and the timetables made it all work even when things were being worked out on the hoof rather than being planned beforehand. Now that I have seen how to get to Ashbourne, exploring the countryside surrounding the town is more of a possibility. Who knows what might come of that?
Tags: 108, 42, 58, Ashbourne, Bowers, Buses, Buxton, Cheshire, Clowes Coaches, Derbyshire, England, Leek, Macclesfield, Peak District, Ticketing, Timetables, Tissington
Yesterday saw me head into Derbyshire for a spot of exploration in the Peak District National Park. What got me to Baslow for the start of the walk was a two part bus journey. Service 58 took me from Macclesfield to Buxton and service 218 got me from there to Baslow. My trot finished up in Bamford (Hathersage or Grindleford could have been stopping points too if time was tight) and a train to Manchester was put to use.Getting back from there took far, far longer than usual because of rail engineering works between Manchester and Stockport. The 30 minute bus journey wasn’t the bone of contention but rather the 50 minute wait for an onward train connection afterwards. Southbound Virgin and Crosscountry services weren’t available so it was a case of using the 21:52 to Stoke or getting a taxi.
To keep everything within the £10 cost of a GM Wayfarer ticket, I stuck with the train. After all, it was allowing me to mix and match modes of transport as needed to set up a linear walk. Derbyshire has its own Wayfarer but that doesn’t extend beyonds it boundaries to carry you into Greater Manchester and Cheshire like its more useful Greater Manchester equivalent. You need to watch you are getting in order to get the full deal.
The whole point of the day wasn’t to see if how far a GM Wayfarer would carry me. There was a good walk enjoyed under ever clearing skies and my legs are telling me a little about my exertions today. However, having that single ticket made it all the easier, ever if going into a train station to make the purchase and then travelling by bus sounds strange. Well, that’s what is needed in Macclesfield…
Tags: Bamford, Baslow, Buses, Cheshire, CrossCountry, Derbyshire, England, Grindleford, Hathersage, Manchester, Northern Rail, Ticketing, Trains, Virgin, Wayfarer
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
