Bus numbers and speed of journey

[malumbu]

Previous thread has gone down the line of "it's all the cyclist fault" that bus patronage has fallen and journey times are longer

Reposted the link to the 2024 data on the number of journeys on all the main modes in London

https://content.tfl.gov.uk/travel-in-london-2024-consolidated-estimates-of-total-travel-and-mode-shares-acc.pdf

I said earlier that neither my usual bus journeys have been affected by cycle routes, and similarly most of my cycle journeys.  The Blackfriars cycle road has changed traffic flows and as said I find Parliament square a mess and avoid it on my bike.

But after numerous increases, probably from Livingston onwards there had been a decline pre-Covid, partly blamed on increased journey times.  It's of course self defeating that people give up the bus to drive, and then make things worse.  The above report also shows that most car journeys in London are single occupancy - shocking eh?

Covid messed up the stats as it took some time for people to return to public transport and now there is so much more working from home.  

Anyway, throwing it open on it's own thread.  It's my pleasure

[Rockets]

1 hour ago, malumbu said:

Previous thread has gone down the line of "it's all the cyclist fault" that bus patronage has fallen and journey times are longer

@malumbu you need to stop knee-jerking, no-one said "it's all the cyclists fault". The subject matter experts invited to the London Assembly Transport Committee discussing why bus speeds have declined so much said that it was one of the contributing factors, certainly not the only factor and no-one on here has made that claim.

1 hour ago, malumbu said:

I said earlier that neither my usual bus journeys have been affected by cycle routes, and similarly most of my cycle journeys.  The Blackfriars cycle road has changed traffic flows and as said I find Parliament square a mess and avoid it on my bike.

But clearly lots of bus journeys are being impacted else the experts would not have claimed that cycle infrastrucutre is one of the contributing factors. 

Did you watch the YouTube video of the Committee meeting? What are your thoughts on what the assembled experts say in relation to that?

[CPR Dave]

Well, if isn't the fault of cyclists it must be the fault of the Labour Party who have presided over this devastating economic decline in London.

"London’s economy remains subdued in historic terms, with relatively low growth. Cost-of-living pressures on discretionary spending are in turn affecting travel. Coupled with a continuing legacy of increased hybrid working after the pandemic, these factors will negatively affect current travel demand and prospects for future growth. However, jobs bounced back strongly from the pandemic, and, despite relatively pessimistic official forecasts, indices of consumer confidence are marginally positive"

[Sue]

1 minute ago, CPR Dave said:

Well, if isn't the fault of cyclists it must be the fault of the Labour Party who have presided over this devastating economic decline in London.

"London’s economy remains subdued in historic terms, with relatively low growth. Cost-of-living pressures on discretionary spending are in turn affecting travel. Coupled with a continuing legacy of increased hybrid working after the pandemic, these factors will negatively affect current travel demand and prospects for future growth. However, jobs bounced back strongly from the pandemic, and, despite relatively pessimistic official forecasts, indices of consumer confidence are marginally positive"

The fault of the Labour Party?

How?

[CPR Dave]

They've decimate the economy. And the Labour Mayor has been in charge of London for nearly a decade. He has presided over London in a period in which, as that report states quite explicitly "London’s economy remains subdued in historic terms, with relatively low growth ... these factors will negatively affect current travel demand and prospects for future growth".

Labour need to pull their fingers out and stop damaging the economy.

[Sue]

51 minutes ago, CPR Dave said:

They've decimate the economy. And the Labour Mayor has been in charge of London for nearly a decade. He has presided over London in a period in which, as that report states quite explicitly "London’s economy remains subdued in historic terms, with relatively low growth ... these factors will negatively affect current travel demand and prospects for future growth".

Labour need to pull their fingers out and stop damaging the economy.

"Decimated the economy"?

Labour only relatively recently took over from the Tories. Do you think the Tories left the economy in a wonderful state which Labour has now "decimated"?

As regards London, do you think Sadiq Khan is  "presiding over London" in some kind of bubble separate from the rest of the UK ?

[malumbu]

Labour were not in charge of the country between 2010 and 2024.  Growth is mainly driven by national government.  @CPR DaveI'm not sure what your particular beef is with the Mayor.

Here's an interesting report from the Campaign for Better Transport on increasing bus patronage (not sure if this is for England or whole of UK).  Driver attitude and entrenched behaviours remains the biggest challenge.  

https://bettertransport.org.uk/blog/embedding-public-transport-in-new-developments/

Edited Monday at 13:21 by malumbu

[Earl Aelfheah]

18 hours ago, Rockets said:

no-one said "it's all the cyclists fault"

It was suggested that bicycles were the primary cause of carriageway pressure. They are not.

1 hour ago, CPR Dave said:

London’s economy remains subdued in historic terms, with relatively low growth.

...don't mention Brexit

1 hour ago, CPR Dave said:

They've decimate the economy.

They've been in power just over a year - following 14 years of Tory mismanagement and chaos.

[malumbu]

Shhhh, Don't mention the Brexit. I mentioned it once, but I think I got away with it all right. So it's all forgotten now and let's hear no more about it.. 

(no prizes for the inspiration)

[CPR Dave]

" They've been in power just over a year "

 

Yes, it's shocking just how quickly they've managed to stuff it up. It's appalling.

[Sue]

42 minutes ago, CPR Dave said:

" They've been in power just over a year "

 

Yes, it's shocking just how quickly they've managed to stuff it up. It's appalling.

What are your opinions about the Tory years beforehand, out of interest?

[CPR Dave]

They inherited a very difficult situation. They fixed the roof.

They then came up against Brexit, Covid 19 and the Ukraine War. Notwithstanding those headwinds they handed over to Labour an economy that had 2% inflation and the highest growth in GDP of all of the G7 countries. 

Back on topic, the fall of bus routes 40 and 12 happened when they were in power, I admit, but they had no power to stop those decisions. 

[Earl Aelfheah]

Travel Watch (who appear in that clip on the other thread) recommend:

• Increasing the operating hours of existing bus lanes and enforcing them 
• Maintaining and not removing existing bus lanes when implementing new road schemes.
• Undertaking a comprehensive signal timing review to prioritise buses.
• Continuing to develop other elements of bus priority, such as bus gates and removal of parking spaces in appropriate locations.
• Implementing the second phase of the Superloop network and continuing to expand it whenever possible so that more current and potential passengers can benefit from its transformational approach to travelling by bus in London.
• Better co-ordination of roadworks, for example, through the expansion of the Bus Sense scheme to all London boroughs and continued use of the ICS.

I would also suggest action to discourage ‘car spreading / bloat’

[CPR Dave]

Does increasing the operating hours of existing bus lanes outside rush hour really make much difference? I can see during eak traffic flow it would help, but at times when there is such little demand for buses that they drop hte number per hour dramatically, surely the rest of the traffic also drops off?

 

I would also ban taxis, minicabs, coaches and bicycles from bus lanes and enforce that too though. 

[Earl Aelfheah]

8 minutes ago, CPR Dave said:

Does increasing the operating hours of existing bus lanes outside rush hour really make much difference?

Yes. buses regularly get held up behind traffic, outside of peak hours, when an operational bus lane would allow them to pass.

And the problem of ever wider vehicles means roads that previously functioned as two-way streets no longer do - with vehicles having to wait to let each other pass, slowing everything down.

Edited Monday at 15:53 by Earl Aelfheah

[CPR Dave]

Vehicle have to be the size they are now for safety reasons. It's all crumple zones to protect pedestrians, cyclists and their own passengers.

 

Electric cars need to be even bigger to accommodate their half ton batteries.

Edited Monday at 16:33 by CPR Dave

[first mate]

@Earl Aelfheah said "It was suggested that bicycles were the primary cause of carriageway pressure. They are not". 

Where was this stated? Over this thread what I have taken away is that bicycles and, to be more precise, cycle lanes, are ONE of the causes of carriageway pressure. Can you say that is categorically untrue?

 

46 minutes ago, Earl Aelfheah said:

And the problem of ever wider vehicles means roads that previously functioned as two-way streets no longer do

Earl you backed this up by referring to an LA session where you said this was discussed. I asked a number of times for a link to that session; do you have it or at least a transcript or time and date of the session?

Edited Monday at 16:37 by first mate

[Rockets]

1 hour ago, Earl Aelfheah said:

Yes. buses regularly get held up behind traffic, outside of peak hours, when an operational bus lane would allow them to pass.

To be fair @Earl Aelfheah according to the bus driver union representative on the London Assembly meeting buses are also being delayed/slowed by cyclists in bus lanes too. Now, as I said before, all the the experts agreed that cyclists in bus lanes was needed for cyclist safety but also agreed it was having an impact as a bus can only travel as fast as the slowest cyclist as they cannot safely pass them due to the width of buses.

To also be fair I believe, if I remember correctly, that it was also the Travel Watch person who suggested that many think that those routes with the most interventions (he cited bus gates as an example) are some of the worst performing.

 

[malumbu]

Oh give us a break.  So a bus driver or two do not like cyclists.  What a surprise.  Very selective reporting. 

I had a fun ride on the 185 one rush hour and it was fascinating to watch the dynamic interaction between my bus and the cyclists on Camberwell New Road.  We'd catch up with the slowest cyclist by the next bus stop, when they would pull away again.  Essentially the bus was going the same average speed as the slowest bike.

Obviously my selective take but I've not witnessed any buses being slower on any of my normal bus routes and my daily cycle rides.  It may well happen but not universal.

And it's not about robbing Peter to pay Paul.  Drivers, usually all on their own, switching to active travel, and/or the bus is much better use of our roads and would help improve bus services as congestion would drop'

On 15/12/2025 at 16:30, CPR Dave said:

Vehicle have to be the size they are now for safety reasons. It's all crumple zones to protect pedestrians, cyclists and their own passengers.

 

Electric cars need to be even bigger to accommodate their half ton batteries.

Total nonsense.  Cars do not need to be supersized.  Average weight increased decades ago due to improved safety.  The increase now is as people are choosing larger cars encouraged by fashion, perceived advantages, and the manufacturers.

The lightest popular city cars are under a tonne in weight and you can get reasonable EVs around 1.5 tonnes.  We've discussed this on other threads.

[Earl Aelfheah]

On 15/12/2025 at 16:30, CPR Dave said:

Vehicle have to be the size they are now for safety reasons. It's all crumple zones to protect pedestrians, cyclists and their own passengers.

This is not true. There are still small cars in production and oversized cars are certainly not designed that way to protect pedestrians or cyclists. 

On 15/12/2025 at 16:34, first mate said:

cycle lanes, are ONE of the causes of carriageway pressure. Can you say that is categorically untrue?

I have said repeatedly that it is true. I don't understand why you ask me the same questions over and over without apparently listening to the answers. Meanwhile you continue swerving questions that have been posed to you. For example:

• Do you accept the recommendations of the Travel watch report? 
• Do you think that cycle lanes should be removed?

It would be good if you both you and Rockets actually clarified what your view is on these things, instead of just kicking up dust and relying on innuendo.  

Edited 8 hours ago by Earl Aelfheah

[CPR Dave]

Even small cars have got massively fatter! The VW golf is now a foot wider than it was when first released.

It's because NCAP ratings require stronger structure, safer crumple zones for pedestrians, and a lot of car manufacturers now put airbags in the doors to protect passengers from side impacts to get the best NCAP safety ratings. 

Bonnet heights have also increased to accommodate the minimum clearance standards. This ensures that anyone who ends up on the bonnet in a collision has some clearance space between the bonnet and the engine, cushioning their heads and saving lives. Naturally it makes the front end of the car "bigger".

Would you do away with all those safety features?

[Earl Aelfheah]

Honda Jazz, Citroen C1 etc... there are lot's of small cars in production. It is clearly not true to say that cars have to be big for 'safety reasons'. 

56 minutes ago, CPR Dave said:

Bonnet heights have also increased to accommodate the minimum clearance standards. This ensures that anyone who ends up on the bonnet in a collision has some clearance space between the bonnet and the engine, cushioning their heads and saving lives.

Higher bonnets are generally more dangerous for pedestrians, especially children, because they hit adults above the centre of gravity (vital organs) and children's heads, increasing the risk of serious injury or death and making them more likely to be pushed under the car rather than over it. Research indicates a 10cm increase in bonnet height significantly raises fatality risk

Edited 8 hours ago by Earl Aelfheah

[Insuflo]

On 15/12/2025 at 16:30, CPR Dave said:

Vehicle have to be the size they are now for safety reasons. It's all crumple zones to protect pedestrians, cyclists and their own passengers.

This is utter nonsense. Cars are the ridiculous size they are now because that’s what the motor industry has decided to push onto the public and many motorists have bought into it. 

[Rockets]

24 minutes ago, malumbu said:

Oh give us a break.  So a bus driver or two do not like cyclists.  What a surprise.  Very selective reporting. 

 No @malumbu. That was the expert opinion of a bus union representative called to give his expert opinion on the continuing worsening of bus journey speeds by the London Assembly.

What you mean to say it is reporting of expert opinion you don't agree with or like.

[Earl Aelfheah]

5 minutes ago, Rockets said:

What you mean to say it is reporting of expert opinion you don't agree with or like.

The experts (your words) from Travel Watch, who appear in the video you've shared, have compiled a report making a list of recommendations. Do you agree with those recommendations (any or all of them)?

Do you think cycle lanes should be removed?

Edited 8 hours ago by Earl Aelfheah