The Benefits of Deckers

Wilts & Dorset will be using an articulated bus on one of its Bournemouth university contracts from January 2010. This may prove an interesting diversion but it isn’t anticipated to be the norm in the Poole-Bournemouth conurbation.

Not that double decks will be, either. Yet, double decks have been with us in Britain since the dawn of the motor omnibus. They’ve taken something of a battering in the past 30 years and once common, uniform fleets of city-wide deckers are no more.

A week ago, we posted on the benefits of articulated buses. This drew 15 comments. In order to ensure balance, we thought it might be useful to do the same for double decks. Before considering the benefits, it’s actually best to start the two significant disadvantages.

1. Double decks attract more anti-social behavioural problems and, as such, operators will always think twice before buying them. Yet, anti-social behaviour whether on a bus, at a bus shelter or the high street is a societal problem and should be addressed as such. What tends to happen, however, is that passengers blame the operator for a failure to “police” double decks. Where possible, operators nevertheless need to “design out” anti-social problems where they can—by ordering single decks.


2. Older passengers prefer siting downstairs and this can cause what appears to be an overloading issue, especially since there are fewer seats these days. Current provincial double decks seat about 30 on a longer chassis, the same as on a shorter VR of the 1970s. Passengers with luggage, shopping of travelling short distances similarly prefer this area. Conversely, longer distance passengers might benefit from less crowding upstairs and the very different view of their surroundings when compared to a car or walking.

So, as for the benefits, double decks are:

• Realistically the only choice for an operator who needs a capacity of more than 40 seated passengers. Thanks to DDA regulations that mean a 12m single deck can barely exceed 40/44, a decker is the only option. And to think since the late 1960s it was possible to seat more than 50 on an 11m chassis.


• Preferred by passengers who to a person dislike standing. Whereas operators might wish it to be otherwise, the public want seats—that’s what they pay for. Overhead clearances in England tend to be high enough for double decks and this has been the preferred design for carrying larger numbers for a century. Even during the privations of war and its crush loadings, there were complaints from standees. There were even complaints on the earliest *short-distance* London Transport Red Arrows of 1966 onwards, when Merlins replaced double decks. There once was a time, long gone, when youngsters would routinely give up their seats for older passengers and no longer helps ordinary passengers.


• Arguably safer than having loads of standees. When the bus is moving, passengers are best in a seat though clearly not necessarily so while descending today’s straight rearward-facing staircases as the bus brakes to stop.


• More pleasant to ride upon. High capacity standing is uncomfortable for passengers on bendy buses when this is for more than about 15 minutes in duration. Disembarkation then becomes very difficult and drivers cannot easily see the rear platforms to control doors easily.


• Better suited to garage groundspace. Bus garages are built with rear entrance rigid single and double decks in mind, in terms of maintenance facilities and parking.


• Better suited to road space. Deckers block fewer junctions or accesses and don’t require considerably more stop-side or expensive bus station infrastructural work. Bus stations are designed for shorter, higher vehicles.


• Arguably better in negotiating English city roads that can be tortuous and congested. The shorter the bus and its wheelbase, the better. This may nevertheless be a spurious argument when you consider the front wheelbase of an artic.


• Cheaper to operate. Maintaining a third axle, whether rigid or bendy, plus an articulation platform, is a considerable expense when compared to two axle vehicles.

It really comes down to Hobson’s choice for the bus operator, as usual. Nothing’s perfect: single decks haven’t peak capacity and require higher frequencies. Double decks attract anti-social behavioural issues, carry empty seats off-peak and passengers tend to avoid the top deck. Artics have flaws that make them unsuited for operators and townscapes.

Whether you are pro-bendy or pro-decker, it seems inevitable that the longer-term future of the bus in urban Britain is neither of these, unless we are going to see modal shift at very high levels. In most towns & cities, it is the single deck that will continue to reign supreme.