Free Christmas bus travel

[karl724223]

Apparantly sister is taking advantage of the offer, as she's meeting up with friends after work, so I suppose I'll get chapter & verse if things dont work!

Ain't you got any mates to take you out after 1900 to say you had a free ride 
Or can't ya sister take you out for one trip 

[Westy]

Ain't you got any mates to take you out after 1900 to say you had a free ride
Or can't ya sister take you out for one trip

I have a 5am start, so dont go out during the week & for the record, sister got back before 7pm, so didn't take advantage!

[Sandy Lane]

From Monday 9th to Friday 13th December free bus travel from 1900 to 0259
All cards will be disabled at this time so they get free travel in case they scan by accident
On nx buses and other operators

Can't find it on Google but I'm sure I saw somewhere the weeks free travel cost Mr Parker £1m and 250,000 passengers took part?
If so that's £4 each by my reckoning?

[LD713821]

Can't find it on Google but I'm sure I saw somewhere the weeks free travel cost Mr Parker £1m and 250,000 passengers took part?
If so that's £4 each by my reckoning?

What a good use of the TfWM budget

[Rachvince53]

What a good use of the TfWM budget

I believe the money came from the compensation fund following cancellation of the northern bit of HS2.

[Tony]

I believe the money came from the compensation fund following cancellation of the northern bit of HS2.

Still TfWM budget.

The HS2 budget is a usual politician's lie. That money wasn't due to be spent for several years, but magically appeared in 2024

[suavegarv]

Can't find it on Google but I'm sure I saw somewhere the weeks free travel cost Mr Parker £1m and 250,000 passengers took part?
If so that's £4 each by my reckoning?

I think it was also on the local news.

[jamesX4]

Can't find it on Google but I'm sure I saw somewhere the weeks free travel cost Mr Parker £1m and 250,000 passengers took part?
If so that's £4 each by my reckoning?

More than £4 each.  A proportion of people travelling after 7pm will already have paid for travel cards, day tickets or have concessionary passes.  

[Gareth]

Can't find it on Google but I'm sure I saw somewhere the weeks free travel cost Mr Parker £1m and 250,000 passengers took part?
If so that's £4 each by my reckoning?

How do they know how many took part? There wasn't any TfWM staff counting at every stop and drivers weren't pressing any buttons on the ticket machine to count how many were boarding. Or at least they weren't on the buses I caught all week.

[Sandy Lane]

How do they know how many took part? There wasn't any TfWM staff counting at every stop and drivers weren't pressing any buttons on the ticket machine to count how many were boarding. Or at least they weren't on the buses I caught all week.

Found the link now 
BBC News - Free bus scheme is good value for money - West Midlands mayor - BBC News
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0kvglep72vo

[Stu]

I believe the money came from the compensation fund following cancellation of the northern bit of HS2.

It was stated in the TfWM publicity that this was paid for from BSIP (Bus Service Improvement Plan) funding.

The initiative is part of the £20 million Passenger Incentive Programme which is funded from the West Midlands Bus Service Improvement Plan (BSIP). It aims to encourage people to try bus travel for the first time or return after a period of absence, to support a passenger-led recovery of the local bus network.  

https://wmbu.org.uk/2024/11/mayor-of-the-west-midlands-unveils-uks-biggest-free-bus-travel-offer-this-christmas/

How do they know how many took part? There wasn't any TfWM staff counting at every stop and drivers weren't pressing any buttons on the ticket machine to count how many were boarding. Or at least they weren't on the buses I caught all week.

This was a major flaw in my opinion. I don't normally travel in the evening, but on the last Friday (13th) I happened to be out in the Jewellery Quarter for our works Xmas meal. I left just after 9pm, got the 8A round to Sparkbrook, from where I picked up the 3 back home. Neither bus was particularly busy, though I can't make any comparison from previous experience.

On both buses, the card scanner and fare chute were covered over, and the drivers were just waving people on, didn't see them pressing anything on the Init unit.

Personally, while I enjoyed free travel that evening, I had a monthly pass anyway, so there was no benefit to me.

If a majority of passengers were travelling after 7pm with paid-for weekly/monthly passes or even day-tickets bought earlier in the day, there's no way you could measure how successful this scheme actually was, without accurately counting passengers who intended to buy a ticket on-bus, and then comparing against historical usage data.

This is probably a controversial opinion, but I suspect that the bus operators benefitted most from this, depending on how they were reimbursed by TfWM - declare more passengers than actually carried etc.

[jamesX4]

Found the link now
BBC News - Free bus scheme is good value for money - West Midlands mayor - BBC News
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0kvglep72vo

£1m for approx. 25 hours of free travel to a limited number of passengers without travel cards, day tickets or concessionary passes does not sound like good value for money to me.

[BlackCountryBusSpotter]

£1m for approx. 25 hours of free travel to a limited number of passengers without travel cards, day tickets or concessionary passes does not sound like good value for money to me.

The Mayor is good at stuff like this like all politicians PR is all they do, they don't actually know if it worked or not

[2206]

It seems quite a few people are waiting round aimlessly at bus stops and bus stations this evening with the early shutdown. With a number of services finishing around 18:00 and the more major services finishing early at around 23:00.
A number of people on the 49 stand at West Brom Bus Station and an elderly lady with a shopping trolley waiting on the 48 stand who when I told her, told me "But that's the only bus I can get home".
Makes you wonder why these people don't check the time of the last bus before they travel
To be honest at a bus station like that you could at least do with a note on the affected stands or get the bus station guard to tell people as your probably going to get the same thing  with the early shutdown on New Year's Day.

[the trainbasher]

It seems quite a few people are waiting round aimlessly at bus stops and bus stations this evening with the early shutdown. With a number of services finishing around 18:00 and the more major services finishing early at around 23:00.
A number of people on the 49 stand at West Brom Bus Station and an elderly lady with a shopping trolley waiting on the 48 stand who when I told her, told me "But that's the only bus I can get home".
Makes you wonder why these people don't check the time of the last bus before they travel
To be honest at a bus station like that you could at least do with a note on the affected stands or get the bus station guard to tell people as your probably going to get the same thing  with the early shutdown on New Year's Day.

If only there was a medium or three which people often viewed or listened to where TfWM or the ops could advertise on... like ITV, social media or... erm... Hits Radio?