It is going to be a long sore point for a small number of First Southampton’s bus users. Monday see’s another change to a small number of bus services in the city, but for the users of service 9 across Merry Oak and Sholing; it won’t be them.
It looks like though, the raft of service increases may be slowing down as buses from Sunday 18th October are actually reducing on some routes. There are also changes after the completion of roadworks in the Bevois Valley.
My wonder is more as to whether the bus operators are seeing more people working from home again, rather than the predicted rush to the office. We all know that the Government are saying “Work From Home – wherever possible.”
From observations, I thought bus loadings were stagnating, but largely fit the service levels in much of the region, but train numbers during the day were starting to drop again. Maybe I was wrong!
Service 1 – Service Reduction
Weekday frequencies on the route to Calmore are being reduced. They are currently running every 15 minutes between 8am and 5pm, which will become every 20 minutes from Monday. The last bus will also be earlier in the evenings, at 1904 rather than 1930 (from Southampton).
This removes one bus per hour from Calmore, albeit also matches the frequency of the equivalent Bluestar service.
There are no changes to the service 1 buses on Saturdays or Sundays; although if the 20 minute frequency is long term, it is a shame the Monday to Saturday timetable could not be the same…
Service 2 – Service Reduction
Weekday services on the route to Millbrook have been timetabled to be every 6 minutes between 8am and 4pm, with an 8 minute frequency for an hour or so either side.
From Monday this will remain every 8 minutes throughout the day. The timetable and giving the drivers a 5 minute layover in town would suggest a single bus is being taken out of the circuit, although it could be that heavier traffic through Shirley is just allowing the service control team to pad some of the buses out.
Again, Saturday and Sunday timetables are unchanged at their 15 minute frequency, and again the weekday changes fall in line with the 8 minute frequency of the Bluestar 18.
Service 3 – Service Increase
Well, you could call it a service increase, and this is where it might be suggested where the 2 additional buses are going.
From Monday, the weekday daytime frequency will move from Every 8 Minutes, to Every 7 Minutes. It might not sound much, but with an end-to-end journey of around 50 to 55 minutes (we are being generous with traffic conditions here) that would suggest that at least one or two buses will be added to the circuit.
Having an imaginary cigarette packet to do some quick maths on, this would mean there are around 30 additional seats an hour available in each direction. If our theory is right, this means that Marc Reddy’s team at Portswood are working with some tight statistics to make such a change, and there are some pretty tight margins of error.
Again, weekend timetables are not changing.
Service 7 – Normal Route Resumes
For the last 2 or 3 months, the weekday service has been diverting on the way out of town, avoiding roadworks in the Onslow Road area. These are now finishing, and buses can once again head directly out via Onslow Road rather than using Lodge Road.
There are no changes to frequency, but a new later last trip at 11pm has been introduced coming out of town.
As always, First Southampton post their COVID timetable changes on a dedicated page, and it has recently been tidied up with redundant information removed.
I still find it a little mystifying that there are very few changes being announced.
Locally, I still find it hard to get on a bus at varying points of the day. “Sorry, Bus Full” appears often as the bus rounds the corner towards my extended arm and the bus rushes by. Some of the local bus company senior managers have proclaimed that they are working with finite resources, albeit appearing to have less buses on the road.
That is fine though, with another Lockdown always on the horizon and the circuit-breaker determined to break the industry yet again.
I think the rest of this month is going to be bumpy, hopefully someone can press the bell and get us off before the service terminates.