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I see in one of the photos here geezer wearing addidas jacket.

Wolfman - please remove your offensive signature!

I'm here to claim my 20 points for spotting Tony today on Moor St. :)

I can't claim my 20 points, because have no idea what Tony looks like?

You may struggle to spot me for the next couple of weeks, will be away from the West Midlands for a time

[Cannock/Hednesford Rail (n)Train ticket Options]

Cannock/Hednesford Rail (n)Train ticket Options
As mentioned (n)Train 1-5 Zones gets you between Hednesford and Birmingham - or anywhere within in Zone 5 - thus Coventry and Wolverhampton too.

If you are travelling on a regular basis then you have three options.

a) Year pass
b) Monthly pass (Direct Debit)
c) 4 Week pass

If you are travelling regularly, then I strongly urge you to choose option b) and buy the Monthly pass as it saves you money in the long run.

Direct Debit

• When you apply for your pass, you include two passport photos and a Direct Debit form authorising Centro to take money out of your nominated bank account.
• In return you get a leather (n) wallet along with your photo embossed onto your plastic ID Card along with your first monthly ticket.
• Your first ticket must start on a Sunday. The first debit payment from your account will then be taken the next day. This calendar date will then be the date your debit payment is made for every month that you are a member of the scheme. If this falls on a bank holiday, your payment will be taken the next working day.
• Tickets posted to you around 10 days before ticket expires. Just write your Photo ID in the box on the ticket and swap it for your old one when it expires.
• Paying by Direct Debit means you don't have to remember to buy your ticket when it expires, or have to queue up at stations/NWM outlets to buy your ticket.
• Centro always write to you in advance informing you of any changes in price - giving you time to cancel if required. You must give 20 days notice to cancel. You can cancel the Direct Debit from Bank/Building Society at anytime.
• If you loose your ticket you pay £5 to have it replaced. Not another £78.50 for another 4 weeks pass!

YEARLY PRICES - (n)Train 1-5 Zones

a) 1 year = 1 Year Pass = 1 purchase @ £760 p/a
b) 1 year = 12 Months = 12 DD purchases per year x £63.50 = £762  p/a
c) 1 year = 52 Weeks / 4 Week Pass = 13 purchases per year x £78.50 = £1020.50 p/a

** Note there are THIRTEEN "months" in a year when using a 4 week pass!! **


Obviously the year pass is the cheapest - but only £2!! (16.6p p/m) more than DD. But Year ticket is only advisable if you know you need it for the entire year and you are not prone to loosing your pass! But over the 4 week pass, Monthly Direct Debit saves you £258 a year!

Just think about the smile on Mrs Bob's face when you present her with those shoes she always wanted but could not afford to buy!   :P  :-* :o  ;D

One gripe, the (n)Network Rail Zone ends at Bloxwich North! We can't use our passes to Hendsford, but (n)Train users can!  ::)

You can buy nTrain tickets for any number of days from 28 to 365 priced pro rata on the 28 day price. If you choose to buy over the counter this can have major advantages. If you know you are going on holiday in 6 weeks time you buy a 6 week pass, this means you don't pay for the time you are not using or have to buy weekly passes for two weeks at the more expensive price.

I have the annual nNetwork pass, the extension to Hednesford is about £130 per year (It was £124 last year, but mine expires this Friday so I expect to pay a few pounds more

Looks like travel express may be going into the coach business, they have a van hool coach parked up the back of their garage could have been two there couldn't see properly

Wasn't there on Thursday, must be either a very new arrival or visitors to Wolverhampton parking in there

The first of Coventry's Enviro 400s have now been sighted part built at ADL's Scarborough plant

4 week train Zones 1-5 (All Zones)- £78.50
:)

There is also a Calender month one which is slightly more expensive, but works out better value when there is 31 days in the month!
Never buy the monthly one February into March!

Thanks tony. What about for the train, as im a bit worried we wont have a bus for much longer

An 'nTrain all zones' ticket covers the whole of the Chase line even as far as Rugeley. The Network West Midlands website isn't as easy to give a direct link to the prices page, but go to http://tickets.networkwestmidlands.co.uk/ and you should be able to negotiate it to the price you want

Can anyone help with this? I might be moving to work at our main office in brum, and will be travelling to & from Cannock or henesford. Can anyone tell me which ticket I would have to get monthly, how much where would I buy it etc also how much would it cost per month for the X51 bus? Thanx

You need a regional travelcard, all prices are listed on this page
http://nxbus.co.uk/west-midlands/tickets-prices/travelcards/adult-travelcards

The 80, in fact, was started by Stephensons of Uttoxter when they ran 100 buses on local services, nearly all of which were duplicates of TWM routes. TWM kept the 80 on as it had introduced a Dudley Road to West Bromwich link. I think the only other Stephensons route TWM kept was 238 West Brom to Merry Hill - I don't know what happened to that.

238 is now the 289

Well said why do the small firms  have to run just
a few mins in front if the other firms
rather than run inbtween

No all companies have to run to their registered timetable! If management register buses just in front of another operator then fine, but buses racing each other just give the whole industry a bad name and risk more accidents.

I feel sure if you ask the management of both Rotala and NX they will tell you all drivers are instructed to run as close to the times on the running board as is safely possible, If that means overtaking the opposition at a stop fine. On a route like the 4 with two companies both  running a 6 minute frequency then yes, you will get quite a bit of this, but 'racing' to get in front? Noooooo

Ive started using sandwell travel as im having to go to hospital everyday. I really dont think they are as bad as they are made out to be. Whilst the buses are old they are cpean amd the staff are quite friendly and have turned up on time. The thing with bradford place bus station I personally feel is caused by the exstremely poor design and it still regularly gets blocked up and you see buses having to reverse to get out. I also dont know how on earth operators can load and unload safely in iust 3 minutes! I think that they have simply been unfairly ousted by the big boys and I reckon thandi couod fall victim next!

I was sent to monitor Bradford Place with a video recorder a couple of years ago. NXWM, Midland and Diamond were all running either on time or equal lateness to each other depending on traffic at different time.

Midland Bus Company (the blue tatty Carlyles that have now ceased), when they did run were on time, just a lot of registered journeys didn't run. Sandwell Travel ran when they felt like it. On the one day only bus ran to its registered time. Buses would park up in Bradford Place for an hour when they should be in service. At other times I saw them go from parked up onto a stand when they saw a queue 45 minutes away from their nearest registered time!

What I saw, and filmed, tied in almost exactly with the findings at the PI

whats going on with midland? a few of the red darts are caked with oil up the backend, and a "new refurbed arriva bus" bought in on the 810 was totally black on the backend. it doesn't look good

I have noticed that to. Maybe short of space now Hill Top closed all parked closer to a wall with engines left running splat splat..like the discharge on a Sat morning from a very hot Fri curry & several strong continental largers  ;D
Or maybe the new bus wash needs a slight adjustment or maybe the buses need to be driven through the wash slower  :P :P :P

Black back ends are usually a sign of oil leaks from the engine

46 Birmingham - Six Ways Aston

Unreliable before, even more unreliable now going to Six Ways Aston
Stupid rota (1 minute to get from Perry Barr Rail Bridge , into one stop and round again to the other side in 1 minute - makes no sense)
Often 10 - 90 minutes late (waited hour and a half b4 :L) - usuailly peak journeys but even first journey of the day is damn late by 4/5 minutes  :-\

It is physically impossible for a bus on that route to be 90 minutes late, if it was it would have just missed a trip out and be a few minutes late on the next. If you have really waited 90 minutes then obviously something is seriously wrong out of the control of the bus company, because with 4 buses on a route each going around in 60 minutes you cannot possibly be waiting that long under normal circumstances

Tony
Aston villa were playing
On the return trip back from SWA, our driver pressed the button 3 times on the radio (meaning late) but AVL didn't respond or never adjusted it
Standstill
ended up at city 40-50 late then 75 back at perry barr

OK, so one bus is 75 min late there are 3 others on the route which, whether they were on time or late would still be in that 75 minute gap, so impossible for there to be a 90 minute gap (even if your bus was the only one on the road it would only be a 75 min gap). Your bus, is now only 15 late, because he would have missed a full trip, and with his layover for both trips would probably be able to actually leave 'on time'

They don't seem to have any. Looks like it will be down to about 16 buses soon with the latest service withdrawals

Photographer sitting on wall in Blakenhall taking photo's of hybrids at around 11:50

Look on the front page and you will find it was tony :)

Correct - this one was taken whilst sitting on the wall
http://wmbusphotos.com/NXWM/5001-9959/5416.html

You could of gone to pipers row and took photos of the B5's on the 59. 5514/3 were the buses

I try not to have all the photos on the website taken in City Centres, it would be a very boring site if I just stood in one location and put 30 or 40 identical photos on per day. Because I hadn't got any photos of the Enviros in service and knew I would be putting 10 or 11 photos on tonight I wanted a bit of variation on the locations so walked along the route to Blakenhall

I really like this aspect of the site-different locations which are named provide interesting shots, especially for those of us who don't make it to all corners of the west midlands county!!

First priority is to get a photo of every vehicle on the site, so first photo put on is regularly in a garage or somewhere similar like all the Coventry eclipse photos taken at Hartshornes (Yes I did have permission to be in there). Second priority is to get a photo of each vehicle in service so the second shot on any page is normally in or close to a City Centre just to improve on a normally low quality garage shot. Then I try to get one of each bus out of the centre. The process starts again with each bus each time it is repainted

Do you have an expensive camera to get such good quality pictures or just a small handheld? Just out of interest

I have a pentax Kx SLR. I have had an SLR since 2008, now on my third as I have worn the first two out. At least I have only had to pay for one as the other two have been replaced under extended warranties!