Transport in London is shit

> SO ACCEPTING of INADEQUATE SERVICE

if the alternative is being wound up by tiny things, of minor delays "RUINING" your life, i'll take the accepting.

xpost Yes, I've never had a driver ask me to pay again in those situations. They usually know if the bus in front has terminated early, and if you say that's what happened, they'll just shrug and thumb you on. Doesn't stop the infuriating situation sometimes where the announcement that the bus is terminating is made, but the bus you're supposed to be decanting to shoots past just as you're getting off the terminator.

yeah drivers aren't deliberately making things hard for anyone, just doing what must be a difficult job at the best of times. No excuse for rudeness, but rude drivers are very much the minority.

xpost I don't know about that. While I try to maintain a zen-like calm in these situations, it's very hard not to let RAGE take hold of you. On one memorable occasion I was running down the road after a bus, with a schoolboy iirc, both of us roaring obscenities, he stopped, took off his shoe and hurled it at the back of the bus and I threw a book I was holding.

Both slightly rueful afterwards as we went and collected our belongings, but agreed it was, in his words, 'whack'.

and for the entire miserable experience you get to pay the overpriced fare twice

No you don't, you just walk on the 2nd bus without paying, that's what I always do... and whenever I see my fellow (stranded) partners pulling out their Oystercards for the 2nd journey, I always feel like going up to them and saying, "What are you doing? This journey is free!". Haven't done it yet.

I have a pass, sometimes revalidate it just for kicks.

My bus usage is such that on most occasions I fully expect to use at least four buses, at which point the cost for the day caps out at £4.00 (I don't use the tube). On the few occasions when I know I'm only going to use two buses (for a there and back trip = £2.60), I always demand an extension ticket when a bus terminates prematurely. I have never had a problem with drivers being unwilling to provide extension tickets. It seems it's an easy matter for them to tap something into their console, which then issues an extension ticket. It's actually quite simple because it's irrelevant where you got on or are planning to go as the £1.30 fare covers the entire journey of the bus. Therefore the extension ticket is valid for the remainder of the bus route (but subject to time limitation, of course).

Alternatively (as suggested above) you can just brazen it out and walk onto the second bus, although that can occasionally lead to problems. Better to have an extension ticket in such situations.

Or, of course, you could get a bus pass for £17.80 a week and not have to worry about any of this.

I could, but that would involve me wasting money since I don't use the bus every day.

Of the last six journeys I've taken on the 63 going to work, I think 4 of them have stopped early. It's not a new development, but it seems to be getting worse.
I sent a complaint letter to TFL back in July? maybe August? about it (about it and the way the drivers can be such dickbags about giving out transfers !!!), and they didn't bother to respond.
It just happened again this morning... bus driver told everyone to get on the other 63 in front... except that it wouldn't let anyone on. FANTASTIC.

TFL cover a massive area -- better surely to make the complaint to the specific bus company covering your area and routes: put their complaints number* on yr mobile and ramp it up the moment this happens

(it's on the bus somewhere, but obv with iphones and such is now much easier to find after the fact)

I somehow spent £14 on my oyster yesterday before I'd even made my trip home, even though I didn't leave the house till noon. What the fuck happened? How is it even possible when there's supposedly a price cap? (My trip - bus to Shoreditch, then Liverpool St -> Bank -> Waterloo [through that odd Waterloo and City line] -> Surbiton.)

most likely is that it failed to check you out of a journey -- when you swipe at the end, if it doesn't read it for some reason, it treats it as you doing a runner (also if you forget to) (or actually do a runner)

Isn't there separate caps for tubes, trains and buses?

There shouldn't be for anything that would be covered by a standard one-day travelcard. Mark S is probably right.

Sounds like you were capped at the price of a zone 1-6 anytime travelcard (which is ore than I would have thought):
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/14416.aspx

Waterloo and City line a likely culprit for that - no gates, you can exit without swiping.

yep, go to a desk and explain what happened and they'll refund you

yeah I was surprised to find myself suddenly out in the open of Waterloo station, but thought I'd be alright because I was immediately swiping again to get onto a train anyway. Bawbags. (That's the first serious problem I've had with transport in London, though!)

yes waterloo is terrible for that (as well as actually getting lost and going in a giant circle via underground passages for hours on end): always swipe out even if it means hunting around -- the first time i made this mistake i was with a student-age person... when i told her that was weird i seem to have escaped without swiping she literally screamed a little, grabbed my card and ran around till she found somewhere to swipe me out (they have loans to pay back) -- you have a few seconds' grace apparently

A few seconds? I suppose they have to "time out" your journey sooner or later but would've thought you'd get a lot more leeway than that.

london bridge is bad for that too

i was very struck by that little scream -- she may have exaggerated the lack of time allowed to get the point home

A few seconds? I suppose they have to "time out" your journey sooner or later but would've thought you'd get a lot more leeway than that.

I'm sure I remember an occasion when I went home after work via a few beers in finsbury park, without touching out or in again, and only getting charged for the one journey. i hope i'm not making this up.

i think different territories have different policies or programming maybe? there was a whole year when some of the south london stations wouldn't accept oysters at all

I didn't touch out or back in once (gates were open), half an hour drink, timed me out.

Vauxhall had a problem for ages where even if you did touch in, it wouldn't register it on your journey history. So you'd get charged extra.

Of the last six journeys I've taken on the 63 going to work, I think 4 of them have stopped early. It's not a new development, but it seems to be getting worse.
I sent a complaint letter to TFL back in July? maybe August? about it (about it and the way the drivers can be such dickbags about giving out transfers !!!), and they didn't bother to respond.
It just happened again this morning... bus driver told everyone to get on the other 63 in front... except that it wouldn't let anyone on. FANTASTIC.

― salsa shark, Thursday, November 17, 2011 9:39 AM (9 hours ago)

Aaaaand 2/2 today. The driver on the way home didn't even bother making an announcement that the bus would stop early, just flashed the lights when he arrived at the 'last' stop. At least the 63 driver immediately in front actually let the other bus rejects on.

three of us flicking the Vs at the 43 driver who decided to drive his bus with 1 passenger slowly along the queue making "hey, try the next bus maybe?" gestures at us. nice moment.

(That's the first serious problem I've had with transport in London, though!)

aaand number two is the entire victoria line being closed this weekend. taking a sleeping bag on the bus it is.

i often wonder whether the much-vaunted improvements that tfl have shut down london every weekend to make since before i moved here SEVEN YEARS AGO will ever materialise

the overland system has improved immeasurably (and not just the ELL), but that's new stuff opening rather than stuff closing and repoening

repwning

No tube near me so I take the bus. Why exactly do buses terminate early? Assume it's to do with them being able to claim that 99% of their buses are consistently on schedule?

That likely has something to do with it. I think it sometimes happens so they can keep up frequency on the main body of the route (if two late buses are bunched near the end of a route it makes sense to stop one early and turn it around rather than have them both drag to the end of the route and back); I was once told that it sometimes had something to do with regulations about how long a driver can drive without a break...

The bunching thing makes sense but it's pretty shit to have two loads of passengers on one bus. Surely it makes sense for drivers to break before the route starts?

If it's to keep up the frequency they're not doing a v good job of it on some routes

THAT'S RIGHT 63, I MEAN YOU

I agree with you - though it's not always easy to be precise about how long a route will take, especially at busy times.

Seems like I'm being a TFL apologist today, which is not my normal look.

xpost aw the dear old 63's not so bad. Helps if you're on a bit of the route which overlaps with the 363, obv.

http://img.u.tv/galleries/777/620x349/Wrightbus_London_27022012.jpg

"We will now pass the best designs and concepts on to bus manufacturers, so they can be developed into final design proposals. A competitive tendering process will then determine to which company we award the final contract to build the new bus for London. This should be decided by the end of next year. The first prototype of the new bus will be on the streets of London by 2011."

Looking forward to taking a ride on one of these tomorrow, although I believe there are only eight of them in service to begin with.

One. There's only one. The same one unveiled as a prototype last year.

Does Southern Rail seem to be really struggling lately? I had a run of 8-9 consecutive working days recently where every commute, morning or evening, was beset with delays and cancellations. This is the Lon Bri-C Palace-Victoria loop, chiefly.

Might just be a bad run but you sort of sense that the infrastructure is falling to bits when stuff like that keeps happening.

(Oh, yeah, saw the prototype parked up near Hyde Park Corner last week. Hype Prank Conman, more like, amirite. Get the 38 frequently, hoping I get a chance to ride this chap...)

Given that the reasons (as I understand it) for abolishing the Routemaster in the first place were safety concerns and disabled access, how are they laying off for those concerns with this new design? Presumably that middle door is wheelchair accessible but there is still the possibility of people falling out the back.

Boris will be there to catch them. Esp. pretty ladies.

One. There's only one.

Ah, the report I read was misleading and did not make it clear that there are eight to begin with but they are not all entering service today.

Seems rather a damp squib style launch but I guess there is still quite a bit of testing to do and they didn't want to take the risk of an overambitious launch.

Does Southern Rail seem to be really struggling lately? I had a run of 8-9 consecutive working days recently where every commute, morning or evening, was beset with delays and cancellations. This is the Lon Bri-C Palace-Victoria loop, chiefly

I'm on that line and haven't noticed any major issues going on, although they're regularly a couple of minutes late. The infrastructure should be okay given it's the same infrastructure a lot of the orange line runs on.

I'm beginning to wonder if more than one blunder bus will ever be built.

What, you mean if Livingstone gets back in he could cancel them? But there's a contract, isn't there, for a certain number to be built by the manufacturer?

Main reasons for abolishing the Routemaster were that it's a 50yr-old design which requires more intensive maintenance than newer buses, having two members of staff increases running costs and the requirement by 2017 for all buses to be fully accessible.

I haven't actually seen the new bus, but it appears the rear door is more like a standard door than the open-space of the Routemaster, which also means you wouldn't be able to easily run up and jump onto the platform.

The original designer of the 'new Routemaster' has written a pretty scathing summary of the design and tendering process http://www.capoco.co.uk/media/downloads/Capoco.NewBus4London.Audit.1.pdf

There's two completed buses, I think.

Just in time for Boris' re-election, what a coincidence!

Apparently the rear door will be open on the new one if there's a conductor on board.