SCOTLAND'S BUSES 2015
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SCOTL AND'S BUSES 2015
WELCOME Welcome to scotl and's buses 2015, a publication devoted to Scotland's dominant mode of public transpor t. Buses make an enormous contr ibution to the nation, offer ing v ital links that enable communities to function and help them to prosper. This publication from passenger transp ort puts the spotlight on those involved in deliver ing Scotland's buses, celebrates their achievements and considers the challenges they face. We hope you find it an interesting read and we welcome all feedback.
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A N D R EW JARV IS
H IGH L IGH TS
Stagecoach East Scotland’s managing director is eyeing opportunities to grow bus use
A selection of key events for Scotland’s buses over the past 12 months
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GEORGE MAIR
LOTH IAN BUSES
CPT’s George Mair says Scotland’s bus industry has demonstrated its ability to adapt to change
Emma Roy explains how Lothian Buses plans to build on its strong environmental record
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M cG I L L'S
STAG ECOACH
Scotland's buses are very good but they can get even better if we work together, says Ralph Roberts
Stagecoach is proving that buses can assist with economic and environmental goals
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FIRSTGRO UP
BUS USERS SCOT L A N D
Meet First Aberdeen's Daniel Laird, First Scotland East's Gary West and First Glasgow's Toni Bradley
Bus Users Scotland (BUS) is working with partners to drive up standards in bus travel
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FO R EWO R D
Bus is still the most widely available public transport mode, enabling people to access work, education and training, health and social care services, shopping and leisure
BUS SERVICES MAT TER derek mackay msp, Minister for Transpor t and Islands in the Scottish Government us services matter. In 2014-15, there were 420 million bus journeys in Scotland, nearly 80% of all journeys by public transport. About a third of these were made by the 1.3 million older and disabled people holding concessionary travel cards. Bus is still the most widely available public transport mode. It generally has the lowest fares per journey. Bus services enable people to access work, education and training, health and social care services, shopping and leisure. They support social cohesion, employment and the economy. They are generally well-liked by their users, with impressive levels of satisfaction.
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They are increasingly accessible CCTV is helping make staff and passengers safer and more secure. More and better real time passenger information is being introduced. The fleet is becoming greener.
Our Green Bus Fund has helped acquire 269 new green buses over the last five years.
Review later this month, I hope nevertheless that we can secure a good outcome for bus. But regardless of the outcome we need to look at how to ensure we are getting the best outcomes for our financial inputs. For example, how should we support greener buses? Should we support infrastructure and newer, Euro 6 vehicles to displace older more polluting models?
But bus also faces challenges Operating costs and fares are rising in real terms. There is patchy coverage in some areas and at some times and there have been overall falls in passenger numbers, service mileage, fleet sizes and staff numbers. The causes of this are various, inflation, congestion, competition, public spending constraints and misperceptions, particularly from people who aren’t regular bus users.
It’s not all about money How can we get better engagement and partnership between operators and local transport authorities? The changes we’re making shortly to the bus service registration process are aimed at providing more opportunities for early engagement. I want to see those used to deliver good outcomes for passengers. In refreshing the National Transport Strategy, we’ll clarify who is responsible for what and what is expected of them. We’re looking at the existing regulatory levers available to local
So what are we doing about it? I’m pleased that despite the pressures we have been managing to maintain central and local government funding for bus, at least in cash terms, over the last few years. Although we expect further real terms reductions in the budget available to the Scottish Government following the UK Government’s Spending
transport authorities to make sure they are fit for purpose where funding, persuasion and market forces alone can’t deliver. One area where I hope partnership is starting to bear fruit is smart and integrated ticketing. We’re working with bus, rail, ferry and other operators to deliver early progress towards our cross operator, cross modal nationwide vision. Together with our continuing support for Traveline and better real time passenger information, this will help make bus more attractive, especially to the nonusers we want to switch.
Derek Mackay MSP
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SCOTL AND'S BUSES 2015
GOING FOR GROWTH P RO F I L E
andrew jarvis, managing director of stagecoach east scotl and, and this year's chair of cpt scotl and, is eyeing oppor tunities to grow bus use t was five years ago that Andrew Jarvis, this year’s chairman of CPT Scotland, moved 560 miles north to Scotland, leaving Stagecoach South to take charge at Aberdeen-based Stagecoach Bluebird. He had expected the winter to be a bit more brisk than the English Riveria, but the winter of 2010 was especially harsh. Jarvis recalls that there were six weeks of snow in Aberdeen and that it snowed for 28 consecutive days. The temperature reached minus 23oC in one of the company’s depots overnight and there were piles of snow as big as double decker buses at Insch depot, located in rural Aberdeenshire. “I’ve never been somewhere where you had to dig your car out of the drive in the morning and then when you get home you had to dig your car back in again,” he says. Jarvis says it was testament to the commitment of Stagecoach’s employees that services kept running throughout this spell of extreme weather. There was obviously an impact on revenue, but Stagecoach recognised that this was a rare occurrence and continued to invest in the business the following year. Jarvis has headed the group’s Kirkcaldy-based Stagecoach East Scotland operation since 2013. The operation has a fleet of 550 vehicles. His career has seen him work in a variety of different companies, large and small, in a number of different locations, but Jarvis seems to be at home with Stagecoach, where he has now
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been for almost a decade. “I love working for Stagecoach,” he says, and he sounds like he really means it. “It’s a fantastic place to work. “They give you the time and they allow you to develop your business.” This free-thinking environment suits Jarvis, who had the initiative to set up a branch of the family bus company in Huddersfield in the 1990s in order to achieve the year of work experience required by his university course (see panel). “They want you to understand the business and they’ll back you if you’ve got some good ideas,” he says. “You don’t get criticised for giving something a go and trying something, so long as you learn the lessons from any failures.” A good example of this is Stagecoach East Scotland’s Coastrider X7 inter-urban between Aberdeen and Dundee. Jarvis and his colleagues had observed that the Aberdeen commuter market was moving further and further outwards as the buoyant
oil industry pushed prices up in the city. So, in March 2011 they began a trial service with some old B10Ms Interurbans from half way along the route into Aberdeen. The response was good and Sir Brian Souter, who was at that time Stagecoach’s chief executive, said it should be extended to Dundee and operated by a more modern fleet. In September 2011, six brand new Plaxton Elite coaches arrived for the start of the extended service. Jarvis says this £250,000 per vehicle investment was a leap of faith: “It was £1.5m for a route for which really there was no real justification other than we all thought it was a good idea and the initial few months had shown it to be very promising,” he says. However, Souter’s mantra is that where you’ve got growth, you should throw more investment at it to maintain the momentum, so last year the route received another fleet upgrade – with bigger 62-seat Elite i semi-double decker coaches arriving. And the route continues to grow, with year-on-year adult passenger
RIGHT: Andrew Jarvis, managing director of Stagecoach East Scotland BELOW: Stagecoach's X7 'Coastrider'
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ANDREW JARVIS
growth of around 15.5%. This successful new service has prospered and proved popular on a route that has strong competition from other providers. “Why would a service that goes along the coast much slower than some of the other transport options do so well? It’s because there is a whole series of separate markets along the coast that wasn’t anything about the end-to-end traffic.” He says the service has also been helped by the fact that in Scotland there isn’t really a stigma attached to commuting by coach. “Perhaps it goes back to the pragmatic nature of the country,” he muses. “If that’s the best value and best way of doing it, then we’ll do it.” Although Souter is now chairman rather than chief executive, he has contributed hugely to the development of Stagecoach’s bus, coach and rail networks in the UK and beyond but East Scotland is his patch. Born and bred in Perth, Souter knows the area extremely well and Stagecoach is of course headquartered there. What’s it like running a Stagecoach subsidiary under the nose of the group’s co-founder? “You just have to know what you’re doing,” he laughs. “We know we have to turn out a good show – cheerful staff with decent routes, good value fares and a clean, reliable fleet that doesn’t break down - the stuff that you should do everywhere, not just because the group chairman happens to live there.” It’s the customers that Jarvis is keen to impress, and last year’s Bus Passenger Survey from Transport Focus suggests that he and his team are achieving that. The business was split in two for the surveys with the Strathtay and Perth operations’ passengers 95% ‘satisfied’ with their overall journey, with almost two thirds (60%) saying they were ‘very satisified’. Only Anglian Bus received such a high score. 91% of Stagecoach’s customers in South East Scotland were ‘satisfied’ with their overall journey, with more ➢ than half (52%) saying they 7
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were ‘very satisified’. A strong performance is also important in difficult economic times, and Jarvis says that it’s still a mixed picture in Scotland. The big urban areas, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Dundee, continue to be big draws, but it’s much harder in smaller regional towns like Stirling, Glenrothes, Kirkcaldy and even Perth. And finally, Jarvis says that it’s important to impress the politicians. “If MSPs’ and councillors’ postbags are stuffed full every day week after week with bus issues, they’ll want to do something on bus issues,” he explains. Re-regulation of buses doesn’t
appear to be on the agenda in Scotland, and Jarvis and his Stagecoach colleagues are keen that it stays that way. He praises the working relationship that the bus industry has with the Scottish Government and its executive agency, Transport Scotland. “At the moment we’ve got a pragmatic arrangement with Transport Scotland. Every business wants stability, stability of funding, stability in the wider sense,” he says. “We’ve got a concessionary scheme we understand, we’ve got a BSOG scheme we understand, if there are no shocks coming down the line then there doesn’t need to be shocks coming out of the bus industry.”
Andrew Jarvis with Sir Brian Souter and Charlie Mullen, Jarvis's predecessor as MD
BU SE S I N T H E B L O OD Andrew Jarvis has buses in the blood. His first official paid job began in 1990, the day after his 16th birthday, when he started work as a Saturdays and summer holidays booking clerk at tour operator Smiths Shearings in Wigan. His father, Roger, worked as a manager at the company. Later on his father was made redundant and he set up his own bus company, Blue Bus, based in Horwich. Jarvis worked two nights a week for the new venture, cleaning and shunting buses. He then went to university in Huddersfield to study transport and distribution management “I knew where I was going and what I wanted to do” – and he attained his PCV license, enabling him to drive for Blue Bus during the holidays and Pride of the Road, a local independent operator during term-time. His university course required him to do a year of work experience but there were few opportunities available in the recession of the early 1990s, which was also a time of great disruption in the newly-privatised bus industry - so he set up a branch of Blue Bus in the town! He’d seen the loads on buses running around Huddersfield
Andrew Jarvis began his bus industry career 25 years ago at a tour operator in Wigan
and he believed there was potential, so Yorkshire Blue Bus was established. It started out with six vehicles but by the time he returned to university there were around 25 vehicles. With all this experience behind him it is not surprising that three bus groups offered him a place on their graduate scheme in 1996. He opted for the Go-Ahead Group, and he spent the next 18 months at the group’s Brighton & Hove subsidiary under the tutelage of Roger French, its highly-regarded managing director. Within a year he became the garage staff manager at the company’s Whitehawk depot but in 1998 he moved to the group’s Go North East subsidiary to work as a business development manager. He enjoyed it, but he missed
operations so a year later he left the group to join Wilts & Dorset. His new job title was district manager south. “It sounds terribly old fashioned, but in some ways it was a traditional and old fashioned sort of a company!” he says. He says he enjoyed his time there and he learnt a lot from Andrew Bryce, its operations director, but the ownership model was different. At that time the company was still privately-owned (although it was later acquired by his former employers, Go-Ahead). “I could see there was a lot more potential having come from Go-Ahead but they were the owners and rightly you were doing what they wanted you to do,” he says. Three years later he was on the
move again. In 2001, Stagecoach had sold its operations in Bolton, Burnley and Blackburn to Blazefield and his father had immediately started competing with the new owners in Bolton. Jarvis returned to the north west and he helped to grow the Blue Bus fleet from 60 to 100 vehicles. In 2005, his father sold Blue Bus to Arriva, and Jarvis and his younger brother, Ben, transferred over to the new owners (Ben has just moved to Stagecoach Manchester as commercial director). Jarvis admits it was a bit of a culture shock moving from Blue Bus to a large Plc group - the Arriva North West & Wales business itself employed 3,500 employees across 19 depots - he says it was a good regrounding into a Plc after six years away. In 2006, however, he joined Stagecoach as operations director Stagecoach South. Working as part of managing director Andrew Dyer’s closeknit team, he says it was exciting to be part of a business that was taking advantage of strong opportunities for growth. In 2010, he headed to Scotland, initially running the group’s Aberdeen-based Stagecoach Bluebird before taking charge at Kirkcaldy-based Stagecoach East Scotland in 2013.
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SCOTL AND'S BUSES 2015
CHANGE, CHALLENGE, OPPORTUNIT Y cpt’s george mair says Scotland’s bus industr y has demonstrated its ability to adapt to change, take on challenges and exploit oppor tunities hange, Challenge, Opportunity’ is the theme of this year’s CPT Conference. On November 2-3, at Cameron House on the ‘Bonnie Banks’ of Loch Lomond, Scotland’s bus industry and its friends will come together for the 40th time. It’s a forum that has always attracted big names – helped by the fact that two of the UK’s big passenger transport groups – FirstGroup and Stagecoach have their group headquarters in Scotland. Martin Griffiths, chief executive of Perth-based Stagecoach, is among the speakers at this year’s event. The conference tackles the issues that are important to Scotland (transport minister Derek Mackay is also among the speakers) but also offers an opportunity to consider the impact of much broader global changes. This year’s conference will include a panel discussion titled ‘technology in transport – a look to the future’. This will consider the growing influence of disruptive technologies like Uber. There will also be a presentation from Dirk Ahlborn, chief executive of Hyperloop - a radical high speed travel concept. The Hyperloop team believe that a combination of fans and magnets could shoot capsules through a tube at near supersonic speeds. They say it could cover a distance like Edinburgh-London in around 30 minutes! Whether or not Hyperloop turns out to be the future of travel or a pipe dream, it is certainly
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evidence of new ideas that could, like Uber, bring about change, challenge and opportunity. The evolution of government policy also presents a change, a challenge and an opportunity to the bus industry. In Scotland there is no looming prospect of re-regulation. Derek Mackay, who was appointed minister for transport and islands last November, says re-regulation is not on the horizon so long as the bus industry continues to be an active participant in enabling the government to achieve its transport vision. It’s a different scenario to the one south of the border. In England, the push towards devolution at a regional level was given legs by last year’s independence referendum in Scotland, has seen “bus franchising” included in deals with Greater Manchester and Cornwall – and offered to others. George Mair, director of CPT UK (Scotland), says it’s “hugely worrying”, but to his relief Mackay and his SNP colleagues show no sign of going down this route. “He’s aware that there are occasional local issues where a bus might disappear, but in general terms the industry is delivering a good service,” says Mair. The minister has intimated that the commercial freedom to run services in Scotland is the industry’s to lose. But that’s not to say that the regulatory framework in which the industry operates has not changed. In September, Transport Scotland confirmed plans to make changes to the bus service registration process to require
operators to consult with councils prior to submitting service changes to the traffic commissioner. At present Scottish bus operators are required to inform the relevant local transport authority 14 days before submitting a service registration or alteration. This will increase to 28 days with operators required to consult rather than inform local authorities of their plans. The new arrangement is intended to give councils time to respond to network changes, and find possible solutions. “That was a hard bit of
ABOVE : A Mercedes-Benz Citaro, introduced into service by McGill's. TOP: George Mair, director CPT UK Scotland at last year's CPT Conference
negotiation for the industry because there’s a general fear that you giving up a major bit of control,” says Mair. “But we’ve made it quite clear we’re prepared to do these things as long as we retain the overall registration period - 70 days.” “It allows dialogue to happen over a longer period than the 14 days presently but at the end of the 28 days, the operator still owns his business and has to be his decision.” Mair says this is further evidence that the Scottish bus industry is robust enough to adapt to change
and overcome the challenges it faces. “We are a good industry at working our way through and coming out the other side,” he says. “You can’t stop change. You can’t stop challenges coming along. And I think the thing to do is grasp the opportunities that come along and hopefully grow your business.” The industry has faced an especially difficult time in the last few years, since the collapse of Lehmann Brothers in 2008 and the onset of a sustained period of global economic stagnation. In 2007/08, Scotland’s buses carried 488 million passengers but by 2014/15 it had fallen to 420 million. The missing 68 million passengers represent a decline of 14%. Mair says that the current situation in Scotland is mixed, with the economy performing much better in some areas than others. “If you look at the background over the last five years I think it’s probably been the most difficult period that the industry has faced, certainly in my time and I was
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around from when we had the difficult times back in the 1970s and 1980s,” he says. “We’re bouncing along,” he says. “We’re hoping always that we’re starting to see light at the end of the tunnel. We’ve come out of that difficult period.” There are, however, still spending cuts to come – and these could hamper the industry’s recovery. Scotland’s councils face the unenviable task of deciding where the axe will fall. Education? Health? Social care? Mair says the industry’s challenge is to get local authorities to see the wider benefits to health, education, employment and the economy that transport spending can deliver. He hopes that the forthcoming refresh of Scotland’s National Transport Strategy will make this connection and put more pressure on the councils to put transport higher up their agenda. He welcomes the ammunition that has been provided by research
thousands and the employment of thousands more who are indirectly dependent on the manufacture and operation of buses. There have been breakthroughs. Mair describes the bus industry’s deal with the Scottish government over reimbursement for participating in concessionary travel schemes as “a classic piece of partnership working”. Together the partners sat down together and built a model, and when the data is fed into this model an answer is generated. It gets everyone away from the situation where expensive consultants are routinely called in. The result is that bus operators can be comfortable about a funding stream that represents a large chunk of their revenue £190m a year. Mair would like to get that kind of certainty for the £50m a year Bus Service Operators’ Grant. Originally known as Fuel Duty Rebate, this funding stream has enabled bus operators to claim back a portion of the tax on the fuel they consume. However, since 2012 the grant has been allocated on the basis of distance travelled rather than fuel burned – at a rate of 14.4p per passenger kilometre (dead mileage not included), which doubles if vehicles have been purchased with the support of the Green Bus Fund. The industry didn’t support this change. Mair says that the switch to a distance-travelled allocation benefits operators who run services in remote areas that are probably tendered and have poor prospects for growth. In contrast, city centre operators crawling their way through congested streets are penalised, despite their stronger growth potential. The issue that currently concerns him, however, is that the funding pot is not increasing in tandem with the rise in the number of GBF-supported vehicles (around 60% of the Scottish bus fleet is Euro 4 or higher). CPT is currently talking to the Scottish Government about this.
undertaken for campaign group Greener Journeys on the value of buses. When the methodology behind this research was applied to Scotland it found that: Q bus passenger retail spend exceeds £2.5bn in Scotland. Q the bus industry generates £5.4bn gross added value to the Scottish economy. Q 30% of commuter journeys in Scotland are made by bus and 1 in 10 commuters would be forced to look for another job if they could no longer commute by bus. “The industry has probably been a bit lax in coming forward with arguments to support why you should invest in buses in the past,” Mair concedes. “Some of the stuff that Greener Journeys has been coming up with is fantastic.” He also points out that the Scottish bus industry directly employs over 14,000 people, earning an average wage of over £24k, and contributing £87m in tax and national insurance. It also supports the pensions of
“It’s not just the money to help you buy the vehicle, it’s actually the incentive [to run it] as well,” he explains. “It’s important that they work together.” Mair points out that such decisions are not without implications: “When you look at charts on mileage and passenger journeys and you see blips you can quite often line it up to political decisions. If you cut the reimbursement rate on concessions and you cut BSOG the next year, well don’t be surprised if there is a reaction to that - a negative one. “No business has a right to anticipate and expect that the government is going to bail them out. You can’t do that. There has to be an acceptance that you’re in business and you’ve got to get on with it. But sometimes when you do these things there’s a repercussion.” But there’s much to celebrate about Scotland’s buses, says Mair. Things still go wrong, but the industry is now much better at responding. He cites the strong working relationship that operators have with Bus Users Scotland. Meanwhile, quality partnerships in the west of Scotland have radically changed fleets in some locations. “If you look at the Fastlink SQP [Statutory Quality Partnership] I think that’s probably about the highest specification of any SQP in the country in terms of the vehicles that have to be operated and the commitments that operators have signed up to in terms of operational delivery and quality,” he says. And then there’s the latest Bus Passenger Survey from consumer watchdog Transport Focus, which found that 92% of Scotland’s bus users are ‘satisfied’ compared to 88% in England. “There is a lot of good work being done,” Mair concludes. “We don’t shout too loud about it as an industry, but it is nice when you get the customer giving those kind of ratings. That’s the most important thing.”
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SCOTL AND'S BUSES 2015
+53.2%
+60.6%
Scotland
England
+55.8%
92%
88%
Scotland
England Regional breakdown:
Wales
BUS FA RES: CHA NGE SINCE 2005*
* not adjusted for inflation. Source: Department for Transport
205 million 1.8 billion PASSE N G ER M ILES
V E H ICL E MIL ES
Scotland’s buses covered 1.8 billion passenger miles in 2014/15 Source: Department for Transport
Scotland’s buses covered 205 million vehicle miles in 2014/15 Source: Department for Transport
87%
94%
North East
South East
90%
92%
Strathclyde
Tayside and Central
PASSE NGE R SATISFACTI ON
Source: Transport Focus
CONGESTION
81% COM M E RCIA L V E RSUS SU BS IDIS ED
81% of Scotland’s bus network is run commercially with no subsidy beyond BSOG from public funds. That figure rises to 95% in most Scottish cities. Source: CPT Scotland
Journey times in some parts of Scotland have increased by as much as 12.5% in the last five years. Congestion currently results in the use of around 10% more buses in Scotland than should be required to maintain current service levels Source: CPT Scotland
+12.5%
151million CONCESSIONARY TRAV E L
1.3 million Scots have National Concessionary Travel Cards. Concessionary travel journeys in 2013 (the latest year for which data are available): 151 million, accounting for 36 per cent of all bus journeys in that year Source: Transport Scotland
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STAT I ST I CS
£200m
420million trips by Bus (2014/15)
92.7million
The Scottish bus industry has invested over £200m in new vehicles over the last five years. Over 90% of the Scottish bus fleet is now accessible or low floor
60%
trips by Rail (2014)
Around 60% of the Scottish bus fleet is Euro 4 or higher, with the majority of mileage in urban areas operated using modern, greener vehicles
8.2years
COMPARISON WITH RAIL
Passenger journeys: 80% of all public transport trips in Scotland are made on buses. Source: Transport Scotland
29% Bus
Average age of the bus fleet in Scotland
92% Buses
9% Rail
Percentage of adults using mode of travel at least once per week in 2014 Source: Transport Scotland
87% ScotRail
Percentage of buses in Scotland equipped with...
67% CCTV
Overall passenger satisfaction Source: Transport Focus
£2.5bn £5.4bn 30%
90%
Automatic vehicle location (AVL)
88%
Live ITSO Smartcard readers
TH E BUS F L E ET
Source: CPT Scotland/Department for Transport
VALUE TO ECONOMY
£803m
Bus passenger retail spend exceeds £2.5bn a year in Scotland.
Rail
£107m* Bus
£9.30 Rail
£0.25* Bus
The bus industry generates £5.4bn gross value added to the Scottish economy.
of commuter journeys in Scotland are made by bus and 1 in 10 commuters would be forced to look for another job if they could no longer commute by bus. Source: CPT Scotland
SUBSIDY
SUBSIDY P E R PASSENGER
Government support: * excludes concessionary travel reimbursement of £190m
Government support per passenger journey: * excludes concessionary travel reimbursement
(37.2 times more support for rail per passenger than bus) Source: CPT Scotland
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H IGH L IGH TS
First Games Transport and First Glasgow received a Special Award at the UK Bus Awards for their work in organising and managing transport arrangements at the Commonwealth Games
HIGHLIGHTS OF 2014/15 A selection of key events for Scotland's buses over the past 12 months N OV E M B E R AWAR DS
S C OT T I SH OP E R ATOR S R E C O G N I SE D AT U K BU S AWA R D S
A number of Scottish organisations and bus operators were recognised at the annual UK Bus Awards, which were held at London’s Hilton Hotel in November. First Games Transport and First Glasgow received a Special Award for their work organising and managing the transport arrangements for the 2014 Commonwealth Games. First Games Transport deployed some 580 buses and coaches for
the period of the Games which between them made some 48,000 individual journeys over the 12 days. In addition, First Glasgow kept the city moving as well as providing spectator shuttle services to the 12 main venues around the city. SEStran took away the Gold Award in the Local Authority Bus Project of the Year category for Edinburgh’s BusTracker real-time information system. Extremely impressed by the geographic coverage SESTran has achieved, the judges considered the scale of the initiative sets it apart and makes it a model of what can be delivered through constructive partnership, despite a current
challenging financial environment. Lothian Buses took away two Bronze Awards. In the Putting Passenger First category, the operator was recognised as a result of its work to undertake a detailed review of its approach to customers that has seen its travel shop and customer service teams integrated to provide a seamless experience. Judges were impressed with how Lothian Buses enhanced its already impressive customer service ethos. Meanwhile, the council-owned operator’s ‘Nightbus Home safe. Midnight to 4.30am’ strategy was rewarded in the Marketing Initiative of the year category. It followed the successful
implementation of a broad multichannel campaign to highlight Lothian’s Nightbus network, which resulted in a 48% increase in Nightbus passenger numbers and the creation of a brand that reflects safe and reliable night-time transport. PATRO NAGE
R E C OR D - B R E A K I N G F I R ST B I RT H DAY First Aberdeen’s Platinum Service celebrated its first birthday with the news that passenger numbers were set to break through the two million barrier. Since the launch of Platinum the service has outperformed every target set against it. Passenger ➢
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growth is currently at 5.3% year on year and around 35,000 people now travel on First’s Platinum buses every week. Platinum 19, the first to be launched, links Culter, the city centre and Tillydrone. Following its huge success, First expanded Platinum to service 12 which carries customers travelling to the city centre from Torry and Heathryfold every 10 minutes. Seven months after launching, it won the Best Bus Service award at the Scottish Transport Awards in Glasgow in June 2014 - an industry acknowledgement of what the service has achieved in a very short space of time. DEC E M B E R FAC IL I TI ES
F I R S T M I N I ST E R OP E N S G L AS G OW ’ S N E W SU P E R DE P OT Britain’s biggest bus depot was officially opened by First Minister Nicola Sturgeon in December, when she toured First Glasgow’s new £20m headquarters, named Caledonia, following a staff competition. The new facility, on Cathcart Road in the south side of the city, houses 300 buses and 800 employees – although has space for up to 450 buses and 1200 employees as the business grows and attracts more passengers. It was a welcome return for Sturgeon, who put the first spade in the ground to start the new depot’s construction a year earlier. The new buildings incorporate some of the latest advances in design and the depot is one of the greenest in the UK. It incorporates the latest and most effective form of solar panelling, enough to power 40 homes a year, and captures rainwater to be used in its two large automated vehicle washes. Other features include bespoke vehicle lifts, a specialist long-term vehicle repair unit, training facilities and modern accommodation for staff that includes a gym and canteen.
and Renfrewshire council areas. The SPT Committee approved contracts for the routes at a total cost of £3,187,476, representing a saving of £133,786 when compared to existing contracts. Meanwhile, January also saw SPT commit over £1.5m towards the cost of purchasing 12 new Wrightbus StreetLite and Optare Solo buses for use on the Isle of Arran. The vehicles are leased to operator Stagecoach Western, which won a tranche of bus service contracts on the island in the summer of 2014.
JA N UA RY COMPA NI ES
Mc G I L L’ S A TOP 5 0 0 C OM PA N Y Greenock-based bus operator McGill’s was named as one of Scotland’s top 500 performing companies in January. The company reported a 22% increase in turnover during 2014 and was placed at position 422 in Scotland’s Business Insider 500 league table, which recognises Scotland’s most respected and fastest growing companies. FU N DIN G
F E BRUARY
SPT COMMITS FUNDS TO SU B SI DI SE D BU S N E T WOR K
HO LYRO O D
M I N I ST E R BAC K S BU SE S AT BU S SU M M I T
In January Strathclyde Partnership for Transport committed just over £3m towards continued support for a large number of subsidised bus services across the Strathclyde region. The award of the contracts will support the operation of a large number of socially necessary bus services until July 2018. The services cover routes in Glasgow; North and South Lanarkshire; North, South and East Ayrshire; East Dunbartonshire; Argyll & Bute
Scottish transport minister Derek Mackay said that he has no plans to move towards implementing bus franchising in Scotland, but that he reserves the right to use the powers available to him if the industry failed in its efforts to continuously improve. Speaking at the UK Bus Summit in London, he said that the bar to implementing Quality Contracts, which require ministerial approval
in Scotland, was “very high”. “At this stage I think it’s about partnership and phased improvement,” he said. “I don’t want to micromanage or control bus operators… I want a good product, modal shift and reliable services, but we need improvements.” Mackay added that he was watching bus franchising developments in England closely. ENVIRONMEN T
F U E L L I N G FAC I L I T Y F OR A B E R DE E N ’ S FUEL CELL FLEET February saw Aberdeen’s £19m Aberdeen Hydrogen Bus Project move into gear with the announcement of the two bus routes which local operators First and Stagecoach would deploy their respective fleets of Fuel Cell buses. Aberdeen City Council announced that the six-strong Stagecoach fleet would operate on the X17 Aberdeen city centre to Westhill route, while the four First Aberdeen vehicles would enter service on the X40 Kingswells to Bridge of Don Park and Ride service. The hydrogen fuel cell buses, made by Belgian firm Van Hool, were brought to the city as part of
Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland's First Minister, officially opened First Glasgow's huge new £20m Caledonia bus depot in December 2014
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organisations across Scotland in the employment of young people. Having achieved its accreditation, McGill’s is now eligible to use and display the Investors in Young People logo and plaque. APR IL FACILITIES
U P G R A DE F OR E DI N BU RG H ’ S BU S STOP S
Bus shelters in Edinburgh have received an upgrade with digital displays as part of a 10-year partnership with media firm JCDecaux
the city council-led project which has backing from Europe, the UK Government and the Scottish Government as well as a broad range of private sector partners. It is the most high-profile of a range of projects designed to create a hydrogen economy in the city. Supporting the new vehicles is a new hydrogen refuelling station at Aberdeen City Council’s Kittybrewster depot, which is owned and operated by supplier BOC. The 10 Fuel Cell buses started to enter passenger service in the following months. MA RC H TRA N S PO RT FOCUS
N I N E O U T OF 1 0 BU S U SE R S S AT I SF I E D Scottish bus companies scored highly in the Autumn 2014 Bus Passenger Survey, published in March by Transport Focus. It found that 92% of Scottish bus users were satisfied with their overall journey - compared to 88% in England. The highest rated Scottish bus operators were Lothian Buses and Stagecoach in Strathclyde, which each achieved a 94% approval rating, followed by First
First Aberdeen has had a busy year, not only celebrating the first year of its Platinum network (left) but also, with Stagecoach, introducing Fuel Cell buses into service (right)
on the bus (91%); safety of driving (90%); cleanliness and condition of the vehicles (89%); and punctuality of the bus (89%).
in South East Scotland (92%) and Stagecoach in South East Scotland (91%). In Tayside and Central Scotland, First and National Express Dundee each achieved an overall satisfaction rating of 90%. Commenting on the results, Sarah Boyd, head of operations at Lothian Buses, said: “We are really pleased to be recognised for the high quality service we continue to provide our passengers across Edinburgh and the Lothians. “What matters most to our customers is that we give them the best possible means of travelling in and around the city and this survey is further evidence that we are delivering on their expectations.” Other areas where Lothian Buses was highly rated by customers included: the availability of seating and standing space on the bus (94%); personal security
SKIL LS
Mc G I L L’ S AC H I E V E S I N V E STOR S I N YO U N G P E OP L E AC C R E DI TAT I ON
McGill’s commitment to training and developing young people was rewarded in March with the award of Investors in Young People accreditation. Launched in July 2014, Investors in Young People originated through a key recommendation from the Commission for Developing Scotland’s Young Workforce, led by Sir Ian Wood. The accreditation is offered to all businesses across Scotland and exists to recognise and support
Work began in April to replace around 400 of Edinburgh’s bus shelters as part of a 10-year partnership with advertising company JCDecaux. Existing shelters have been replaced by new, more modern shelters, designed taking passengers’ views into account. Some of these will feature digital advertising screens providing tourism, local and council information. Last year the City of Edinburgh Council signed a 10-year contract with JCDecaux to manage its 1500 bus shelters and 60 large-format billboards, as well as look into other schemes including wayfinding signage and a city-wide bicycle hire scheme. MAY INVESTME NT
S TAG E C OAC H L AU N C H E S HYBRID FLEET Stagecoach East Scotland launched a fleet of 18 new hybrid double deckers on the operator’s Taywaybranded route between Arbroath and Dundee in May. The new buses, Volvo B5LH hybrids with Alexander Dennis Enviro400 bodywork, marked an investment of around £5.3m and followed a £2.4m spend on high specification Volvo B11R Plaxton coaches for the Coastrider X7 route in November 2014. The vehicles were part funded by the Scottish Green Bus Fund, which supplied £1.4m and aims to support environmental projects and developments in Scotland within the public transport ➢ industry.
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May saw Stagecoach East Scotland launch a new fleet of hybrid buses. Left to right are Phil Owen of Volvo Bus, Andrew Jarvis of Stagecoach East Scotland and Andrew Gray of ADL I NV EST M E N T
F I R S T A N NOU NC E S £ 1 5 M I N V E ST M E N T IN SCOT TISH FLEETS
FirstGroup announced a substantial £15m investment in new buses for its bus fleets in Aberdeen and Glasgow in late May. After introducing 75 new buses at First Glasgow, the group announced plans for a further £14m investment, which will see a mixture of new double deck, single deck and midibus vehicles enter service with the operator in 2015/16. Meanwhile, First Aberdeen confirmed plans to invest £1m in seven new buses for use on its network of services in FirstGroup’s home city. The vehicles entered service during August. All of the new vehicles feature leather seating, CCTV system and WiFi that will provide passengers with free internet access during their journeys. The commitments form part of an overall order by FirstGroup’s
round trips on the 12-mile JetBus airport route before returning to base for a charge-up. The vehicle is being operated on the JetBus route by Stagecoach.
UK bus division of 385 new vehicles worth £77.7m for delivery in 2014/15. First’s order reflects its commitment to customers and stakeholder partners across the UK and brings the company’s investment in more than 2,220 new buses to nearly £385m over five years.
JUNE AWARDS
OP E R ATOR S R E C O G N I SE D AT T R A N SP ORT AWA R D S
EN V IRON MEN T
E L E C T R IC BU S H E A D S TO T H E OR K N E YS
A number of operators were recognised at the Scottish Transport Awards, which were held in Glasgow on June 18. The Public Transport Operator of the Year Award was won by First Glasgow. In what was a hotly contested category, First Glasgow impressed the judges by rising to the challenge of the Commonwealth Games, where it transported a quarter of a million spectators. Taking away the honours of Scotland’s Best Bus Services was Stagecoach East Scotland,
Orkney Islands Council introduced a fully electric Optare Solo midibus on a route connecting Kirkwall with the town’s airport during May. The purchase of the vehicle followed the award of funding from the Scottish Government and Transport Scotland as part of the Scottish Green Bus Fund and the Future Transport Low Carbon Vehicle Fund with grants of £97,560 and £132,000 respectively. When fully charged, the bus has a range of around 70 miles. It is expected that it will make five
which won the award for its X7 Coastrider service between Aberdeen and Dundee. Meanwhile, in the hotly contested Frontline Employee of the Year Award, the winner was named as Craig Duthie of First Aberdeen. Duthie was praised by judges for dedicating one of his days off to organise a birthday surprise for a bus-loving youngster with learning disabilities. CAMPAIGNS
Mc G I L L’ S G E T S INVOLVED IN CATCH T H E BU S W E E K Bus operator McGill’s, Scotland’s largest independent operator, got involved with Catch the Bus Week by offering a special promotion for younger travellers. It saw under 16s offered an all-day ticket for unlimited travel, across certain Go!Zones for only £1. A special £2 child day ticket was offered in the other remaining Go!Zones. Other operators across Scotland
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took part in the campaign, which aims to encourage people who don’t normally take the bus to give it a try. J ULY PART NE RS H I P
S QP L AU NC H E S B E T T E R BU SE S F OR I N V E RC LY DE Strathclyde Partnership for Transport and member council Inverclyde worked closely to launch a Statutory Quality Partnership that aims to improve local bus services. SPT and Inverclyde Council together with Transport Scotland and local operators are all a party to the terms of the SQP. This joint commitment broadly aims to encourage use of public transport; provide a better standard for vehicles; reduce emissions; improve access to bus routes and timetable information and improve safety and security for passengers. The Inverclyde SQP covers Port Glasgow, Greenock, Gourock main bus corridors; Greenock town centre to A78 boundary and Greenock and Port Glasgow bus stations. Operators wishing to offer services in the area must now meet the specified SQP criteria in order to do so. The agreement also includes the commitment of both SPT and Inverclyde Council to ensure relevant infrastructure and traffic management measures are maintained in order to support better quality bus services.
Despite 66% of those questioned using the car to get to work, over half of respondents described themselves as frequent or occasional bus users. An additional one in three said that they do not use the bus but would like to do so. The two main barriers to using the bus identified in the study are cost and length of journey time. Unprompted, 24% of respondents – nearly one in four - said the main reason they don’t use the bus is its cost. However, 22% also said their main barrier was that their journey by bus took too long, and 82% said they would be more likely to use the bus if their journey was quicker. A number of recommendations have been put forward following the study, including extending bus lane opening times – currently being trialled on the city’s Great Northern Road – creating express bus services, and re-evaluating current routes. It also identified the role employers have in encouraging bus
use, and recommendations include car pools, corporate fare discounts as well as a charge on employers who provide workplace parking. STA F F
C OM M ON W E A LT H BATON SU R P R I SE F OR A B E R DE E N BU S DR I V E R S
First Aberdeen gifted two Commonwealth Games Batonbearers their own commemorative batons in a surprise ceremony. Drivers Andrew Ballantyne and Shane Mitchell carried the baton through Aberdeen as part of the nationwide baton relay last year. Managing director, David Phillips, had been made aware in a chance discussion with another employee that the pair had no memento of their special day. Following a search to obtain the two commemorative batons, he wanted to surprise the pair with a lasting memento of the once-in-alifetime event.
EVENTS
F I R ST S C OT L A N D E AST K E E P S T H E S C OT T I SH OP E N M OV I N G
First Scotland East announced extra buses to help golf fans travel to and from the Scottish Open, which was held at Gullane Golf Club from July 9-12. With no public parking at Gullane, First supplemented the regular X24/124 service, which runs hourly between Edinburgh and East Lothian, plus half hourly between Musselburgh and North Berwick, with additional duplicate journeys on key journeys in a bid to help move some of the 50,000 spectators. Meanwhile, a special service was operated over the weekend of July 11-12, which provided an hourly service directly between central Edinburgh and the Gullane course. CAREERS
STAG E C OAC H H E L P S ST U DE N T S G E T C A R E E R R E A DY Staff at McGill's got into the spirit of things to celebrate Catch the Bus Week in June
RES E A RC H
F I R ST A B E R DE E N EXAMINES BARRIERS TO BU S T R AV E L First Aberdeen worked with stakeholders in July to discover how more people could be encouraged to use the bus. In partnership with Nestrans, Aberdeen & Grampian Chamber of Commerce, First Aberdeen published results of research into what the barriers to bus use are, and how they can be overcome.
Mitchell, a First driver of four years who was selected to carry the Queen’s Baton after saving a customers’ life, said: “I had no idea what it was about and my stomach was churning. I honestly thought I was in some sort of trouble. When Andrew and I walked into reception, David just said ‘here you go boys, these are for you, congratulations they’re very much well deserved’ and handed each of us a box. I was almost speechless”.
Two Aberdeen bus drivers were surprised with their own Commonwealth Games batons in July (left) as Orkney Islands Council introduced its first electric bus in June (right)
Stagecoach backed a national programme over the summer to help prepare the next generation for the world of work. The Perth-based group is one of several hundred employers across the country supporting the Career Ready programme, which helps build the skills of young adults aged 16 to 19. It saw Stagecoach provide paid four-week internships to its first two students under the UK-wide programme, which is helping around 2,700 students across the country. Nationwide, employee ➢
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volunteers across the group are among 2,000 people from the public, private and voluntary sectors who are mentoring students. Arran Young and David McNaughton undertook their internships based in Perth. Young worked with the group’s communications and finance teams at Stagecoach’s head office, while McNaughton, keen to pursue a career as an engineer, undertook his internship based at Stagecoach’s Perth bus depot. “Helping the next generation of young people get into work and develop their skills is a top priority for the country and crucial for all businesses,” said Martin Griffiths, Stagecoach’s chief executive. AU GUST PAT RO NAG E
1 5 , 0 0 0 PAS SE NG E R S U SE FA L K I R K TO U R I S T BU S A dedicated tourist bus service linking key sites around the historic town of Falkirk has carried 15,000 passengers since its launch as a pilot service in April. The Scottish Governmentfunded Loop bus service to support the Falkirk area’s major tourism drive has been busy helping visitors and locals make the connection between the tourist attractions and other road and rail services over the summer season. The distinctive pink bus provides an hourly service and is funded by Transport Scotland and operated by local bus operator First Midland Bluebird. It takes in The Falkirk Wheel, Falkirk High and Grahamston Stations, Falkirk Town Centre, Falkirk Stadium, Callander Park and The Kelpies, with dedicated bus stop signs featuring VisitFalkirk branding to help signpost visitors to the route. RESU LTS
R E C OR D B R E A K I NG P E R F OR M A NC E F OR L OT H IA N BU SE S More passengers than ever before travelled on Lothian Buses services in 2014, helping to increase the
September saw a new look for National Express Dundee as it became Xplore Dundee with new branding designed by local students
First Midland Bluebird has helped to keep 15,000 passengers in The Loop in Falkirk
completely redeveloped its flagship Travelshop on Waverley Bridge. Lothian Buses generated revenue of £135.3m (2013 £132.3m) resulting in profit after tax of £8.24m (2013 £8.58m).
company’s revenue by £3m and generating a dividend to its public sector owners of £5.5m. During the year, Lothian Buses also successfully expanded several of its initiatives to the Edinburgh Trams service, including the mobile app, which received 200,000 downloads in 2014, and its sister mobile ticketing app, which generated £2 million worth of sales over the 12 months. The company also launched its CitySmart card that allows passengers to pre-purchase single and multiple bus and tram journeys before travelling, and
SE PTE MBE R BRANDING
NAT IONA L E X P R E S S D U N DE E B E C OM E S X P L OR E DU N DE E September saw National Express Group relaunch its bus operations in Dundee under the new name of Xplore Dundee.
The new name is joined by a new look, with an increasing number of buses now operating with the company’s brand new green livery, designed in partnership with students from Dundee and Angus College. To support the relaunch, the operator’s network has been refreshed in a move that aims to offer easy to use, turn-up-and-go services. That move has seen new marketing materials and each route assigned a colour, to make it easier for passengers to spot their bus. Local students Ryan McGinnis, Georgia Gray, Lisa Cavell and Gillian Annandale have worked closely with National Express’s own bus designers to create a new livery for the operator’s vehicles which echoes the transport heritage of the city. “This is a fresh new look – it’s one we’re very proud of and we hope our customers will be, too,” said Elsie Turbyne, managing director of Xplore Dundee. “This is our city, these are their buses and we want to do our bit to ensure Dundee’s public transport system is top-class, at a time when our city is growing, developing and looking to the future.”
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LOTHIAN BUSES: THE ROAD TO ZERO emma roy, env ironmental officer at lothian buses, explains the how the company plans to build on its strong record of env ironmental responsibility n 2009, Lothian Buses – Edinburgh and the Lothians’ largest bus operator, and the UK’s largest publicly-owned bus company – set out its ambition to become one of Europe’s leading transport services, providing a fully environmentally aware fleet. It marked the beginning of a 10-year plan to create a service dedicated not only to our customers, but also to the environment in which they live and work. Our goal, through the introduction of innovative technology and partnership working with leading manufacturers, is to work towards a future with zero emissions for every city centre journey. Whilst we understand this outcome is more than a few years away, we are proud to say we are making great strides towards reducing our impact and providing cleaner journeys throughout the region.
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Environmental Journey Lothian Buses has a strong track record of environmental responsibility and having won multiple awards for our green credentials, we are often acknowledged as an industry leader and example of best practice. Since I joined Lothian Buses just over a year ago, it is clear to me that sustainability is at the very heart of the business, with the
company acknowledging that its activities have an impact on the local environment while taking steps to reduce this. The introduction of the Scottish Government’s Climate Change Act (Scotland) in 2009 was an important milestone, although Lothian Buses had been investing heavily in its fleet for many years. This new legislation simply served as a welcome boost to our programme of activity and motivated us to strive for even better standards in a shorter time frame. The Act set out stringent targets in order to reduce CO2 against the 1990 baseline year, which at that time was estimated as 72 million tonnes Scotland-wide. Two key targets were set to reduce carbon emissions to 42% by 2020, and to 80% by 2050, against 1990 levels. Accompanying these targets were four transformational outcomes - the key outcome for bus operators being the ‘almost complete decarbonisation of road transport by 2050, with significant progress to be made by 2030.’ Following the introduction of this legislation, Lothian Buses introduced a range of new technologies designed to reduce its environmental impact, including Eminox Selective Catalytic Reduction Technology® (SCRT) which has been utilised on numerous older vehicles to improve their euro standard rating. It was around this time that
we began taking a much more proactive approach to upgrading the fleet, developing a strong relationship with the Scottish Government, which introduced the Scottish Green Bus Fund. After a successful bid, we were able to purchase Scotland’s first double deck hybrid vehicles, converting an entire route running through Air Quality Management Areas (AQMAs) to a hybrid operation. This move sought to reduce harmful emissions and in itself acted as a catalyst for purchasing vastly more environmentally friendly vehicles in the future. Subsequent rounds of funding have seen a total of 85 hybrid vehicles introduced into our fleet, which in turn have been strategically deployed on routes running through AQMAs to minimise their impact on the environment. Since 2011, over £18.5m has been invested in low carbon vehicles, with £5.8m coming from the Scottish Government’s
Green Bus Fund. Currently, 62% of the 700-strong fleet is at Euro 5 standard or above. In the words of Derek Mackay MSP, the Scottish Government’s Minister for Transport, “Lothian Buses has shown consistent commitment to improving the environmental performance of its fleet in parallel with delivering real benefits for passengers and I’m pleased that we have been able to support it along the way through our Scottish Green Bus Fund.” Environmental Strategy Throughout our journey so far, we’ve confronted several obstacles and faced a few challenging moments, most of which have been centered on costs, but all of this experience has helped us develop. What we’ve learnt is that in order to succeed, we must adopt a completely environmentallydriven understanding of all our operations, rather than a solely vehicle-focused approach.
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Therefore, as part of Lothian Buses’ environmental commitment and our pursuit of progress, this year we created a dedicated environmental brand. This brand represents our continued investment in the fleet working to bring new low carbon buses to the roads of Edinburgh, cutting carbon emissions by using less fuel and reducing on-street noise through silent operation at bus stops. The tagline “We think the world of Edinburgh,” is
P RO F I L E
Established in 1919, Lothian Buses is Edinburgh and the Lothian’s largest bus operator. A multi-award winning company, Lothian Buses is widely acknowledged as an industry leader in the provision of high
the introduction to Edinburgh of Scotland’s first fully commercial, hybrid-electric, single deck Euro 6 vehicles in the country, brought to Edinburgh. These new buses, which are currently being trialled in various European cities by Volvo, allow the vehicle to travel up to 11km in full electric mode. They’ll be similar in appearance to the current Volvo 7900 hybrids already in service, but will boast additional components including roof-mounted charging rails, a larger storage battery, a more powerful electric motor and additional electrical components to manage charging and operation. When these buses reach the terminus point, they will receive a full charge via charging stations, which takes less than 10 minutes. Four charging stations will be built, two at each end of the route, to allow the vehicles to charge during layover without the need for operational compromise.
displayed on super-side adverts on the latest hybrid additions to the fleet - the Volvo B5LH Euro 6 double deck vehicles. The brand is part of a companywide strategy to lower our environmental impact and to highlight our continuous journey of improvement. It focuses on our commitment to introduce low carbon vehicles to support the improvement of air quality. We are also undertaking work to influence and change internal behaviour to increase resource efficiency and make the best use of our assets, and enhance working practices. As a company, we’ve been working hard to adopt this attitude with dedicated initiatives to reduce our internal impact. Currently we’re concentrating on recycling, energy and monitoring our water efficiency as well as staff travel. As a whole Lothian Buses consistently strives for the best possible standards across the board which is one of the many reasons it’s such an appealing employer. Since I’ve been with Lothian Buses, I’ve witnessed just how passionate and dedicated the company’s people are in terms of going the extra mile and maintaining our reputation as a leader in UK transport.
LEFT: Emma Roy, environmental officer at Lothian Buses. BELOW: Visual representation of charging station
The future - City Mobility We’re on the right course with current emissions targets and hybrid fleet and Lothian Buses is preparing to take the next step towards our zero emissions destination. In a first for the UK, we are in working with Volvo to launch ‘City Mobility’ in 2017. This innovative venture will see quality public transport services, and is frequently used as an example of best practice. Lothian Buses operates over 70 local bus services in Edinburgh and extensions to outlying suburbs, towns and villages. Additionally, the company also operates Lothian Country Buses into the East Lothian area, the popular Airlink express service to Edinburgh Airport,
the comprehensive NightBus network, and provides services to the city’s Park and Rides facilities. The subsidiary Edinburgh Bus Tours operation provides 5 Star Scottish Tourist Board rated guided tours through the city centre and beyond, operating up to 30 open-top buses all year round. Three Travelshops across the city provide passengers with a friendly face for travel services
The initial plan is to introduce these buses into the areas that will benefit most from a significantly reduced environmental impact. Therefore, there will be 25 buses for use on Service 30, which operates through three designated AQMAs and carries over 10,000 passenger journeys every day. In each AQMA, the bus will switch from hybrid to electric power using telematics and GPS technology. An estimated 40% of the route will be covered using electricity, producing zero emissions with almost silent running in each AQMA and at each bus stop it serves. The overall result of this outstanding project is a saving of up to 40% in diesel fuel consumption, and therefore a reduction of emissions by up to 75% (with a combination of zero tailpipe emissions while in electric mode and an efficient Euro 6 engine). Whilst there’s still a fair way left to go, by keeping our commitment to the city and its environment at the heart of our strategy, Lothian Buses will remain a big player when it comes to the development of sustainable transport. We are planning ahead to ensure that we meet and exceed emissions targets set by government. It’s also important to our customers and, as a company, we are committed to reducing the impact of our services on the city as much as possible. With an expanding hybrid fleet and exciting new prospects on the way, I’m confident we should soon be able to further enhance our place as one of Europe’s leaders in this field. and information, including ticketing and timetable enquiries. With three operational depots, in-house maintenance and coach works facility and a state-of-theart control room, the company utilises its fleet of over 700 buses to provide a public transport service to meet and exceed the needs of Scotland’s diverse, modern and constantly evolving capital city.
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O PINIO N
The Scottish bus industry delivers best value to the public purse than anywhere in the UK and most of Europe - and it can get even better
LET'S GET THE RECIPE RIGHT Scotland's buses are in a ver y good position, but they can get even better if we work together and look at the whole picture, w r ites ralph roberts, managing director of mcgill's f you’re reading this, it is likely that you’re involved with, or are in the passenger transport industry. Running buses today is a sometimes fraught and delicate balance. On one hand, the cost of the journey and the absolute need for the bus to run on time is of paramount importance, but on the other, the unwillingness to provide buses with the space required on the roads infrastructure and the natural political reticence to upset the car lobby, doesn’t make for an easy juggling act. Once again, emissions are coming to the fore of public and political minds with the discovery of ‘cheat devices’ on some cars. Buses have natural cheat devices,
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this is better known as ‘real world road conditions’. Congestion, roadworks and poor infrastructure management does its best to maximise emissions on even the most environmentally-friendly buses. The absolute best way to minimise harmful emissions is to burn less fuel in the first place. Bus journey times have increased steadily over the last decade due to all of the above and even worse, predictability of journey time is harder to deliver. In Scotland, over 80% of all journeys made by public transport are by bus, yet the bus is still very much the Cinderella of public transport. This is a perception that must change. As industry stakeholders, we must all be careful to make sure that we are working towards a common goal. Ticketing and the
regulatory regime certainly gets most of the headlines, but what tops the bus company passenger survey headlines is reliability and punctuality, closely followed by value for money and good customer service. Those are two potentially opposing priorities in my view. For example, there is no point in slavishly following an emissions agenda if all it does is make bus travel more expensive and causes a reduction in footfall. Quicker journey times on the other hand, gives a massive reduction in emissions, increases footfall and lowers the cost of the trip. This can then be used to introduce even cleaner vehicles and give manifold benefits. Using silo thinking to simply focus on the tailpipe emissions alone will have limited effect and is ultimately a
box ticking exercise that addresses nothing outside of the silo. We need to carry out a holistic root and branch review of what is needed, this can then be turned into a meaningful transport strategy that everyone can not only sign up to, but deliver. The tastiest pies are usually bland when even one or two key ingredients are missing, let’s not make bus travel bland for the next generation, let’s get the recipe right. The future that I see for buses in Scotland has nothing to do with the regulatory regime and has everything to do with focussing on outcomes. I was involved with a European tendering authority in the past which wanted low fares, low emissions, low subsidy and high frequency on a comprehensive network of routes. They were genuinely confused when their outcomes didn’t fit with the funding model. In Scotland, we have a situation where buses receive the lowest public subsidy per passenger in the UK, and in most cases, in Europe. Stated differently, the Scottish bus industry delivers best value to the public purse than anywhere in the UK and most of Europe. The good news is that it can get even better. Scotland is in a very good position. The scale of the country, and with the devolved responsibility we have for transport, means that, with a joined up approach (some call it partnership) we can achieve some fantastic outcomes if we are all of the same mind. Let’s do that, shall we? Let’s do what the travelling public want, let’s agree on a set of criteria that we can all live with. One that gives an environment where local authorities are as focussed on journey times as bus companies are. One that ensures we allocate road space according to occupants, not number plates. One that concerns itself with the people on the bus rather than the bus itself. Only when we look at the whole picture, will we really get the whole message. And only when we focus on the whole message, can we hope to get it right.
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IN NOVATION IS DR IVING FIRST ABER DEEN FORWAR D Young talent is the lifeblood of the bus industr y. daniel l aird is first aberdeen’s commercial manager and First in Scotland’s Young Manager of the Year aniel Laird began his career at the sharp end – driving buses with First Glasgow on a part time basis. To him it was the perfect solution to a common problem for many young people. “I was at university in Glasgow and it just seemed to be the perfect place to earn a bit of money,” he says. “I was a bit interested in the industry, so a part time job as a driver was a neat solution.” So taken with the role was Laird that as his studies came to an end, a career with First seemed to be the perfect career path. He applied and was accepted for a place on First’s graduate management training scheme. The scheme itself is two years in duration with the first year spent mainly at First Glasgow, although there were periods also spent with First’s bus operations in the North of England, as well as Aberdeen. “My first year was spent on the operations scheme and I did the usual thing of going around all of
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M I L I TA RY P R E C I SION F OR N E W V E H IC L E I N T RODU C T ION Gary West joined First Scotland East as fleet engineer in early 2014 and since then he has been heavily involved in introducing over 50 new vehicles into the operator’s fleet. Of course this is small fry when compared to his previous career in the armed forces. “I spent 25 years there in a variety of roles
Daniel Laird says that he was bemused to win First in Scotland's young manager award
“We worked very closely with the organising committee, looking at the network and seeing how we could fulfill their aims,” Laird remembers. “It was a complex task, but we got to the point where we achieved what they wanted in terms of network and capacity.” Then in the summer of 2014 as his training scheme was reaching its conclusion, Laird was approached by Duncan Cameron, the then managing director of First Aberdeen, to see if he would be interested in joining the operator as commercial manager. It was an opportunity that Laird jumped at. He had already done a lot of work in Aberdeen as part of his training scheme, principally on plans to introduce the Platinum premium bus brand on one bus route in the city. It meant that the operator, its staff and its network was a known quantity. “Platinum was a very new concept for First Aberdeen and there was some scepticism,” he admits. “But we’ve seen very strong growth, much of it from the more
and I was heavily involved in procurement,” he says. That, perhaps, is an understatement. West latterly participated in a multi-billion pound vehicle procurement contract, the largest undertaken by the Ministry of Defence since the Second World War. He also spent time as fleet engineer of 1,200 armoured vehicles. However, his plans for a year off after leaving the forces came to a shuddering halt after a former MoD colleague, who
On his arrival he had plenty to do, with West quickly grasping that there was a need to rebalance the operator’s fleet. With 19 different vehicle types across First Scotland East, he worked to consolidate this disparate fleet by bringing the different vehicle types together at specific depots. “Having so many vehicle types was creating some significant problems,” he says. “There was a stock and skills issue, so it made sense to bring the vehicle types together and then back that up
the depots, but towards the end of that year I was becoming more and more involved in commercial things,” he says. “So I switched at the end of the first year to the commercial scheme. I was just pulled more towards it.”
Working closely with Kevin Belfield, the group’s regional commercial director, that second year saw Laird heavily involved in a number of strategic projects, including preparations for the 2014 Commonwealth Games.
was working for FirstGroup, suggested that West would be the ideal man to lead an engineering improvement programme at First’s Essex bus business. “They were looking for someone to devise a framework that would drive things forward, so my plans for a year off came to nothing,” he laughs. “That project came to an end and again I thought about taking some time off, but then I was kindly offered the fleet engineer role at First Scotland East.”
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F IRST GRO UP
affluent areas, which just goes to show that if you get the product right, people will use the bus.” The work on Platinum has been developed by the operator with efforts to highlight the advantages of bus use to the city’s car drivers. That has led to research undertaken in partnership with the local chamber of commerce to identify barriers to bus travel. “It highlighted how journey times are the biggest barrier,” says Laird. “We spend a lot of time talking to the city council and with councillors. There are a number of options, but we take them out and highlight where the problems are and how targeted investment could provide a solution. We can’t solve everything overnight, but you need to get these people onboard.” Meanwhile, FirstGroup has honoured Laird’s efforts in his role as Aberdeen’s commercial manager. Earlier this year he was named as First in Scotland’s ‘Young Manager of the Year’ at the group’s Scottish staff awards. It’s an award that he admits has bemused him. “I’m very proud to have been recognised so early in my career,” he says. “But I’m very passionate about things and I just see it as doing my job. I sometimes take a step back and think about what I’ve achieved and the part that I play. In Aberdeen we have 170 buses and 50,000 journeys a day. It’s quite something to think that I play a part in directly controlling that and it’s not something that I take lightly either.” by skilling the depot up with the correct balance of trades and the necessary skills to maintain those vehicles. Commonality was key.” Aside from this work, plus overseeing the day-to-day operations of First Scotland East’s engineering activities, West has also helped introduce a total of 58 new buses over the last 18 months. It’s something that he is proud to have played a part in. “We’ve been really fortunate to have the investment in these vehicles,” he says. “It’s
First Glasgow driver Toni Bradley was recognised earlier this year as First in Scotland’s Bus Driver of the Year. It’s an honour that she has been thrilled to receive. “I’m not one to court accolades but I have to admit I’ve been blown away by this one,” admits Bradley with a smile. “It doesn’t get much better than being recognised for doing what you’re passionate about. It was a privilege to be nominated and to be successful. It was very special.” She says that the best thing about the award has been the reaction and support of her colleagues at First Glasgow’s Scotstoun depot, where alongside her driving duties, she is a route representative, acting as a point
of contact between drivers and management to feed back any service delivery issues, since late 2013. Meanwhile, Fiona Kerr, First Glasgow’s managing director, pays tribute to Bradley’s skills, noting that her commitment to delivering a great service is unwavering. “She is also always on hand to help and support other drivers and she has an excellent rapport with our customers, always showing empathy and care,” adds Kerr. “Without doubt, she’s a fantastic role model in our business.” For Bradley though, her job has always been an aspiration. “If there’s such a thing as a job you’re born to do then for me it was always going to be a bus driver,” she laughs. “I have a passion for transport and logistics and from as young as I can remember, I wanted to drive Glasgow
Corporation buses.” That led her, in May 2001, to join First Glasgow as a trainee driver, before hitting the streets a couple of months later on completion of her training. Bradley clearly loves her job, saying that she enjoys not only being out and about and the flexibility offered by shift work, but also the responsibility involved in driving a large vehicle. “The best thing, though, is being part of something that actually makes a difference,” she adds. “I would recommend this industry as a career choice to anyone who wants to be part of something massive that has a huge impact on people’s lives.” Bradley admits that being a bus driver can be a tough job, regardless of gender, but reactions from friends outside of the industry suggest that there’s usually a little added admiration for female bus drivers, something she says is nice. And of course, there’s rarely a dull moment at work too. “I usually see plenty of things that bring a smile to my face,” she says. “One that sticks in my memory was the case of a gentleman travelling on my bus who somehow managed to get his arm trapped between a pole and a bulkhead. Before I could get to him to help him out, he calmly removed what was a prosthetic arm, unstuck it and reattached it before going on his way with a smile. It still makes me laugh!”
First Scotland East's Gary West
not something the business has had in recent years and it has been a big motivator for everyone concerned.” While 53 of the vehicles are Wrightbus StreetLite Microhybrids, the influx of new vehicles has also included five ADL E400 Hybrids. Their introduction is particularly close to West’s heart. “During my time in the forces I was responsible for reducing the MoD’s dependency on fossil fuels, so to be involved in introducing
Euro 6 Hybrid vehicles with a Gyrodrive capability, the first in Scotland, it was very exciting,” he says. “We’ve done a lot of work to introduce these vehicles with a lot of support from the manufacturer to do that. It has also been good, as it has allowed us to appraise the staff and identify any skills gap, so that has led to a lot of depot-level training on the shop floor. “Again that’s a big motivator, not just for me, but for the guys on the ground too.”
First Glasgow's Toni Bradley receives her honour at First in Scotland's awards
BU S DR I V E R TON I I S I N F I R ST P O SI T ION
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JET’s take off (number of passengers) 650,462 (to end of September)
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Scotland worked with Aberdeen City Council to roll out specially branded bus stops to highlight the existence of the service. The service began in August 2010 with three refurbished existing vehicles that adopted the distinctive JET 727 branding, based on the same JET brand that was already used on Stagecoach services linking the airport in Inverness. Success has been such that during the first week of operation, over 2,000 passengers were carried on the JET 727. Steady passenger growth has followed. In October 2010, just two months after the service began, the vehicles on the route were upgraded to brand new
647,300
tagecoach North Scotland’s bus link between Aberdeen’s airport and city centre has seen positive growth from a standing start. The JET 727 service provides the only direct public transport link between Aberdeen’s busy airport at Dyce and Union Square in the city centre. The introduction of the service followed significant research by Stagecoach, which revealed
that existing links to the airport tended to be primarily aimed at other markets, and called at the airport en-route to their ultimate destination. However, there was a clear demand for a direct link between the city and the airport. Existing taxi services were busy at peak periods and the operator felt there was a gap in the market for a high quality public transport offering. Discussions with then airport operator BAA followed, which led to an agreement that facilitated access to the forecourt area, the provision of a 24-hour bus lane and other infrastructure. Meanwhile, Stagecoach North
446,945
ST E A DY G ROW T H F OR A B E R DE E N ’ S J ET A I R P ORT L I N K
348,139
It has been a busy year for stagecoach’s operations in Scotland w ith a number of initiatives that prove that buses can assist w ith economic and env ironmental goals. Here are some of them
220,386
STAGECOACH GETS GREEN GROW TH
58,661 (from August)
The Optare Versa buses on the JET 727 route feature leather seating, air conditioning, Wi-Fi access and additional luggage facilities
Optare Versa buses that feature leather seating, air conditioning, Wi-Fi access and additional luggage facilities. Since 2010, the growth of JET 727 has continued. In 2011, the first full year of operation, 220,386 passengers were carried, steadily increasing since then to reach 650,462 passengers in the first nine months of 2015. Work has also been undertaken to maintain this momentum. In early 2011 the frequency of the service was upgraded to offer an improved service on Sundays. Further improvements happened last May when the frequency of the service was enhanced yet again, assisted by the introduction of an additional four buses. This has seen buses running up to every 10 minutes. Meanwhile, some journeys now provide a link with the NorthLink ferry terminal in Aberdeen that are timed to connect with sailings to Lerwick and Kirkwall. Steve Walker, managing director Stagecoach North Scotland, said: “The demand for the JET bus 727 service has been growing because it is reliable, comfortable and is great value, with tickets starting from £2.90. Opposed to the average £20 cost for other modes. “We are committed to providing our passengers with the frequency and number of buses they need to satisfy this demand, so this is an important substantial commitment to one route. We hope even more people will use the JET 727 bus service, whilst enjoying a relaxing journey, with comfortable seating, extra leg room and the great value tickets.”
2010
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EXPRESS A M B I T ION I N AY R SH I R E Stagecoach West Scotland’s X77 coach service between Ayr and Glasgow has won a loyal following from passengers. Stagecoach’s foundation was as an express coach operator and the group continues to offer significant operations of this nature in Scotland, not only through services using its own brand, but also through the express coach service joint venture with ComfortDelGro using the Megabus and Scottish Citylink brands. In Ayrshire, Stagecoach West Scotland operates a significant network of services that link towns up and down the Ayrshire coast with central Glasgow. The jewel in the crown of this network is the X77, which offers a fast connection between Ayr and central Glasgow via Prestwick Airport. It’s an intensive operation, operating up to every 10 minutes in the peak hours, catering to those travelling to work and to study in Glasgow, with a significant leisure market between the peaks. The route has operated for
some years and has benefitted from sustained investment, most recently last summer when the opportunity was taken to upgrade the vehicles used on the service. Previously a fleet of Neoplan Skyliner double deck coaches was used on the service, but Tom Bridge, managing director of Stagecoach West Scotland, admits that the vehicles were past their prime. “There were reliability issues with those vehicles and so we jumped at the opportunity to upgrade the route with Van Hool double deck coaches cascaded from the Oxford Tube service between Oxford and London,” he says. “They have been a massive step forward, not only from the point of view of reliability, but also from the passenger point of view. They have a real street presence.” The arrival of the former Oxford coaches was followed by positive research on the X77 undertaken by Stagecoach’s customer insight team. Its survey work amongst passengers using the route found consistently high customer satisfaction scores for driver appearance, standard of driving and passenger comfort all in excess of 90%. Meanwhile,
98% of respondents said that they were either likely or very likely to travel on the service again. 94% said that they would recommend the service to a friend. “We’re not resting on our laurels with that,” notes Bridge. “The new coaches offer things that people have come to expect, like extra legroom, free Wi-Fi, power sockets and that sort of
98% 94%
of X77 users are likely/very likely to travel on the service again
of X77 users are likely/very likely to recommend the service to a friend
One of the Van Hool coaches on the X77
TAY WAY G OE S G R E E N Hybrid buses have been introduced on Stagecoach East Scotland’s service between Dundee and Arbroath. Stagecoach East Scotland upgraded its ‘Tayway 73’-branded bus route between Dundee and Abroath earlier this year with greener buses that aim to boost the environmental credentials of the bus. The move has seen 18 double deck Volvo B5LH hybrid vehicles introduced on the route in a move that has been supported by the Scottish Government’s Green Bus Fund scheme. The vehicles are also the first Volvo hybrids to be introduced that feature
Dundee's 'Tayway 73' service is now operated by 18 Volvo B5LH hybrid double deckers
thing, but we’d like to go further. We’re looking at putting a coffee machine onboard, to get the right ambience. People like a coffee when they're on the move, so it’s about adding value and adding to the overall experience.” The X77’s main competition, aside from the car, is ScotRail’s train service. While journey times are broadly similar, Bridge believes that the coach has a compelling competitive advantage; the vehicles are more comfortable and, more importantly, it’s cheaper too. “We also offer the advantage of a door-to-door journey,” he adds. Bridge and his team clearly have an eye on the future too. At present X77 passengers can buy a Megarider product that allows them to connect to and from the service using the operator’s Ayr bus network, but the Stagecoach West Scotland MD would like to go further. “How about offering a ride sharing service that gets people from their front door, perhaps away from our conventional bus network, to an X77 stop?,” he asks. “These things are easily possible in this technological world. It’s something we’re thinking a lot about.” Alexander Dennis’s new look Enviro400 body. “The route is an unusual mix of a dense urban service with steep hills, some city centre running where air quality is key, and then on to suburban housing with some interurban running at the route’s very end and we felt the parallel hybrid system from Volvo with the B5LH offered the best match to the nature of the route,” says Andrew Jarvis, managing director of Stagecoach East Scotland. Jarvis adds: “Our huge investment in the last six months shows we’re not only committed to improving public transport in Dundee and Angus, we’re also determined to reduce our overall environmental impact.”
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Q 'STRAINT
SAFE, SECURE, SIMPLE Quantum, q’straint’s fully automatic wheelchair securement system, has been officially launched and is ready for sale. The latest installation of this ground breaking product is w ith lothian buses uantum is the transportation industry’s first securement system of its kind, designed to ensure new levels of safety and independence for mobility impaired passengers In October 2013 Quantum, the industry’s first fully automatic rear-facing wheelchair securement station for virtually any bus or rail carriage was showcased at its first major international show, Busworld in Kortijk. It was very well received and won a European Coach and Bus Week innovation label award. It has since been further enhanced with the addition of a new backrest for a complete
Q
stand-alone system. The backrest is optional and is designed to reduce head and neck injuries for wheelchair users. The revolutionary new product was developed by combining transportation insight, intelligent technology and a pioneering new approach to securement. After boarding a bus or carriage, Quantum allows wheelchair and scooter passengers to position their chair and by simply pushing a button to secure themselves in a stable and safe rear-facing position without driver assistance. The process takes under 25 seconds. “In addition to ensuring the highest level of passenger safety, keeping buses on schedule and
preventing tip-overs, Quantum provides a more respectful experience to the process of wheelchair securement,” said Bob Joseph, Q’Straint VP of business development. “Now safe securement and release is fully automated.” In the past, drivers would take additional time to affix straps to harness the chair, potentially invading the passenger’s personal space. With Quantum, all passengers are treated equally. Quantum systems are now in place across the USA and the UK is following suit. In early March Quantum was successfully fitted for the first time in real life application to a Wrightbus Gemini
double decker at East Yorkshire Motor Services (EYMS). On the 5th August Q’Straint invited Helen Dolphin MBE, director of policy and campaigns for the charity Disabled Motoring UK to trial Quantum in situ on an actual bus route. Being an occasional wheelchair user herself Helen was able to give an insight into the issues that wheelchair users face when using public transport as well as share her thoughts on Quantum. Helen knows only too well that an extremely important issue for disabled people travelling on a bus is safety. “I have often found myself nearly tipping over in my manual ➢ wheelchair when a bus has
Q’Straint engineers applied the highest levels of industrial design to ensure Quantum delivers the performance to keep passengers safe and operators productive
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PRO F IL E
For over 25 years, Q’Straint has remained focused on one mission: To develop the most innovative solutions that advance the safety and effectiveness of wheelchair passenger travel. Its reputation as a global leader is the result of making transportation safety and customer needs the highest priority. It is committed to continued product leadership and innovation; and taken a corner a bit sharpish, I was therefore delighted when Q’Straint invited me to try out a new piece of equipment designed to secure wheelchairs and scooters on the bus,” Helen says. Helen, along with representatives from Q’Straint and some members of the press, took a journey through Hull on the EYMS double decker. The journey began with Helen seamlessly boarding the bus, backing in to the wheelchair space and securing herself by “pressing a large flashing green button”, within 20 seconds two arms were securely holding her wheelchair in place. Helen reported: “I tried my best to escape from the arms securing me but my wheelchair did not budge. This bus could have driven a slalom course and I would have remained exactly where I was locked in. I felt completely safe and secure.” “Quantum ensures the highest level of passenger safety whilst also giving wheelchair users the independence to automatically self-secure without driver assistance. It provides ground breaking new levels of safety and accessibility and we are delighted to see the first UK installation on board an East Yorkshire Motor Services bus,” said Andy Cumming, managing director. Q’Straint continues to roll out Quantum across the UK with the latest installation with
has the most exhaustive and comprehensive research and testing programs; and for more than two decades has played a key role in developing regional and international safety standards. Today, its diverse global staff serves customers in more than 50 countries throughout North and South America, Europe, Australasia, Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Q For more information visit QStraint.com. Become a Q’Straint friend on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ QStraint and follow on Twitter at www.twitter.com/qstraint.
How Quantum Works Q’Straint engineers applied the highest levels of industrial design to ensure Quantum delivers the performance to keep passengers safe and operators productive. When the vehicle is safely stopped, the Quantum unit is ready for the wheelchair passenger. Once the passenger’s wheelchair is centered against the backrest, the press of a button engages the automatic locking sequence. Integration with existing vehicle electrical and interlock systems prevents accidental release of a secured wheelchair while the vehicle is in motion. Quantum is being introduced after one year of extensive field tests in severe driving conditions.
TOP and ABOVE: The wheelchair is automatically self-secured, without driver assistance
721 vehicles. Q’Straint is also in discussions with many major European bus manufacturers and operators and is very excited by the reception Quantum has received. It is now at the stage where it is discussing detailed installations, definitely a leap in the right direction.
Lothian buses. The unit has been installed on a new for 2015 Volvo Wrightbus Hybrid, and will be servicing a highly dependent wheelchair user route. Lothian Buses operate over 70 services in Edinburgh and surrounding areas of Midlothian and East Lothian and has a fleet of
Industry Benefits Operators will benefit immediately and profoundly with reduced dwell time when securing passengers in mobility devices which will result in more reliable schedules. More evolved than manual tie-downs, Quantum puts an end to challenging securement manoeuvres that upset passengers and put drivers at risk of personal injury. By safely securing wheelchairs and scooters, Quantum ultimately reduces liability exposure for injuries to mobility impaired passengers as well as to seated or standing commuters who could be injured by unsecured mobility devices.
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SCOTL AND'S BUSES 2015
Bus Users Scotland runs Your Bus Matters events across Scotland that are held in conjunction with operators and local authorities
BUS - WORKING FOR PASSENGERS bus users scotl and (bus) is working w ith par tners across the countr y to drive up standards in bus travel and put the needs of bus passengers at the hear t of transpor t policy us passengers in Scotland, it would seem, are pretty satisfied with their journeys – certainly passengers travelling with the 11 operators who participated in the latest round of surveys conducted by what was then Passenger Focus and published in Autumn 2014. These were Scotland’s major operators – First, Lothian, McGill’s, National Express and Stagecoach – and they achieved some of the best results in Britain, with 92% overall satisfaction for all of them. This largely mirrors the complaints and monitoring work carried out by Bus Users Scotland, set up in 2013 with funding from
B
Transport Scotland, an agency of the Scottish Government. This has allowed us at Bus Users Scotland – conveniently BUS – to open an Edinburgh office and employ six staff. Like our colleagues at Bus Users Cymru, we are part of the Bus Users UK family, and as transport is devolved to the Scottish Government we work closely with the Transport Policy unit at Transport Scotland as well as the traffic commissioner, bus operators, local authorities and a range of stakeholders representing the interests of bus passengers. While the Bus Passenger Survey results are encouraging, we know from our own work that there is no room for complacency, even among the principal operators.
They still attract their fair share of complaints, but we know from the complaints that pass through our office that the way they handle these has improved greatly. It would be gratifying to think that the existence of BUS has played its part in this, but we sense a genuine desire to get away from woolly cut-and-paste responses to complainants that often ignored the basic complaint with glib phrases. We monitor the responses bus passengers receive and see that there is a much stronger commitment among bus companies to deal with complaints properly and speedily, and even to admit that they get things wrong sometimes, and provide a genuine apology and, where appropriate, provide travel
vouchers where passengers have been inconvenienced. But there are still pockets of bus operation in Scotland where passengers are poorly treated, with inadequate or non-existent bus stop information, chronic unreliability, buses simply not operating, surly drivers, poor driving standards, unsuitable buses – the list goes on. We are aware of these problems from the complaints we receive and from the work of our three Bus Compliance Monitors. They operate throughout Scotland, monitoring punctuality, reliability and quality standards both at registered timing points, using radio-controlled watches, and by travelling the routes, which can allow them to identify reasons for late running such as road traffic accidents and roadworks. Our aim at BUS is to drive up standards in bus travel and put the needs of bus passengers at the heart of transport policy. Our focus is on compliance monitoring to check bus services are running where and when they should be; complaints management, to ensure that complaints are handled efficiently and effectively; good practice development – working with bus companies, acting on complaints and sharing best practice; and advocacy – working with government, local authorities, special interest groups, Transport Scotland and bus companies to make sure the views and interests of passengers are properly represented. The input of the Bus Compliance Monitors is an essential part of our work. They travel incognito and monitor services on every day of the week and at all times of day to get a complete picture. They operate in response to requests from the traffic commissioner’s office, follow up complaints, and will monitor services at the invitation of bus operators who may have concerns about a particular route or particular drivers. Their reports are routinely sent to the Traffic Commissioner’s office and where concerns have been expressed about aspects of a
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BUS USERS UK
company’s operations, BUS staff will contact the operator to discuss how matters can be improved. Our Monitors are called to present evidence to Joan Aitken, the traffic commissioner for Scotland, at Public Inquiries, and have been praised for the thorough nature of their evidence and presentation. Bus travel is important in Scotland, with 420 million passenger journeys made on local services in 2014/15, a figure that appears to have stabilised after falling sharply in the years after 2007/08. Over 80% of these journeys are made in the southern part of Scotland, taking in the Central Belt, the south-west and the Borders. The remainder are made in the vast area to the north where, beyond major cities like Dundee, Aberdeen and Inverness, population density is such that many communities have no bus service, and others rely on infrequent services usually supported by the local authority. While much of BUS’s work is inevitably in the more populous areas of southern Scotland, we also focus on the more remote communities. In 2014/15 BUS dealt with over 500 complaints (2013/14: 307); this increase is partly due to the raised awareness of BUS among passengers in Scotland, and partly to the Your Bus Matters events held across Scotland – what Bus Users UK used to call ‘surgeries’ – where passengers have the chance to make their views known. Your Bus Matters events are held in conjunction with bus operators and the relevant local authority and held in a prominent location. Bus companies are encouraged to provide buses and staff and the events are advertised locally in the weeks leading up to the event. The choice of venue may be the result of concerns about bus services in that area, or follow major route changes, or may be requested by one of the bus operators as a means of gathering useful research from passengers. All of the major operators in Scotland have been involved and
many local independent operators have also attended. The events are informal and allow passengers to discuss any issues or concerns about the buses they use. It must be noted however that much positive feedback is also received by operators, including praise for helpful drivers, decent buses, and good timekeeping. Transport representatives from the local authority are invited to the event and we encourage them to attend these events as there are often questions and comments about aspects of bus travel that are under their control, including bus stations, information, stops and shelters, as well as supported services. All comments are logged and BUS maintains contact with the passengers and the bus companies/ local authorities to ensure that comments and complaints are properly followed up. Of all the complaints handled by BUS in 2014/15, the greatest number concerned service reliability, followed by driver/staff attitude, buses failing to show or
stop, frequency of service and vehicle condition. These same categories regularly account for most of the complaints BUS handles, and in addition, the Department for Transport has designated Bus Users UK as the recognised body to oversee bus users’ complaints under EPRR (European Passenger Rights Regulations), covering Great Britain outside London. Complaints received directly from the public are directed to the bus company or local transport authority concerned and we monitor the progress of these complaints to ensure that passengers are receiving appropriate responses. In most instances the operators resolve complaints quickly. However, in situations where an operator has either dealt with a complaint and the complainant is not satisfied with the response or they have simply failed to act on the complaint, then BUS will take up these complaints and liaise with key decision-makers within the bus company concerned
Gavin Booth (left) leads Bus Users Scotland and its staff of six based in Edinburgh
BELIEFS
BUS believes that bus users have a right to expect: Q Good-quality information at every stop Q A clear indication of buses serving each
stop Q Advance notice of service changes Q Friendly, helpful drivers Q Clean and wellpresented buses Q Clean and comfortable seats Q Adequate heating and ventilation Q Safe and smooth driving standards
Q In-bus information – ideally audio/visual next stop information Q Prompt and appropriate complaint handling by bus and coach companies Q Bus priority measures and strict parking controls to allow buses to run punctually
in order to secure a positive outcome for the complainant. Since the launch of the new Bus Users UK website at the start of 2014, passengers have an easier way of getting in contact with BUS as they can submit a complaint online via our web form; this means that complaints can reach us quicker especially when a complainant submits via their smart phone/ tablet after the incident. This also allows operators to receive CCTV footage quicker if it is required in order to investigate a complaint. The Bus Appeals Body Scotland (BABScot) comprises an independent convener, Ian Longair, and two members - John Elliot, chief executive of Traveline Scotland, representing the bus industry, and Harry Barker, representing bus passengers. BUS works hard to resolve complaints problems before they are referred to BABScot, but where disagreement continues, BABScot adjudicates on the case, considering all correspondence from both parties, before reaching a decision which may favour the passenger or the bus company. In 2014/15 just one case was referred to BABScot. BUS has developed excellent working relationships with bus companies throughout Scotland and works closely with the traffic commissioner and her staff, Transport Scotland, CPT Scotland, and Regional Transport Partnerships, and sits on the Transport Scotland Bus Stakeholder Group and specific working groups, in addition to local groups throughout Scotland. BUS is keen to encourage local Bus User Groups that give bus passengers a voice and access to bus company and local authority staff. These are often formed where passengers are unhappy about the level or quality of bus service they receive, and the most active group, the Rural East Lothian Group RELBUS, concerned about the bus services in that area, is a good example of an effective lobby group. Q Bus Users Scotland, Hopetoun Gate, 8b McDonald Road, Edinburgh EH7 4LZ Q www.bususers.org
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