On 4 Jul 2006 10:00:17 -0700, "Mizter T" wrote:

The perpetual circus of rebranding is IMO pretty ridiculous, an opinion
I'm sure is widely shared. And every time I hear or see 'First' in
front of a train companies name I'm reminded that First Group PLC is
somehow managing to funnel loadsa wonga to their shareholders at the
same time that plenty of public cash get's pumped in to the transport
system.

I just think "Worst".

--
James Farrar
. @gmail.com

On Tue, 4 Jul 2006 16:10:22 +0100, "Peter Masson"
wrote:

The tiling on the Bakerloo Line platform at Marylebone still proclaims the
name of the station to be 'Great Central'. The name of the Bakerloo station
was changed to Marylebone on 15 April 1917.

Yeah, LUL seems to be convinced that original names should stay in the
tiling.

I must say, I like it.

--
James Farrar
. @gmail.com

Roland Perry wrote:

iirc, the Cambridge P&R runs on the basis that the car parking is
provided by the council (and not charged for), and the bus company keeps
all the fares. York's scheme felt much the same. Nottingham is slanted
more towards paying per car, to park, and getting a free bus ride
(although you pay the "parking" fee to the bus driver).

and the latter, IMHO, is much more sensible since the cost doesn't rise
based on the number of passengers in your car. (In Canterbury, for
example, parking costs L2, paid at the site, and you and your
passengers ride for free - making it better value if you are a large
group. In Cambridge, Maidstone and many others, you park for free and
each of you pays around L1.50, making it quite an expensive medium stay
cost for a group of 4.)

Oxford, meanwhile, seems to combine both systems, making you pay a
token fee (50p last time I was there) for parking *and* a bus fare. But
I think it's otherwise the best example on the country - the buses
don't stop at the end of shopping hours!

In message .com, at
00:24:44 on Thu, 6 Jul 2006, Rupert Candy
remarked:

Roland Perry wrote:

iirc, the Cambridge P&R runs on the basis that the car parking is
provided by the council (and not charged for), and the bus company keeps
all the fares. York's scheme felt much the same. Nottingham is slanted
more towards paying per car, to park, and getting a free bus ride
(although you pay the "parking" fee to the bus driver).

and the latter, IMHO, is much more sensible since the cost doesn't rise
based on the number of passengers in your car.

From the driver's point of view, yes. But if the "deal" is that the
Council does the subsidising by building and maintaining the car park
(without cost to the bus company), and the bus company keeps the fares;
an input cost to the bus company is the number of passengers, not the
number of cars. Interestingly, the Nottingham buses are run by the City
Transport company.

(In Canterbury, for example, parking costs L2, paid at the site, and
you and your passengers ride for free - making it better value if you
are a large group. In Cambridge, Maidstone and many others, you park
for free and each of you pays around L1.50,

£2 now in Cambridge.

making it quite an expensive medium stay cost for a group of 4.)

York was also £2 a person (return). In both of these kids are free.

Oxford, meanwhile, seems to combine both systems, making you pay a
token fee (50p last time I was there) for parking *and* a bus fare. But
I think it's otherwise the best example on the country - the buses
don't stop at the end of shopping hours!

The closing time has always been a bone of contention at Cambridge. They
did try opening later, but it's back to 8pm now. York claimed to run
till midnight. Nottingham only manages 7pm
--
Roland Perry

On Thu, 6 Jul 2006, Rupert Candy wrote:

and the latter, IMHO, is much more sensible since the cost doesn't rise
based on the number of passengers in your car. (In Canterbury, for
example, parking costs L2, paid at the site, and you and your
passengers ride for free - making it better value if you are a large
group. In Cambridge, Maidstone and many others, you park for free and

It also makes boarding the bus quicker, as people don't need to get a
ticket (since they got one when the parked the car). Considering cars
enter the car park one or two at a time, you are spreading out the ticket
buying over the waiting time, rather than everyone getting one at the same
time (when they board the bus).

Cheers

Chris
--
Chris Johns

tim (back at home) wrote:
"Neil Williams" wrote in message
oups.com...
Paul Ebbens wrote:

Have a chameleon bus that change colours ;-)
Or just have electronic blinds on front, side and rear, with each
showing full destination details. If the stop layout is confusing,
change that.

IMO, because of the operational limits it causes, route branding
doesn't really work.

I was in Reading at the weekend (for the first time in at least
a decade).

The Buses there were all different colours indicating the
route(s). I spent ages trying to find (and read) the
operators name and address and eventually discovered
that they are all operating by Reading Buses.

So it can be done. (As for that matter is the possibility
of a municipal operator not being taken over and rebranded
by one of the majors, how did they manage it?)

tim



A bit like TrentBarton - they tend to Brand both the routes and buses
with colours and the name (numbers are rare) of the route.

eg the Xprss is Green, the Rainbow 5s are Purple, The Black Cat is white
and red, etc

Only thing is where they do keep numbering it tends to be in the 6.1,
6.2 (yes those are decimals)

Oh and they are still semi independent, being part of a group of other
local operators

Rupert Candy wrote in message
:

Roland Perry wrote:

iirc, the Cambridge P&R runs on the basis that the car parking is
provided by the council (and not charged for), and the bus company
keeps all the fares. York's scheme felt much the same. Nottingham is
slanted more towards paying per car, to park, and getting a free bus
ride (although you pay the "parking" fee to the bus driver).

and the latter, IMHO, is much more sensible since the cost doesn't
rise based on the number of passengers in your car. (In Canterbury,
for example, parking costs L2, paid at the site, and you and your
passengers ride for free - making it better value if you are a large
group. In Cambridge, Maidstone and many others, you park for free and
each of you pays around L1.50, making it quite an expensive medium
stay cost for a group of 4.)

Oxford, meanwhile, seems to combine both systems, making you pay a
token fee (50p last time I was there) for parking *and* a bus fare.
But I think it's otherwise the best example on the country - the buses
don't stop at the end of shopping hours!

There's also Reading's P&R which used to (maybe still does) stop running
buses on a Saturday as early as 4PM in order to discourage people parking
any later and occupying spaces that belong to the cinema at Winnersh
Triangle which only permits P&R use outside the cinema's evening rush. A P&R
that stops at 4PM is about as much use as a chocolate teapot :-(

Oxford's scheme is interesting because they have recently stopped charging
for parking, but only at certain car parks. Sadly the closest one to me (and
which avoids the queues around Botley Road or the dreaded Green Road
Roundabout) is one of those where you still need to pay.

York's is good: the journey time is fairly quick, the buses seem to run more
frequently than Oxford's, and the total fare is cheaper (ie one return fare
in York versus one return fare plus one car parking in Oxford). Oxford's
buses wait for *ages* at the car park instead of departing as soon as they
have filled up with the waiting passengers and running a more intensive
service.

In article .com,
(Neil Williams) wrote:

Paul Ebbens wrote:

Have a chameleon bus that change colours ;-)

Or just have electronic blinds on front, side and rear, with each
showing full destination details. If the stop layout is confusing,
change that.

IMO, because of the operational limits it causes, route branding
doesn't really work.

York park and ride services used to have blinds which gave their route
colours. That was when they were all single deck, including some bendies.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

In article , (Roland
Perry) wrote:

iirc, the Cambridge P&R runs on the basis that the car parking is
provided by the council (and not charged for), and the bus company
keeps all the fares.

You don't recall correctly, Roland.

The current £2 return fare on Cambridge Park and Ride buses includes 20p
paid to the Council towards the costs of the car parks.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

Peter Masson wrote:

Although City Thameslink was originally called St Pauls Thameslink
(renamed in '91).

Although there were still some signs and maps up calling it "St Paul's
Thameslink" as late as 1994/5. It could be quite confusing for passengers
at times.

The tiling on the Bakerloo Line platform at Marylebone still proclaims the
name of the station to be 'Great Central'. The name of the Bakerloo
station
was changed to Marylebone on 15 April 1917.

True but a) this is at the station itself, by which time most have worked
out where they're heading; and b) there's plenty of other signs and
announcements that over come this.

By contrast having "St Paul's Thameslink" listed on a map that doesn't
contain any reference to "City Thameslink" (and where the Thameslink name is
also used for another station as well as a line route) can be utterly
confusing. Why wasn't the name problem spotted when it was first proposed?
For that matter why didn't they just retain the Holborn Viaduct name - it
can't have been because they thought passengers might confuse the station
with a Central Line tube could it?!