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Another meeting has taken place today with TfWM & Chaserider and it has been agreed that with immediate effect from this Saturday the 19 will be hourly with 1 bus on the route (Monday to Friday will still remain as 2 buses) I am also led to believe the route finishing early like it currently does IS going to be permanent

Sounds like the tail wagging the dog!

Prob cos tendering is more lucrative maybe

D&G has historically always built its business on winning tenders as the lowest bidder. You reap what you sow!

I wonder if @hlliwmai would feel the same way if Chaserider had to make redundancies following a loss of contracts.

Well if they do return and they are as you say diminished then so be it! It means Chaserider have then got another reason to pull the plug on the service simple!

You could argue that Chaserider should have perhaps done their homework prior to tendering! 

From what I understand, these issues are hardly new with services in the area. 

I don't think anyone comes out of this in a good light. Ultimately, the users of the service suffer and the users contribute to Chaseriders income.

Very nice I like this...the little scum who are doing all the damage won't though diddums 🤣🤣

I wonder if you would like it if you had to use that bus service to get home!

It doesn't resolve the root cause of the problem. Ultimately, any users that do rely on those journeys will now make alternate arrangements and *if* those journeys do return - usage will be severely diminished.

It's actually quite incredible that a failure of society has now turned into a TfWM related failure. 

The Coventry buses at the least have "NXWM" on most of them.

https://www.carouselbuses.co.uk/pickmeupwycombe looks like one of the vehicles that have been on the 11x recently. Bustimes says that OBC have 5 buses in this livery in Oxford.

(Now I've looked on bustimes at Stagecoach)

15991 is operating around there in Coastliner 700 livery
15889 is the poppy bus that I've seen

Nothing on bustimes is listed has having s7 branding, but there are a few buses in various states of branding.

Now I know that this is probably the same reason that NX has got blue buses dotted all over the place (incoming electric buses) so I'm not too fussed about it. I just hope they get their buses then sort their liveries out.

Still buses in Birmingham with full National Express Coventry logos, such as 4894 on the 14 today.

https://www.route-one.net/news/stagecoach-west-unveils-poppy-liveried-oxford-tube-coach/ <-- it weren't that one, so it must've been one of the other transfers. I'm off work until Wednesday and I only go into Oxford on a Tuesday so I may not get to see it if they rewrap it after the weekend.

Which brings me onto... the branding down in Oxford for Stagecoach (and Oxford Bus Company) is a complete mess.

I've seen "Coastliner 700" branding amongst the many, many different stages of Stagecoach livery (in various states of distress) as well as some High Wycombe branded buses (on the 11x for OBC).

Sounds just like the complete mess in Birmingham with the sheer amount of Coventry liveried vehicles (as well as all the other legacy variants of NXWM livery) I see on a daily basis!

Interesting they sent 4859 instead of 4847/4849. Could that mean BC will get more of that 4843 - 4862 batch eventually.

I'm sure the decision maker will have had a fully justified and sensible rationale.

Is anyone a member of The Friends Of The Psv Circle Facebook page?

(Im not, but it was suggested!(

You might want to put them straight about that bus!

Put them straight on their opinions of its presentation?

What might help is if TfWM made some informative videos to help educate bus passengers as to what they can do themselves to maximise capacity on a vehicle.
Things like take a seat if one is available.
Sit upstairs if you're able to.
Put your bag on your lap so someone else can sit down next to you.
More people can stand if you don't use the fold-down seats.
And stand in the designated standing area rather than blocking the narrowest part of the bus.

Yeah because the people that do occupy two seats and put bags on seats are really going to be considerate enough to watch educational videos on bus etiquette! 

People shouldn't need to spam the office to get replies. One contact should be enough. If you gave a stuff about your passengers, you'd get a reply. Even Arriva and their highly slated customer service team can manage to give replies to people! It's not on the passenger to spam emails to get replies, it's on the operator to read and respond to the emails.
7 has quite a different timetable on Mon-Fri versus Sat. Plus somehow manages to run 2 trips a completely different way to the normal 7 but keeps the same route number
8A should be split so Parkside-Stafford AM and Stafford - Parkside PM are numbered route 8, this is to reduce confusion as the 8A runs completely different routes AM and PM.
9 is seemingly about 4-5 different variations all under a single route number. Timetables have so few timing points that no one can differentiate between them and there seems to be no contact with the council or whomever your Traveline agent is to sort the data properly as well.
875 very strange variation on the 19:05 which should definitely be renumbered. 8xx series of route number makes no sense, up and down the country operators are reducing route numbers to make it simpler for passengers, what was wrong with the 75? Wednesday diversion via Rodbaston College doesn't have any proper timings, how can the bus arrive into Cannock at the same time as other days when it's got a 5-10 minute diversion to make?
875A, a route number which is daft as it has little no relevance to the 875 route (different stops in Stafford Town Centre, only runs a few trips Mon-Fri, completely different outbound route, should be numbered appropriately)
877/878 significantly different timetable Mon-Fri versus Saturday. Far too many different route variations under a single route number.

The network mess situation isn't helped by either yourselves or the council uploading poor data to Traveline which is completely different to the timetables on your website, which again is completely different to the actual bus tracking (over long periods). Complete lack of consistency everywhere, how anyone uses your services outside of 9-2 I really don't know as there is so much missing or wrong information between all of the information sources. If it's not your data going to Traveline (as I know Traveline now populates itself using operators data more now than it used to), you need to get in touch urgently with the various councils and sort out the information.

Yes there has been some investment in newer vehicles but the PVR has also increased significantly with new contracts so it's not really a fair comparison of your current fleet versus last year.
This is an enthusiasts forum and like many others do with other operators, they state their experiences. I can't help that you have gotten all touchy about it and want to defend the indefensible. As for your last point, I love that question. When companies can't take criticism so they deflect. My comments come from a passengers perspective and a perspective of wanting to grow bus patronage across the country. Sadly it's got a long way to go in Staffordshire (and some surrounding areas) with the low quality of yourselves and Chaserider. It takes a lot to be worse than Arriva, and yet somehow, you prove day in, day out that it is possible.

Unfortunately operators like these are a by-product of the 'race to the bottom' mentality that inhibits so many parts of this industry.

The 'Midland Red' 144 to go back to running through to Birmingham - although I doubt it would  happen.   

Not viable anymore

I think the enhanced train service, changes in travel patterns and the previous operators allergy to picking up passengers within the TfWM area has led to the demand and requirements for an end to end service to diminish.

The new 20 service seems a sensible balance between maintaining the link and providing onward connections.

Agreed. Seems that electric is the future power source for NX buses. Could the hydrogen buses be converted to electric?

If electric is the future power source for NX buses then let's hope the future of buses isn't NX!

Not sure unless the driver shortage is to blame. Presumably Banga are in a position to cover the daytime services, perhaps by interworking with say the 891.  The cutting of Sunday journeys may be simply that not enough passengers are carried to warrant putting it out to tender.

It's quite amusing that years ago Banga used to compete on the 535, now they will be returning as the operator of the corridor! 

What is so specific about the 89 anyway, what about tendered services that haven't been renewed that genuinely leave stops without a bus?

Specifically, that the travelling public was told just 3 months ago that fare increases were 'to avoid bus routes being cut' by our 'major operator' !