The local media are calling it a “turf war”. As ever, in reality, there’s more to it. But it’s nevertheless a little bizarre.
It all centres upon the 30 stopping service between Cardiff & Newport in Wales which, apparently, is 90 years old this year and has been a joint service between Cardiff Corporation & Newport Transport since 1942. But not any longer, it appears. Sort of.
Whether it warrants it or not, Newport Transport’s share of the has oft been a double deck. Careful scrutiny of the destination display shows its Leyland is on that route. The Stagecoach to its rear reveals this is contemporary shot
Under the old regime, up to early August, the service required three buses from each operator, offering a combined 20-minute service. Now, Newport Transport’s gone its own way, by running on top of the Cardiff Bus journeys. This increases Newport’s tally to six. Then, add in the relative newcomer, the three-bus Newport Bus limited stop Newport-Cardiff X30, increased from two to three journeys per hour this summer. The sum total equates to nine Newport Transport buses to Cardiff Bus’ three.
The question is, could the market really bear a 20-minute stopping service when every 30 would seem more realistic. This on top of a Newport Transport-only 20-minute express. And don’t mention the train. This usually takes under 15 minutes and during the off peak charges remarkably reasonable fares.The local media suggest that Cardiff Bus’ refusal to accept Newport’s newish Passport smartcards is at the heart of the “war” that began in early August. Given that Cardiff has not risen to the bait by maintaining its previous commitment, it seems a little harsh to blame Cardiff Bus. It isn’t Cardiff Bus that’s currently escalating matters. Yet, it was Cardiff’s “refusal” that apparently warranted Newport offering its own service journeys over-running Cardiff’s, to assist Passport-bearing passengers. Interestingly, both operators still accept each other’s paper tickets, even on the Newport over-running journeys (but this has never been the case on the Newport Transport-only X30).
The odd thing about all this is that Newport Transport’s website mentions neither their smartcard nor the changes to the 30. Instead, it refers to the 20-minute joint operation, as ever was. And it still has the old 30-minute X30, now every 20.The view from Cardiff Bus on smartcards might be somewhat different. Cardiff is trying to bring out its own smartcard. Since both operators use Welsh Assembly sponsored Parkeon TGX150s, in time and with testing there should in theory be complete ITSO compatibility. Could it be that Newport Transport is acting unilaterally on this? A bit like the X30?
Finally, it’s quite rather remarkable that the Cardiff-Newport service was never run by traditional “country” operators from the Western Welsh group. Successor National Welsh did try an hourly extension to the Gloucester to Newport 73 to Cardiff in the late 1970s. This was soon abandoned owing to lack of passengers.
8 comments:
Your comment about the National Welsh service 73 is not quite correct, as it dates back much further than the late '70s. It was Red & White service 73, and prior to that service 13 (during the 1960s) - and before that, service 1 if my recollection (of various articles that I have read!) is correct. By 1964, the main service was half-hourly, but even then the Cardiff-Newport section was only hourly.
There were some strange picking up restrictions on the Newport-Cardiff section (presumably to protect the municipal operators' service), which meant that a passenger could not travel between Cardiff and Newport, although some local journeys within the intermediate section were possible. Thus a passenger boarding in Cardiff Bus Station could travel to Castleton or St Mellons (between Cardiff and Newport); but not to points on the west side of Newport up to and including the Bus Station, nor to a couple of stops east of the Bus Station. Further east, they could alight at any stop.
The R&W service followed largely the same route as the 30, so the fact that some local journeys were possible within the Cardiff-Newport section seems rather curious. From my recollection of the second half of the 1970s there was little such traffic, so the provision of those fares was probably academic.
Firstly, a few corrections.....
1. The PD2 is NOT on the 30; someone is having fun with the route number display! (Depending on when the photo was taken, that might have been me driving!).
2. The X30 accepts and issues Cardiff Bus "Day/Week to Go Plus" and "Day/Week to Go" paper tickets between Gabalfa and the Central Bus Station.
...and now a few comments
3. Three stands at Newport bus station are now used for services to Cardiff - 13 for Cardiff Bus's 30, 14 for Newport Transport's 30 and 15 for the X30.
In Cardiff, all 30s/X30s use stand E4, which can get rather busy! There are simultaneous Cardiff and Newport service 30 departures at XX:10 between a.m and p.m. peaks.
4. Newport Transport's flat fare of £1.30 is now valid to Cardiff, so they significantly undercut the £2.10 single offered by Cardiff Bus.
Newport Transport are also 20p cheaper within the Cardiff city boundary, where Cardiff Bus charge a £1.50 flat fare.
5. The rail fares are £4.10/£3.90 peak/off-peak return. These are both cheaper than Cardiff Bus's £4.20 return (which includes unlimited travel within Cardiff), but are significantly undercut by Newport Transport's fares.
6. The train takes around 15 minutes, the X30 around 35 minutes, the 30 approx 55 minutes.
7. Newport Transport's web site hasn't been updated since January! There is supposed to be a new site under development, but that's no excuse for simply abandoning the existing one!
The site doesn't even advertise the new smartcard (Passport)!
http://www.newporttransport.co.uk/
So all these enhancments in Newport are known only to those who use the buses regularly - the key "I'll use the car today" market has no idea how cheap it is to travel to/from Cardiff by bus.
8. Loadings on Cardiff Bus's 30 don't appear to have significantly dropped. Holders of concessionary passes tend to jump on the first bus that arrives at their stop.
There is scope for Newport Transport to grow the market, but promotion of their frequent, cheaper service needs to be significantly improved.
"The PD2 is NOT on the 30; someone is having fun with the route number display!"
Are you sure? I just showed the photo to my wife and she said she has definitely seen the bus around Cardiff on a few occasions very recently.
"Are you sure? I just showed the photo to my wife and she said she has definitely seen the bus around Cardiff on a few occasions very recently."
Yes, I'm sure. She possibly saw it on a wedding or similar hire.
Indeed, the Newport Leyland half-cab was embarking on a wedding private hire but that doesn’t sound anywhere near as interesting as running on the 30...
As of the 18/09/10 the bays used by the various service 30's in Newport bus station, make no mention, either on printed or electronic signs, of any of the Cardiff Bus departure times.
Can I therefore assume that Newport Bus owns and operates Newport Bus Station?
Shouldn't any bus station be operated for the benefit of the passengers, stating times of all departures, regardless of operator?
Anti-competition rules and regs. obviously don't apply in Newport bus station, bays 13-15!
It's not the first time that there have been problems with multi-ride ticket acceptance on route 30. On several occasions in the mid 1990s Newport Transport drivers refused to accept my Cardiff "all day" multi-ride ticket. For a period, I had to make sure that my journeys were timed to use Cardiff rather than Newport buses.
Newport bus station is operated by Newport City Council. Newport Transport has no say in the operation of the bus station and pay departure charges like all other operators.
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