Changes at Damory

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I know. It’s not a Damory bus…. it’s the closest I have!

Although I posted recently about the changes at Go South Coast coming up, I did not really appreciate the changes in the Dorchester operations of Damory Coaches. There is a list of changes that are now showing as both route and timetable, which I think it is time to take a look at.

I would imagine some of this (the changes to CR routes) is in line with changes that started to take affect last January. In last year’s changes, Dorset County Council started to directly collect the fare income and that would presumably mean that the “value” of the contracts that are in place increase to reflect that change. It’s kind of how the railways now work, with the Treasury taking all the fare income from rail travel and then paying South Western Railway / Great Western Railway / etc, a management fee.

Changes from 19th February

There are minor timetable changes to:

• Poundbury Service 1
• Manor Park and Fordington Service 2
• Weymouth and Crossways to Dorchester Service 5
  • A slight aside that the “Dorset School Days” service for Thomas Hardye School is now “Cornwall School Days”? Must be a Typo.
  • The school day service will now also run non-stop from Dorchester Town Centre to and from the school(?)
• Poundbury Service 6

Blandford to Weymouth service X12 / CR8

So there are some changes, which I am not sure whether they are actually as written or not. As you can see from the service number change, the X12 is being brought into the new numbering scheme. I remember when Wilt’s and Dorset ran through services from Salisbury as the 184.

• Route change within Blandford Forum where all CR8 trips will divert off Salisbury Road to run via Blandford Community Hospital (except the school day service that runs via Milton Abbas)
• Some of the additional stops on the school trips for the X12 are missing off the CR8 around Milton Abbas. I can not imagine that it is the case though(?)

Blandford to Dorchester service 187 / CR9

The CR9 will extend beyond Dorchester South Station to run to/from the Dorset County Hospital which will affect timetables by a few minutes, including on schools trips via Thomas Hardye School.

The first and last services of the day will also be extended:

• 0737 (School days) / 0757 from Winterbourne Kingston to Dorchester now running through from Blandford Forum
• 1735 from Thomas Hardye (School Days) / 1740 from Dorset County Hospital will now run through to Blandford Forum

Presumably the vehicles are based out of Blandford depot anyway? Jurassic Breezer 1108 has been the regular vehicle on this route, and with it being a schools trips in the mix I would presume this would continue?

More off our patch there is also a service change listed for the CR7 Shaftsbury to Blandford service.

I know…..

When I first said Hampshire Bus Update, and I included Weymouth as I enjoy going to Weymouth; I don’t think I fully thought it through. Dorset can be a hugely rural area in some parts and these little county and village routes keep getting lost in lists.

Maybe I will draw a line with Bournemouth and Poole. I quite enjoyed the jaunt down via Swanage and Weymouth last year, but I might have to start truncating how far south I go!

No – there is not a “Dorset Bus Update” in the works.