(06 Sep 2019, 4:50 pm)Andreos1 wrote

Martijn Gilbert was on Radio Newcastle about an hour back and he was chatting about his thoughts.

He reckons 30% of the fleet (under the current purchasing strategy) wouldnt meet the emissions targets set at time of launch.

There is also a query as to whether the B5 hybrids would meet the targets or not, similar questions applied to SNE's gas buses.

I thought he presented himself well, but inevitably, questions were put to him about fares.

The presenter countered that she travels from Wallsend to the BBC studios in her car and it is cheaper than the bus.

I think that's the crux.

You can have all the emissions zones, bus lanes and buses in the world, but if sharing a taxi or using the car is cheaper...

But the thing is if she is using the bus to commute to work every day, there is no way she would be buying a return ticket every day. It would be more cost effective to buy a weekly ticket as Martijn said. Then again, assuming a clean run, it'd probably cost her about £1.20 in petrol/diesel for her return journey, there is no way a bus could compete with that... or could it?

What people fail to take into account is by the time you add in all the extra expenses of running a car like buying/leasing the car, maintenance, insurance, the car does actually become quite expensive.

If for example we lease a base Vauxhall Corsa with maintenance included, that's probably going to cost around £160 a month, plus insurance that's taking it to about £200 a month just to have the car.

Then the price of the fuel for her journey on top of that would take it to about £225 a month.

If we then look at the price of a 2 Zone Network One pass, which is what she would need, that is only £86.50 for a 4 week ticket.

Less than half the cost per month for her journey, and that's assuming she only uses her car for commuting.

With a car, the more you travel, the more fuel you use, so the more it costs. With a bus pass, you can use it as much as you like and it costs the same