North East Buses

think Northumberland CC did an overhaul of H2S at the start of this term.

I've just been reading through the DCC cabinet paper for this, and was quite shocked that they have over 1,000 individual contracts for H2S transport. So a review, preferably by someone with experience of designing services, would probably be beneficial. I wonder how many schools in a similar area, for example, all have individual buses? Most operating no where near capacity, when instead you could have one bus serving say three schools.

I think one thing they'll be looking at very closely again, is the statutory walking limits from the Education Act 1995. This will either be to remove some H2S transport or to factor in a more significant walk to/from a bus stop, to allow the number of services to be reduced. They say as much in one of the consultation points that they've outlined, looking at H2S being more a connection to other public transport, rather than the current door to door service.

A lot of those contracts are taxis that already do a convoluted route, often with kids who need to travel a fair distance for a suitable education and are already pushed to their limits in terms of being in a full taxi for longer than they're comfortable with.

The special school around the corner from us had no available places in its specialist provision at both the time of Youngest starting secondary school and 6th form, so he travels at least 25 minutes each way (not that we're sore about it as the provision there is simply better for him all round, both in terms of personnel and physical environment). He is severely autistic rather than quirky autistic and sharing a taxi went disastrously wrong for him and his reaction was distressing for the other passengers so he travels solo.

I'm sure a lot of other individual contracts involve high needs or children in unique circumstances such as needing to travel between establishments, a shortened school day, needing to carry a huge amount of medical equipment and so on.

(10 Feb 2023, 1:21 pm)BusLoverMum wrote [ -> ]A lot of those contracts are taxis that already do a convoluted route, often with kids who need to travel a fair distance for a suitable education and are already pushed to their limits in terms of being in a full taxi for longer than they're comfortable with.

The special school around the corner from us had no available places in its specialist provision at both the time of Youngest starting secondary school and 6th form, so he travels at least 25 minutes each way (not that we're sore about it as the provision there is simply better for him all round, both in terms of personnel and physical environment). He is severely autistic rather than quirky autistic and sharing a taxi went disastrously wrong for him and his reaction was distressing for the other passengers so he travels solo.

I'm sure a lot of other individual contracts involve high needs or children in unique circumstances such as needing to travel between establishments, a shortened school day, needing to carry a huge amount of medical equipment and so on.

It's actually a bit worrying how the Council report is laid out when referring to special educational needs. They're committing to reviewing individual needs, but for me it reads that they're being reviewed to see that H2S transport is actually required. Page 17: https://democracy.durham.gov.uk/document...tation.pdf

I hope DCC isn't one of the local authorities also looking to harmonise school start and finish times in order to save cash. Otherwise they'll have a right old problem.

(10 Feb 2023, 1:38 pm)Adrian wrote [ -> ]It's actually a bit worrying how the Council report is laid out when referring to special educational needs. They're committing to reviewing individual needs, but for me it reads that they're being reviewed to see that H2S transport is actually required. Page 17: https://democracy.durham.gov.uk/document...tation.pdf

Ah, that interesting word for make it go away, "socialisation"

Seek views on the potential impact on the duration of transport
journeys and the benefits of independence/ socialisation with
peers.

Like most councils it would probably help if they had people in transport who had time to sit down and look at their network and how to save cash. Unfortunately they end up just tendering the same network time after time whether it makes sense or not.
There will be loads of cases where routes could be merged to save cost or they’ve added extra buses in here and there rather than just extend routes to cover extra areas. Likely there’s a load of routes using larger vehicles than required (more cost!)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

When I had my Nexus school bus pass, it allowed me to use any bus between home and school, so I could either use the dedicated scholars, or the GNE bus that went the same way, but that doesn't seem to be the case in Durham? And maybe not even in Nexusland now?

Maybe it's just my brother's school, but he is only allowed to use the one bus that goes into the estate, he can't get any of the other 4 buses that go nearby, or the Arriva bus.

They also have a late scholars bus for the after school clubs, but you're only allowed on it if you're pre-booked onto it. So if he misses the first bus he's screwed. He either has to pay for the Arriva bus back, or call for a lift.

In fact, after school I would often just go to the Metrocentre on my school bus pass and never once had an issue, sometimes I'd even be able to make it home!

(12 Feb 2023, 3:06 pm)streetdeckfan wrote [ -> ]When I had my Nexus school bus pass, it allowed me to use any bus between home and school, so I could either use the dedicated scholars, or the GNE bus that went the same way, but that doesn't seem to be the case in Durham? And maybe not even in Nexusland now?

Maybe it's just my brother's school, but he is only allowed to use the one bus that goes into the estate, he can't get any of the other 4 buses that go nearby, or the Arriva bus.

They also have a late scholars bus for the after school clubs, but you're only allowed on it if you're pre-booked onto it. So if he misses the first bus he's screwed. He either has to pay for the Arriva bus back, or call for a lift.

In fact, after school I would often just go to the Metrocentre on my school bus pass and never once had an issue, sometimes I'd even be able to make it home!

It was more or less the same when I attended school in the early-mid 90s. Although it didn't apply to me as I lived within walking distance of the school, pupils were issued with a red bus pass which permitted travel between two points (School and, for example, Whickham, Rowlands Gill, Ryton, Dunston, Chopwell etc.) within specific time-windows before and after school.

Like you, I knew of pupils who opted not to use the school bus for whatever reason, and travelled to Metrocentre before transferring onto another service. As far as I'm aware, nobody was ever refused travel for doing this.

(12 Feb 2023, 6:02 pm)MurdnunoC wrote [ -> ]It was more or less the same when I attended school in the early-mid 90s. Although it didn't apply to me as I lived within walking distance of the school, pupils were issued with a red bus pass which permitted travel between two points (School and, for example, Whickham, Rowlands Gill, Ryton, Dunston, Chopwell etc.) within specific time-windows before and after school.

Like you, I knew of pupils who opted not to use the school bus for whatever reason, and travelled to Metrocentre before transferring onto another service. As far as I'm aware, nobody was ever refused travel for doing this.

That was the same with our passes and I started secondary in 2008, it had the school and the village on, along with the time window.
I think it was something like between 8am and 6pm?

I refused to use the scholars because of the absolute scum that happened to live in my village, so would always take the GNE bus, even if it did mean hiking up a hill to get to it (10 points if you can guess both locations lol)

We would often just go to the Metrocentre on the bus pass then try and get back home with it as well, often the drivers would just let us on but there were a few drivers that would refuse because we could have used the direct bus, or because it was too late.

(12 Feb 2023, 6:02 pm)MurdnunoC wrote [ -> ]It was more or less the same when I attended school in the early-mid 90s. Although it didn't apply to me as I lived within walking distance of the school, pupils were issued with a red bus pass which permitted travel between two points (School and, for example, Whickham, Rowlands Gill, Ryton, Dunston, Chopwell etc.) within specific time-windows before and after school.

Like you, I knew of pupils who opted not to use the school bus for whatever reason, and travelled to Metrocentre before transferring onto another service. As far as I'm aware, nobody was ever refused travel for doing this.

Same school era, but we were issued with the TWPTE Cat pass that meant we paid the child fare of 15p (went up to 20p) and we could use any bus we wanted.
There were scholars (some commercially operated), but it was just as easy using a normal public service.

Had no idea those passes you mention were even a thing within T&W back then.

(12 Feb 2023, 8:58 pm)Andreos1 wrote [ -> ]Same school era, but we were issued with the TWPTE Cat pass that meant we paid the child fare of 15p (went up to 20p) and we could use any bus we wanted.
There were scholars (some commercially operated), but it was just as easy using a normal public service.

Had no idea those passes you mention were even a thing within T&W back then.

I had the green pass too, but the red one was issued if you lived three or more miles away from the school I believe. Obviously, living in Winlaton and going to St Thomas More, I didn't qualify otherwise I would have been using it to go to Metrocentre or into town in the evening.

I must be getting old lol

I went to school in the 80s, South Tyneside and my bus fares were 5p in the Juniors (yes in those days aged 8 to 11, I travelled on my own to and from school on public bus) and in comp the fare was 10p. I remember a friend at school lived just over the 3 mile boundary and was entitled to free travel to and from school on public buses, something like 0800 -0900 and 1530- 1630. So free travel was in those days also, but a 3 mile ruling was also in place (you had to live over the 3 miles(

(12 Feb 2023, 9:14 pm)MurdnunoC wrote [ -> ]I had the green pass too, but the red one was issued if you lived three or more miles away from the school I believe. Obviously, living in Winlaton and going to St Thomas More, I didn't qualify otherwise I would have been using it to go to Metrocentre or into town in the evening.

Just checked and I was under the 3mile limit, but can't remember any mates having another coloured pass.

---

(12 Feb 2023, 9:43 pm)ifm001 wrote [ -> ]I must be getting old lol

I went to school in the 80s, South Tyneside and my bus fares were 5p in the Juniors (yes in those days aged 8 to 11, I travelled on my own to and from school on public bus) and in comp the fare was 10p. I remember a friend at school lived just over the 3 mile boundary and was entitled to free travel to and from school on public buses, something like 0800 -0900 and 1530- 1630.  So free travel was in those days also, but a 3 mile ruling was also in place (you had to live over the 3 miles(

I lived less than a hundred yards from primary school, but can remember those 5p and 10p fares from weekends or holidays. 
5p single/10p transfer.
Then it went up to 10p single/15p transfer.

Absolute bargain. 

Mind the £1 ticket Nexus offer is still extremely good value.

(12 Feb 2023, 8:58 pm)Andreos1 wrote [ -> ]Same school era, but we were issued with the TWPTE Cat pass that meant we paid the child fare of 15p (went up to 20p) and we could use any bus we wanted.
There were scholars (some commercially operated), but it was just as easy using a normal public service.

Had no idea those passes you mention were even a thing within T&W back then.

Probably a later era for me, but when I was at school, everyone had the orange U16 passes. They allowed for reduced fares and the CAT day tickets. Think it was still only around 25p single/30p transfare at that point.

As for scholars services, loads of people I went to school with didn't bother with the scholars services. They knew for Penshaw/Shiney Row for example, it was quicker to get out of the gates promptly and onto the 194/294, than hang around for the 461 or whatever it was to be ready to depart.

(12 Feb 2023, 6:02 pm)MurdnunoC wrote [ -> ]It was more or less the same when I attended school in the early-mid 90s. Although it didn't apply to me as I lived within walking distance of the school, pupils were issued with a red bus pass which permitted travel between two points (School and, for example, Whickham, Rowlands Gill, Ryton, Dunston, Chopwell etc.) within specific time-windows before and after school.

Like you, I knew of pupils who opted not to use the school bus for whatever reason, and travelled to Metrocentre before transferring onto another service. As far as I'm aware, nobody was ever refused travel for doing this.

My eldest sometimes does this.  Quite a few do from what I can gather.   Thorpe to Blaydon, a mooch around and then up to Winlaton.  His record is 3 buses home.

Don't think he's ever been challenged by a driver either.