(10 Oct 2022, 2:35 pm)Adrian wrote My comment on achievable service was around traffic levels, not 'force majeure' events (such as rail strikes), as the legal boffins like to call them. As I say, in my opinion it's a lazy excuse, similar to last week's "traffic congestion/protest march/football traffic at All areas" tweet.
Although I take your point on staffing issues, at this stage, I'm not entirely sure what the difference to customers is of a less-frequent timetable that doesn't deliver vs a more-frequent timetable that doesn't deliver? The results seem to be the same, i.e. customers are stood around for ages, waiting for a bus that is unlikely to turn up or sails past full. Of course, less buses on the road and less drivers required is also a cost saving to an operator.
Not suggesting there'd be new schedules for rail strike days, but let's look at football specifically. We know Saturdays are busy and we know when there's matches on by the fixtures list published in July/August. Yet there's nothing put in place to deal with the bottlenecking on busy corridors on a normal Saturday with Football. It was always extremely busy with Saturday football, even 20 years ago, where we had a lot more options in terms of buses. We've got just as many people with a lot less options now, so when an X1 or couple of 21s inevitably go missing, it creates a problem for the rest of the day.
I'd be surprised if anyone doesn't want to do right by the customer, and I disagree with the comment on here that often suggest otherwise, but at some point we need to stop trying to force square pegs into round holes. There's events throughout the calendar year, football being a prime example, where we need a better solution.
Wait till Christmas sneaks up on them!