MetroBus

[whole diary]

[chuffed]

And so it came to pass, that the utterances of the great prophet FT,N were seen to be coming true. The people of South Bristol, led by their High Priestess Karin Smyth wailed beseechingly to their Metrobust masters 'Where is our bus route'. And the masters replyeth ' it is a figment of thy imagination' What was inscribed of tablets of stone is no more. And the people were sore afraid.

And so  endeth the first day.

The people of the neighbouring country of North Somerset who as travellers in an antique land,  stood sullenly by, led by the blinkered monolithic false gods Ashton and the Ap who as worthless vast and trunkless legs of stone stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the South Bristol link road half sunk a shattered bus shelter lies.


 The metrobus spokesperson whose frown, and wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,tell that its future passengers well those passions read. which yet survive, scrawled on the shelter, stamped on these lifeless things,The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;

And on the pedestal, these words appear
My name is Marvin//Mark/George/Tim (insert name of choice here) , Mayor of Mayors;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck of Metrobust, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands of Weston-Super- Mayor stretch far away.

And so endeth the second day

The prophet was so dismayed by his own words that he  sayeth that he is hath intending to banish thyself into the outer darkness. And the people cried, wailing beseechingly, renting their garments as they tried to cast off the plague of metrobus excuses that hath engulfed them. 'What will we do without the great prophet to guide us? 

And so endeth the  third day.

[Red Squirrel]

Interesting, Does that explain this, which I spotted on a recent trip to Wessun?

[Bmblbzzz]

Bucket and spade holiday at Dismaland?

[TonyK]

And so it came to pass, that the utterances of the great prophet FT,N were seen to be coming true. The people of South Bristol, led by their High Priestess Karin Smyth wailed beseechingly to their Metrobust masters 'Where is our bus route'.

Before that, I had recorded the lamentations of the people of south Bristol when they heard that there would not be trams running along shiny new metallic rails along the New Cut after all:

"By the rivers of Bedminster
Where we sat down
Yea, we wept
When we remembered iron"

But you are too kind - it is true that I am without honour in my own land, but a prophet?

Wait, though, for a moment. I called the Ashton Vale to somewhere near Temple Meads MetroBust line a dead duck at least a year before Mark Bradshaw called it a lame duck. I predicted a final cost of £250 million when all others were saying £180 million. I said the whole thing was flawed at least a year before George Ferguson. My initial prediction of November 2019 for complete opening (now looking optimistic) was made almost 5 years ago, when the official date was early 2016 AD (Atkins Dominated), and I sagely predicted that a time would come everybody involved would try to blame everybody else. And there was more, much more. Maybe I do have a gift after all!

And the people cried, wailing beseechingly, renting their garments as they tried to cast off the plague of metrobus excuses that hath engulfed them.

I largely buy what I can't steal from clothes lines.

[Red Squirrel]

So you're saying you knew they'd make a bysshe of the whole thing?

[TonyK]

So you're saying you knew they'd make a bysshe of the whole thing?

The very tragic romantic poet I had in mind! Whenever I hear the word "shipwreck" I instinctively think of either Shelley or MetroBust.

[Bmblbzzz]

But you are too kind - it is true that I am without honour in my own land, but a prophet?

Wait, though, for a moment. I called the Ashton Vale to somewhere near Temple Meads MetroBust line a dead duck at least a year before Mark Bradshaw called it a lame duck.
...snip...

So it was dead and then it was lame and now it shall walk? Not only a prophet but also Lazarus!

[Western Pathfinder]

And so it came to pass, that the utterances of the great prophet FT,N were seen to be coming true. The people of South Bristol, led by their High Priestess Karin Smyth wailed beseechingly to their Metrobust masters 'Where is our bus route'.

Before that, I had recorded the lamentations of the people of south Bristol when they heard that there would not be trams running along shiny new metallic rails along the New Cut after all:

"By the rivers of Bedminster
Where we sat down
Yea, we wept
When we remembered iron"

But you are too kind - it is true that I am without honour in my own land, but a prophet?

Wait, though, for a moment. I called the Ashton Vale to somewhere near Temple Meads MetroBust line a dead duck at least a year before Mark Bradshaw called it a lame duck. I predicted a final cost of £250 million when all others were saying £180 million. I said the whole thing was flawed at least a year before George Ferguson. My initial prediction of November 2019 for complete opening (now looking optimistic) was made almost 5 years ago, when the official date was early 2016 AD (Atkins Dominated), and I sagely predicted that a time would come everybody involved would try to blame everybody else. And there was more, much more. Maybe I do have a gift after all!

And the people cried, wailing beseechingly, renting their garments as they tried to cast off the plague of metrobus excuses that hath engulfed them.

I largely buy what I can't steal from clothes lines.

O Thou art mighty Four Track Now tell us please What is the answer to Life the Universe and Everything to do with Metrobus is it really Fourty Two.?

[TonyK]

So it was dead and then it was lame and now it shall walk? Not only a prophet but also Lazarus!

Lazarus later died again, and stayed dead. I see that as setting a precedent.

O Thou art mighty Four Track Now tell us please What is the answer to Life the Universe and Everything to do with Metrobus is it really Fourty Two.?

No. It's forty-two.

[Western Pathfinder]

I just knew you'd get that goes to prove how clever you are ......

[chuffed]

Not to worry folks.....the wheels aren't coming off the M2 route just yet. It's just that they don't fit, and in the words of a metrobus spokes (ha!) person... it has to follow a set process.......... design, construct, test, make adjustments, redesign, process, test etc. If this had been trams running in rails you'd have been pretty sure they fitted !

 4 pages about Metrobus in the latest Buses magazine and a further 4 pages interview with James Freeman to see how far his 4 year vision for Bristol buses has advanced after 3 and a half years. Reckon Bristol buses will be running to the moon before a wheel is turned on the Long Ashton route. Hence my tongue in cheek cynical comments last week.

[TonyK]

Not to worry folks.....the wheels aren't coming off the M2 route just yet. It's just that they don't fit, and in the words of a metrobus spokes (ha!) person... it has to follow a set process.......... design, construct, test, make adjustments, redesign, process, test etc. If this had been trams running in rails you'd have been pretty sure they fitted !

 4 pages about Metrobus in the latest Buses magazine and a further 4 pages interview with James Freeman to see how far his 4 year vision for Bristol buses has advanced after 3 and a half years. Reckon Bristol buses will be running to the moon before a wheel is turned on the Long Ashton route. Hence my tongue in cheek cynical comments last week.

Oh dear, it's all true! At least according to the Bristol Post:

Three years after Metrobus M2 work started it's delayed again because bus wheels do not fit guide rails
The real reason why Bristol's first scheduled Metrobus route is delayed

ByTristan Cork
14:31, 16 APR 2018
One of the three Metrobus routes is facing months of further delays after tests revealed the bus wheels do not fit the ‘guided busway’, BristolLive can reveal.

The schedule for the start of the Ashton Vale to Temple Meads route has gone off the rails, both metaphorically and in reality, after tests revealed the 2.5km-long guided busway section of the route needs ‘adjustments’.

BristolLive has learned the rail section of the route – which will be known as ‘M2’ when it is eventually up and running – needs a considerable amount of work at a large number of sections.

BristolLive understands the measurements for the width of the guided elements of the bus had a certain arc of tolerance, but the two element involvements – the guided rail on the track and the guiding wheels on the bus – have come in at the ‘opposite extremes of the tolerances allowed’.

Metrobus has now admitted the wheels don’t fit properly – after months of maintaining there was no major physical reason the M2 route from the Long Ashton park and ride to Temple Meads would not open.

A Metrobus spokesperson confirmed following testing of the height of the guideway, it now needs to be ‘adjusted in a number of places’.

“There is a process, design, build, test, make adjustments as required,” she said.

“Testing has taken place, adjustments at various points along the 2.5km busway need to be made.

“When those adjustments are made a second round of testing with the full range of vehicles - Metrobus vehicles and other buses that might use the guideway in future (including the Airport Flyer and biogas vehicles), road sweepers and gritters, emergency vehicles - takes place,” she added.

The guided busway element of the route is on the newly-built section of the route from Long Ashton park and ride to the point where the M2 route effectively becomes a bus lane along the regular road on Cumberland Road.

That section, made up of more than a mile-and-a-half of bespoke road, is one of the most expensive sections of the entire Metrobus project. After crossing a field and running alongside the industrial estates of Ashton Vale, it is lifted over the main Bristol-South West railway and brought parallel with Winterstoke Road by an S-shaped flyover.

The route then drops down under the complicated Ashton Gate road junction, where the A369 Portishead road meets the A3029 Winterstoke Road and interchanges with the A370 Brunel Way. Finally, the M2 Metrobus route turns right along the back of Paxton Drive, goes under Brunel Way again and crosses the newly-restored Ashton Swing Bridge over the River Avon.

This section is just over a mile-and-a-half and contains the ‘guided busway’ part of Metrobus that makes the project different from a standard bus lane.

After the adjustments, the guided busway will have to be tested again – with all the different vehicles that might use it being driven along it. That will take months, and Metrobus has not put a timescale on when it will happen.

“The M2 route will open once testing has been completed and any necessary adjustment are made to the infrastructure,” a spokesperson confirmed.

The M2 route was supposed to be the first to open, and had been due to open in the autumn of 2017 – two years after initially planned. But then, Metrobus announced it was being delayed until Easter 2018 and then ‘spring’, but last month admitted it was not going to open then.

BristolLive understands at this point, with the information about the faulty busway guided rails known to Metrobus and First Bus – which is going to run the services on the route – First asked Metrobus to put its resources into getting the M3 route, from Emerson’s Green to the city centre open as soon as possible.

All the ticket machines and other infrastructure has now been put into that route, and it is due to open at the end of May.

But the latest delays to the Ashton Vale – Temple Meads route have been criticised by local politicians. Last month, Cllr Stephen Clarke (Green, Southville), who is the chair of the scrutiny committee at the West of England Combined Authority that is overseeing the Metrobus project, accused those in charge of the project of misleading him and the people of south Bristol about the M2 route.

Now, Tony Dyer, former mayoral candidate and the South Bristol’s Green parliamentary candidate at the last election, said Metrobus needed to ‘be honest and realistic’.

“Many of us have expressed our concerns over the years as original proposals for a rapid transit system became, mainly on cost grounds, a guided bus system and then, increasingly, merely a series of over-engineered bus lanes with a bare minimum of guided sections,” he said.

“The fact that the ‘northern route’, which has no guided sections, has now been given priority lends credence to the claims of serious problems with the guided sections of the Ashton Vale route.

“Those responsible for delivering Metrobus need to be honest and realistic with the Bristol public and our elected councillors and MPs^▸ (Member of Parliament) about the problems affecting the delivery of Metrobus including a realistic timeframe for full and regular operations to begin.

“Until then, we should take a cautious approach to any further expansion of the Metrobus network until confidence has been restored in the ability of such schemes to be delivered on time and on budget and as specified,” he added.

South Bristol MP Karin Smyth, who last week criticised Metrobus for dropping the Long Ashton – Hengrove route after its absence from the route maps was revealed by BristolLive, said there was ‘a culture of secrecy’ with the project.

“The secrecy and lack of thinking about how this is going to look needs to be dealt with,” said Ms Smyth. “The defensiveness creeps in and people aren’t thinking sensibly about how to be open and honest about what’s going on.”

So those adjustments - a couple of turns of a screwdriver?

[stuving]

Oops.*

* Other more appropriate expletives are available.

[Timmer]

You couldn’t make it up.

Is this what a major city like Bristol deserves?

Well former Bristol MP^▸ (Member of Parliament) Dawn Primarolo stopped the trams returning to Bristol and this poor excuse for a substitute really is a joke.

[martyjon]

All the ticket machines and other infrastructure has now been put into that route, and it is due to open at the end of May.

No it isn't, unless contractors worked feverishly yesterday, Sunday, to put the other infrastructure in place.

AND WHO'S GONNA PAY FOR THE ADJUSTMENTS which is gonna be a bit more than a tweek or two of a screwdriver. From what I've been told it'll be a few days demolition work by a JCB fitted with a hydraulic jack hammer and rework.

See my earlier post on this thread regarding buses side swiping themselves when passing, breakdown recovery trucks unable to use the guided bit and the guided bit being out of bounds to snowploughs.

The latest problem has also raised concerns of the safety of the route as it appears that the curvature in places means that with the length of the vehicles wheelbase the rear wheels are tempted to ride up and out of the wheel channels when negotiating the curves so we may yet see a PW^▸ (Permanent Way) speed restriction on this express metrobus route.