The new London buses

[titch juicy]

I'm sure there's been a thread or two about these, but I can't find them.

I use London buses a lot. Most of my travel around London is by bus or by bike as I think they're the most pleasant ways to get around.

I took a short journey on one of the new ones yesterday in Central London and I cannot believe how passenger unfriendly the design is. The upstairs seating is genuinely uncomfortable, has significantly less leg room than the other newish buses and you can't open the windows so the climate is controlled centrally (not everyone likes being the same temperature and the ride is bumpy as hell). There seems to be less seating than the other newer buses (I imagine because of the two staircases). Surely the whole point of these is to be like the old routemasters, where you can hop and on off whereever you like, otherwise, what is the point? I imagine they are more expensive to run as they need a driver and a conductor.

The only similarity I can see between them and the old routemasters is how uncomfortable they are and that they look nice.

I read that they are costing over a million pounds each to make, and the cost over it's lifetime will be ?354k, significantly more than existing buses. Happy to be corrected on this though.

Is this, along with the Thames Cable Car Boris' biggest vanity project/waste of time?

In fact while we're at it, and this genuinely isn't intended as an anti-Boris Johnson tirade, but has he contributed anything of real value to London during his tenure?

[????]

yup. Getting rid of the bendy ones and Ken

....but that's about it

[titch juicy]

Getting rid of the bendy ones at great cost to the taxpayer and replacing them with these to even greater cost to the taxpayer.....to my feeble mind, this doesn't make sense.

I didn't think Ken had done a particularly bad job, had he?

[Otta]

I heard someone saying the other day that these new buses cost ?300k EACH. Can that really be true?

Just seen this

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-19605280

So ?180m for 600 buses does indeed come to ?300k each. That seems absolutely ludicrous!

But I think I am the one person in London that rather liked the bendy buses.

[Applespider]

I quite like them and prefer them to normal double deckers. I've been on a few and didn't notice the seating being particularly uncomfortable. The temperature being centrally controlled didn't bother me either perhaps since I've seen arguments on normal buses where the most aggressive person in terms of wanting the window open/shut wins regardless of those around them.

I did take the opportunity to jump off the back when we got stuck in traffic. However, this is the bit of them that I'm least keen on when I'm on my bike as I suspect a lot of people who jump off won't look when they do so!

Since quite a few routes go through Victoria where I work, they're also far more popular with tourists than 'normal' buses so do work in terms of having a better 'image' for London.

I think the cablecar wins the 'waste of money' hands down. I weep when I think of how many road safety projects for pedestrians and cyclists could have been put in place with the cash spent on that white elephant.

[Otta]

So do they tend to have the back open then? I do hope so, as the main thing I miss about the old routemasters was that you could run and jump on them as they were pulling away or stopped at the lights.

[titch juicy]

They don't have the back open, at least they didn't when we wanted to jump off (at the side of the road in stationary traffic). But, there was no conductor on this one (which poses another question- one of the big reasons they scrapped the bendy buses was the ability to get on without paying, if there's no conductor on some buses, what's to stop people riding without paying on these?).

Re- the seat comfort, I'm tall and my knees were touching the seats in front on the new buses. On the 12, 63, 78, 37, 363 and 197 there's plenty of room).

[PokerTime]

300k for those custom built buses Otta is quite a good deal. A new coach will easily cost that. HGV lorries cost around the 200k mark. A basic farm tractor will cost 80k. These heavy goods vehicles are expensive to build.

[Applespider]

They have the back open when they have a conductor on board and it's closed when there's just the driver. The conductor though can't take fares from what I recall although I suppose he can check if people touch in.

The conductors tend to be on board those new routes that go through the middle of town and might hit jams. The 24 (Pimlico to Hampstead) quite often has an open platform as does the 11 but the 148 is closed more than its open from what I've seen.

Titch - as I am a titch size-wise, I didn't have that problem but can see how it might affect longer legged folk!

[PeckhamRose]

I like them too. And don't find them particularly uncomfortable. They're better when there's no annoying people on them of course....

Oh, and Boris made it safer for me to ride my motorcycle around London by allowing us to ride in the bus lanes.

I'd still not vote for him though!

[Nigello]

I think it's a shame that most of them that I see are not using their main design feature because of a lack of conductor. I'd love to know what the designer (Thomas Heatherwick) thinks of this, especially given the fanfare and the price.

[numbers]

I've never been on one. Would love to try them.

Otta - if you truly didn't mind the old bendy buses then you clearly never travelled on the 12 route. Sheer hell.

[Mick Mac]

The Routemasters are built in Ballymena I believe. My hometown.

If they were made elsewhere in the UK i guess they would be more expensive. And they are a large bit of kit so the 300k does not surprise me. They look state of the art design, really good, curved tinted glass is not cheap. Shame if the seats are not comfortable as it's the passenger that matters really. You can't pay for the design and scrimp on the comfort element.

[Otta]

.

edit for typo

[Otta]

Fair play if ?300k is going rate, just seems obscene.

[maxxi]

I like the seating arrangements downstairs - a group of odd little nooks at different angles and levels - particularly like the seats at the back that face the rear (you can see if another bus you'd rather get is coming up behind without dislocating your neck).

- and they're great for hopping on and off when traffic is stop-go like along Oxford St.

Just seem less sterile than the other buses.

[Jeremy]

The issue isn't whether it's cheap for a custom design. How does the cost compare to a standard double-decker or bendy bus?

[Mick Mac]

Jeremy Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> The issue isn't whether it's cheap for a custom

> design. How does the cost compare to a standard

> double-decker or bendy bus?

I don't think that is the relevant question Jeremy. I think we should have some cutting edge design for the public irrespective of how cheap another boring bus option might be. Also its good for the image of the city and tourists also like it. The point is that the cutting edge option is sought and bought at an appropriate price for that product. Even the public purse is allowed a luxury item now and again.

[El Pibe]

I agree, it's hugely important as a symbol of london, i've seen tourists getting genuinely excited at their approach.

All the buses we'e suffered over the last decade or two might as well be in Reading, just painted red; ugly functional things.

I finally got to ride one (a journey I'd have been quicker walking but hey) just before I left.

I thought it was superb, it really brought back to me the feeling of coming to London on day trips to buy ludicous shirts from Kensington Market as a foppish youth, but that's another story.

That said, I was very glad I didn't have a push chair with me, the internal design IS very impractical.

[AGW3]

I finally got to ride one too recently and thought it was superb as well.

[Otta]

I just think that the majority of TFL fare payers, who's fares keep going up to pay for this stuff, will never use one if these "luxuries" and wonder what benefit they will ever get.

To be honest I couldn't care less if I'm on a bus that tou might find in Reading so long as it gets ne where I'm going at a competitive rate.

I don't want to sound like a kill joy, I grew up catching the 12 and 36 routemasters every day and was really sorry to see them go, but I just don't think this new fleet of buses is a good use if money, and if the back isn't always open I am completely indifferent to them.

[El Pibe]

I'd be very surprised if the entire london fleets were to be replaced. I reckon routes that don't go through the centre would be very unlikely to use a new routemaster.

It seems to be about image, prestige and that tourist buck, but I've no idea what's going on in Boris' headf (I'm pretty sure nor does he!!)

[titch juicy]

If they were just intended as a tourist attraction then fine, roll them out on a couple of Central London routes. However; as a practical, comfortable way of moving a lot of people all over the city they are not fit for purpose.

[titch juicy]

If i'm right, there are about 6,000 buses on London routes, and they are rolling out another 600 of the new ones in the near future.

According to wikipedia, the cost of each bus is ?354k and the cost of a conductor for each bus is ?62,000.

[titch juicy]

just read that the air conditioning broke down on buses in the summer leaving passengers sweltering.

Apparently Thomas Heatherwick wanted windows that opened, but was overruled.

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/transport/meltdown-on-the-boris-bus-aircon-cockup-leaves-passengers-sweltering-in-30c-8690392.html