First West of England / end of printed timetables.

[whole diary]

[grahame]

By email from First Bus, West of England

Hi there,

Throughout the pandemic our habits and way-of-life have changed immeasurably. Here at First West of England we’re constantly reviewing how we do things to ensure our business is evolving to match.

Due to Covid-19, we paused the production of paper timetables and we have taken the decision to stop producing these altogether to save wastage.

Instead, you can find all the timetables on our website. Each timetable also includes a map so you can get all the information you need about your bus route in one place.

However, if you don’t like viewing timetables online, they have been designed so that those who still wish to have a paper version can print them out at home using as little paper as possible.

A good idea to reduce paper wastage, but what about those people who are not online ... who won't be able to print them at home ...

A "Come in and let us print your tailored timetable" service at the Bath Travel Centre would help convince me of First's approach - indeed we're looking at a similar system for the Melksham Virtual Hub that a team of Town Councillors, with the help of the mayor, is specifying.    Slight problem - First have closed the Bath Travel Centre.


Dividing the website offered, the timetables do look well set up.   The indexing of them is NOT ... I went on there looking for the D1.   It starts off "Bath area" and sorted by route number, but no D1.   There's a 1 and a U1. Then it goes on to Bristol and Weston-super-mare.   Continue scrolling and it comes to "West of England" services and, lo and behold, there are the D1 and D2.

[Eliza]

I'm surprised that no one has replied to Grahame's post, which may indicate that the majority don't need a printed timetable, as they use the app on their smart phones.  (I don't have a smart phone.)  Does the ending of printed timetables by First, West of England mean that they will no longer be posted in bus shelters or on bus stops? 

My local operator is Buses of Somerset, part of First Bus.  I consult its website at home but, in its wisdom, its timetables show only Main Stops and don't offer the alternative of All Stops, which is needed for planning a journey.  Try to look up its social media pages for alterations to service, and Facebook cannot be accessed without logging in and Twitter gives limited time for scrolling.  I don't want to have Twitter or Facebook accounts, and should I need them just to view information? 

Lastly, my current bugbear.  The 28 timetable (Taunton to Minehead service) on Buses of Somerset's website shows that the bus calls into Taunton Station, South Side (sotajgad stop) to pick up rail passengers going to Butlin's.  This has not been true for months, since last year in fact.  However, if you use, on the same website, the Plan a Journey facility, you are directed, correctly, to walk to the stop on Station Road.  I suspect that the Journey Planner is using an App, whereas the pre-set timetables are relying on an older platform.  It is all very frustrating.

[eightonedee]

Possibly the reason is that we have all been worn down by modern hypocrisy.  If it was something that in theory disadvantages those with any "protected characteristic", however small a proportion of society they comprise, there would be someone out there shouting about the iniquity of it from the housetops, and SWR^» (South Western Railway - about)'s corporate anti discrimination policies would be on the lookout to prevent it happening.

If however you are merely elderly,  poor  or simply resent an assumption that if you want to do many things totally unrelated to contacting people by phone and browsing the Internet you have to suck it up and get a phone or  be positively discriminated against, then tough. And my guess is that there are probably many more in this sector of society than in any group with a protected characteristic. They also include many (most) of those who are at most disadvantage in today's world.