lots of stuff cut


I still question whether the leisure of the majority should override
the crucial needs of the minority. Seems a bit like populism. TfL
has a very different attitude to disabled access etc, where it has to
take a clear stand on providing for minorities. They wouldn't dare do
a consultation asking whether most people would favour more frequent
buses if that meant that most weren't accessible etc.

Not to stretch this out too far, but this is still not a fair critque
consultation. The short leaflet said "We are proposing to start trains
one hour later and finish them one hour later: first trains would
arrive at Central London stations at around 7am on Saturdays and
8:30am on Sundays; last trains would depart from the West End on
Friday and Saturday nights at around 1:30am." - again, this is far
from ambiguous, and is on the page before the questions start. Just in
case one couldn't be bothered to read that, question 3A then said "Do
you ever travel before 7:00 am on Saturday or 8:30 am on Sunday?", re-
enforcing the fact, along with the previously quoted question 4A, that
this wasn't an extension of hours, merely a re-allocation.

And before you get into what looks like an anti-PC diatribe it's worth
realising that the reason the original proposal (runs an hour later on
Friday and Sat nights, starts an hour later Sat and Sun morning) was
rejected, despite a majority being in favour, was *because it would
disadvantage a minority*. The proposal was then changed so that Sunday
hours would be unaltered, and the tube would run half an hour later on
Friday and Saturday nights, while starting an hour later on Sat
morning. Two thirds of those disadvantaged by the original scheme
would now not be disadvantaged by the revised scheme - TfL attempted
to minimise the impact on an even smaller minority while providing a
service requested by the majority.

I take issue with your accessibility point - partly because low-floor
buses benefit everyone who board buses, partly because in the long-run
we would be forced by law to change to low floor vehicles anyway but
mostly because there's a large difference between not being able to
use public transport at all (before low-floor buses a person using a
wheelchair would have little chance with the tube and no chance with
buses) and havign to switch from tube to buses (which will be the case
for those disadvantage by the hour-later start on Saturday mornings.
To further complicate things, I'm almost certain London Buses have, in
the past, conducted willingness-to-pay surveys with low-floor buses
one of the features that people were asked to pair off with others to
determine the customer benefit of bus alterations.

Tom


Possibly a bit of a misunderstanding here. I wasn't being anti PC. I
think all buses and stations should be accessible and that there
should be no tradeoff.

I accept that I've misremembered parts of the consultation (although I
still question whether the proposal should ever have been made), but
there's something bugging me about TfL's inconsistent attitude to
majorities and minorities.

It seems that when they are required to, as with disabled access, they
correctly ensure that the minority is provided for. There are strict
rules about ensuring that buses must have their ramps in working
order. I am not sure what the latest decision is, but there was a
time when it was said that bus must be taken out of service rather
than run without a working ramp. On one hand this would disadvantage
a majority, who wouldn't get any bus at all, but without such a rule,
operators would probably not bother to fix them in a hurry.

But on other issues their attitude is totally different. I've
witnessed open meetings with TfL where it's been pointed out that the
introduction of cashless buses may leave tourists and occasional
visitors to London standing in the rain because they didn't get their
ticket in advance. The response has been that it makes bus travel
easier for 80% of users, so it's just tough luck for the rest. (I've
actually seen someone left in the rain at about 0200 by a night bus
driver because they couldn't make the machine work.)

And look at how Tourists and occasional visitors can lose out with
Oyster.

Either attitude can have arguments in favour of it, but I'm saying
that it's inconsistent in balancing the ease of the majority and the
needs of a minority. I suggest that the late Undeground proposal is
more like the latter of the scenarios above, and it's interesting that
it was the users who, from what you say, seem to have been more
considerate of the public service aspect.