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Bus Services - Overcrowded in South East London
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Sherwood
Posts: 1,414
Joined: Mar 2005
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13-11-2013 01:12 PM
Someone could write to Heidi Alexander.
She is not my MP.
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rbmartin
Posts: 1,086
Joined: Nov 2007
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19-11-2013 02:53 AM
Not to South London, only to North London.
South London will get it's first 'Boris Master' route in February when Route 148 between Camberwell and White City will convert over.
Although not mentioned as one of the top 10 most packed routes, the 185 is always constantly packed throughout the day and the 197 on a Sunday is busy as TfL continue to only provide a twenty minute service, a legacy from before Sunday trading laws were relaxed.
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Mr_Numbers
Posts: 513
Joined: May 2012
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19-11-2013 07:48 AM
Good news, rbmartin: the 185 appears to top the list! (Well, it's not really good news, but at least the TfL survey confirms your thoughts!)
The survey respondents highlighted the following ten routes in particular for busyness or crowding: 185, 208, 96, 38, 176, 172, 484, 336, 162 and 358
Knowing the 122, I suspect it was supposed to be on this list but was late or cancelled.....  
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michael
Posts: 3,257
Joined: Mar 2005
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19-11-2013 09:08 AM
Mr_Numbers has got me wondering where the next ten busiest routes are. Are they evenly spread across the other 75% of London or are they also disproportionately in South East London? Does anybody know how to get the full list?
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Mr_Numbers
Posts: 513
Joined: May 2012
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19-11-2013 10:24 AM
I've just emailed Ross Jardine who is the contact listed in the report.
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lacb
Posts: 627
Joined: Mar 2005
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Sherwood
Posts: 1,414
Joined: Mar 2005
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19-11-2013 12:00 PM
The 75 was completely full this morning!
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Mr_Numbers
Posts: 513
Joined: May 2012
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22-11-2013 01:09 PM
Here's another map to complement the 'overcrowded bus routes' map that Michael posted. It shows the Tube lines that will run all night on Friday and Saturday nights from 2015.
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/c...-map-2.jpg
As you can see, East London is well served by the Central Line and Jubilee Line, North London is well covered by the Northern Line, West London by the Piccadilly and Central Lines, of course.
Southeast London? Overground Line?
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Mr_Numbers
Posts: 513
Joined: May 2012
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22-11-2013 01:19 PM
You can get passenger journeys by route here:
http://data.london.gov.uk/datafiles/tran...rvices.xls
Just source number of buses on each route, which I have seen online, and am thinking that should give a decent stab at it?
It's interesting, lacb, but unfortunately it only shows passenger numbers, not overcrowding. By number of passengers, the 185 isn't even in the top 50, and the 122 is way down the list.
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rbmartin
Posts: 1,086
Joined: Nov 2007
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22-11-2013 07:17 PM
As you can see, East London is well served by the Central Line and Jubilee Line, North London is well covered by the Northern Line, West London by the Piccadilly and Central Lines, of course.
Southeast London? Overground Line?
If only! The last Overground service to Forest Hill leaves Canada Water at 2356, although they provide later services on New Years Eve which are free to use.
The final rail service to Forest Hill from central London is the 0036 from London Bridge which arrives at 0049.
That leaves us with the 24 hour 176 bus or the N171 in the Brockley Rise/Stanstead Road area.
This post was last modified: 22-11-2013 07:17 PM by rbmartin.
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rymerster
Posts: 72
Joined: Sep 2009
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23-11-2013 01:06 PM
God bless the 176. Thankfully the journey is a lot quicker at night. Sometimes it feels like that Hogwarts bus.
I kind of know a 176 driver at my gym. He told us the route is a lot faster at night because they only have something like a 50 minute target to do the whole Tottenham Court Rd to Penge run, whereas in daytime they are allowed nearly twice as long. So the drivers really put their foot down at any given opportunity.
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Muss
Posts: 50
Joined: Jun 2008
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24-11-2013 01:21 PM
Regarding night buses to Forest Hill. In addition to the N171 and the 176, there's the N63 which can drop you off one stop before Hornimans or the 12 if you fancy the walk from Dulwich Library on Lordship Lane. I've used both in the past. Useful to note that all four buses pass through Elephant and Castle at the same bus stop.
Top tip : the N63 is very handy if you find yourself chucked out onto the streets in Farringdon & Clerkenwell at 3am.
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lacb
Posts: 627
Joined: Mar 2005
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26-11-2013 10:42 AM
Quote:
You can get passenger journeys by route here:
http://data.london.gov.uk/datafiles/tran...rvices.xls
Just source number of buses on each route, which I have seen online, and am thinking that should give a decent stab at it?
Mr_Numbers wrote:
It's interesting, lacb, but unfortunately it only shows passenger numbers, not overcrowding. By number of passengers, the 185 isn't even in the top 50, and the 122 is way down the list.
This is why, Mr_Numbers, I suggested sourcing the number of buses on each route. Divide one by the other and you will get a quick comparator value. Granted, this will make no allowance for peak usage etc but it would give the mean loading per bus over the year. Anything better would need source data but this maybe fit for purpose.
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michael
Posts: 3,257
Joined: Mar 2005
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26-11-2013 11:19 AM
An interesting point was made to me today from a reliable source who I won't name:
I think that a significant part of the reason why 9 out of 10 of the most over crowded bus routes are in the Southeast and 5 of them serve Lewisham is ironically because of good planning rather than bad. Lewisham have worked with TfL for years to put more services into more areas in more appropriate ways and one result of that has been increased ridership on buses as the services have become rapidly more popular.
Generally there is little opportunity to increase the capacity on a route except when the route is retendered ( although it can be done, it is more tricky and tends to cost more if the capacity is increased mid-contract ).
Which really does beg the question; what can be done to relieve overcrowding on buses in South East London? (other than the pipe dream of the tube)
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Novels
Posts: 83
Joined: Apr 2008
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26-11-2013 02:20 PM
As mentioned before, set up a direct non-stop express service like the one for Croydon.
Other suggestion: instead of increasing the services to and from Central London, open up new bus routes connecting SE to Thameslink stations. That would allow us not only to get to Central London more quickly, but also to the north.
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Sherwood
Posts: 1,414
Joined: Mar 2005
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27-11-2013 02:00 PM
The overcrowded routes have been around for years. i think we are being sold a flimsy excuse as usual.
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lacb
Posts: 627
Joined: Mar 2005
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27-11-2013 02:59 PM
I think you are right Sherwood.
Are the bus routes, elsewhere in London, less overcrowded due to poor planning? Sounds more like spin rather then irony to me. Sorry Michael.
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Mr_Numbers
Posts: 513
Joined: May 2012
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03-12-2013 12:14 PM
Michael: Mr_Numbers has got me wondering where the next ten busiest routes are. Are they evenly spread across the other 75% of London or are they also disproportionately in South East London? Does anybody know how to get the full list?
Mr_Numbers: I've just emailed Ross Jardine who is the contact listed in the report.
Mr Jardine has just replied (kindly apologising for the delay) but says "We do not have a breakdown of the next ten or more overcrowded routes from the Committee’s survey of bus passengers." I don't understand why: how can you have a list of the Top 10 of anything without knowing how everything else ranks? So I'm asking him what's happened to the original data or who else might know.
Mr Jardine sent through a link to the same master spreadsheet we've discussed above. On which point...
lacb: This is why, Mr_Numbers, I suggested sourcing the number of buses on each route.
Sorry for misreading your original posting, lacb. Yes, that could potentially be a very useful calculation to get things started. Do you recall where you saw the data on the number of buses per route?
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Baboonery
Posts: 581
Joined: Sep 2007
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03-12-2013 01:32 PM
The wiki page for each bus route has a figure for peak vehicle demand, but not overall vehicle demand.
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Mr_Numbers
Posts: 513
Joined: May 2012
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03-12-2013 01:32 PM
This reply just received from Laura Warren in what I guess is the London mayor's office:
My colleague Ross has passed on your email to me for a response because I work with the Assembly's Transport Committee.
To clarify, the Transport Committee's report on bus services set out the 10 most crowded bus routes as cited in a survey of around 1,000 people using buses in London. In effect, these routes give an indication of passengers' experiences of crowding on certain bus routes but as the survey was self-selecting and not based on responses from all bus passengers in London these findings do not necessarily capture all incidents of crowding on all bus routes in the capital. It is TfL which collects data about the entire bus network and should be able to provide more information about crowding levels on all bus routes.
From existing published TfL data covering the entire bus network, the Transport Committee was able to identify the 10 most used bus routes in London but could not accurately determine from this data the most crowded bus routes. As per your observations about the TfL data, the ten most used routes are not necessarily the most crowded because they may have more bus vehicles allocated to them than other routes to address their greater number of passengers.
As you will see from the Transport Committee's report, the Transport Committee commented in detail on the fact that TfL did not have a set measure of crowding on bus routes and did not publish data on a regular basis showing the crowding levels on all bus routes. It therefore recommended that TfL should address these gaps by determining a measure of crowding for buses and publishing findings against this measure regularly for all bus routes.
The Transport Committee is now seeking a response to its report and recommendations from the Mayor and TfL which will hopefully include a commitment from TfL to determine a measure of bus crowding and report on the crowding levels for all bus routes regularly. This should hopefully address the points you have raised.
In the meantime, if you wish to pursue this further, especially if you want to find out about recorded levels of customer dissatisfaction with bus route 122 or any other individual routes, I would suggest contacting TfL directly. It is TfL, and not the Transport Committee, which holds the data on the performance of all bus routes in the capital and should be able to respond with more information to assist you. Contact details for TfL can be found online via: http://www.tfl.gov.uk
Regards
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