Boxing Day is a busy day in the Busing household. Traditionally, the extended family comes round. We even accommodate my fickle brother-in-law and his fads & fancies. And although it’s a lot of work before and after, so long as the family chooses to be social over the sales, it’s worth it.
That’s why you didn’t see me in the sales yesterday. Millions searched for bargains. For me, it was the laughter around the dinner table that was quite priceless.
Searches to the Omnibuses Blog upto 1800 hrs, on Boxing Day
It seems, though, that many people now chose to spend Boxing Day other than in the family home, preferring high streets & malls. The media’s even elected to call this a ‘tradition’. How can that be, when Boxing Day shopping is only 10 years old? That’s aside, the real traditional sporting fixtures, of course, and here people seem to manage without their bus service, because none exists.
As we’ve said in previous years, where *was* that bus service? People who supported what was reported as the second busiest shopping day of the year did so without their bus. With everyone off work (save for shop workers, of course), families are free to shop with their cars. But surely that’s the case on most Sundays, too, when strategic buses these days are well supported. And, let’s face it, would you drive on Boxing Day if you had the choice?
A survey of south central bus operators shows that neither Transdev Yellow Buses, First Hampshire & Dorset, Stagecoach South nor Wilts & Dorset offered anything on Boxing Day. No change from last year, then, save for Bluestar, operating services 1, 2 and 9 every hour and 18 every half hour, during ‘daylight’ hours. And, as we are now coming to expect from Southern Vectis, there was a Sunday service.
As at 1800 hrs yesterday (after the last buses tended to have departed), it was interesting to note the number of searchers who were looking for Boxing Day bus services, from Bournemouth, to Leeds and back to Southampton. If such numbers were arriving at Omnibuses, think how many there are who searched in vain. The bus industry needs to start changing with the times. In 2006, we said there would be risks, staffing and publicity issues. In 2010, we think more should dip their toe into the pool of revenue that undoubtedly exists o Boxing Day. So long as my family chooses my home over Homebase.
i Marc Morgan Huws of Southern Vectis on Christmas (and other things)
9 comments:
I believe that Arriva ran a full Sunday service - commercially - around Leicester.
Metrobus ran Fastway 10 on Christmas Day and plenty of routes on Boxing Day...
Perhaps it's the railways that need to catch up !
Cardiff bus operated a network on core routes between 0930 and 1800 - all commercial too
As I drove through the balmy southlands from Poole to Lulworth on Boxing Day morning I was surprised (or saddened?) to see several hopefuls waiting at bus stops in Hamworthy and Sandford. I fear a long wait was in store for them in W&D land for any Boxing Day bus . . .
First Bristol ran a very limited, five routes, two trips each way to/from Cribbs Causeway shopping mecca. Shame that First didn't bother to advertise it, only a mention on the councils website !, still I guess you can't ask for everything.
Southern Vectis ran a Sunday service, but even more notably, Wightbus ran a Saturday service!
Madness on the Isle of Wight as usual, of the best possible kind of course. Last year Boxing Day saw a special timetable, roughly half of the old Sunday service levels IIRC. Since then, Sunday frequencies have been increased substantially on many island routes, yet this Boxing Day the full new improved Sunday service was in operation. SV do get some flak for their seemingly incessant cutting of secondary routes, but IMO there can be no denying the extrodinary and ongoing success story of the core SV routes. Here's a remarkable fact: SV nos. 1 and 9 (Newport-Cowes and Newport-Ryde) now run at least every 10 mins daytime/15 mins evening, every single day of the year except Christmas Day (when they run hourly). I doubt any other routes in the UK can currently match that.
Good to see Bluestar returning to Boxing Day operations too, after a few years off.
I really do believe other operators are missing a trick here. For instance, Poole-Bournemouth, one of the south's (or even the UK's) premier bus routes - 22 buses per hour on weekdays - again has absolutely no service this year on Christmas Day, Boxing Day or New Years Day. There really must be a huge volume of unmet demand here, and many other places too.
"Southern Vectis ran a Sunday service, but even more notably, Wightbus ran a Saturday service!"
Looks good for Wightbus on the face of it, but what are they operating on Monday (if anything at all???). That's more to do with local government pay than any desire to meet customer expectations I suspect!
Southern Vectis' sunday service is near as damn it the same as their weekday service these days, so you're not exactly comparing like with like. To run the frequencies Southern Vectis do on Sundays, let alone bank holidays and Boxing Day is miles ahead of any other operator.
In fact, just look at Southern Vectis' timetables wholesale and admire the early morning, evening and Sunday services they run - they beggar belief. I suspect there is a lot for the industry to learn from their 'comprehensive' approach to their network operation.
The one thing I hear from elsewhere in Go Ahead South Coast is that Southern Vectis has pretty much nailed the Trade Unions and that that is a big reason why they are able to run these things - they don't have the same battle to find drivers to work all these times and days and they can do it at sensible rates without having to pay shed loads through Trade Union bargaining.
Apparently Bluestar ran all their Boxing Day routes from Totton because no-one at Eastleigh would 'volunteer' to drive, wheras Southern Vectis run Boxing Day and New Year's Day on their normal rotas for normal pay and just the day in hand.
Good to see the comments, but I'm afraid Anon @0059 is misinformed. Bluestar ran services on Boxing Day because we wanted to, and when we asked for volunteers across the whole business, there were more at Totton than anywhere else so it made sense to run the operation from there. Simples! Nothing to do with nailing trade unions (or not!), just about trying something out in response to the market because we wanted to, and luckily we found a plentiful supply of staff that wanted to as well!
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