Scenario - on Wednesday, I had two laptops to drop off with a volunteer in Salisbury.  These days, I make such journeys by public transport if I can, looking around and seeing how it works for others because if the population into grow and we are to be more carbon friendly, we have to grow the proportion of people using mass transit.  And we have two do that with a carrot to encourage, and with all the joints oiled and not with sticks and penalties to force people.

My report - So outward, Melksham to Salisbury, as recommended by Google. How did that go?



Using Google "Melksham to Salisbury" I came up with a plan to travel by bus, with a change in Devizes.  That's different to my normal plan of covering the longer distances by trains, because we have no trains this week in Melksham and I saw little point in walking to the station to catch a bus to Trowbridge from there, and at a higher price than the bus where my senior (ENCTS) pass lets me ride at no extra charge after 9 a.m.

Google's recommended 272 stops across the road from my home. Timetabled from Melksham Market Place at 09:27, it passes a minute later. The MyTrip App lets me see how the bus is doing, and I was eating toast, drinking coffee as I watched the bus coming in to town, walked out, crossed the road and within a few minutes hailed the bus. It's a well known (to me, anyway) hourly service Monday to Saturday daytime, but it would be useful for others - and indeed as an advert for the significant number of people who walk past, for it to be advertised on the bus stop which has no timetable, and no QR code label or equivalent so no way of people not "in the know" to find out.

We were, formerly, a hotel.  And from those days, many guests looking to spend a day in Bath, or make a visit to Devizes, would ask about transport.  So many times I have been asked about the Park and Ride for Bath, from guests not wanting to brave driving into the city, and my advice was almost inevitably "leave your car here and take the bus from outside". People did, people were amazed, people still drive into Bath from Melksham when the bus would be better for them. I digress.

Bus arrives, I know to put my hand out, stops,  That "put your had out" isn't obvious to all newcomers; advice as a hotelier we had to make sure that we gave. Labelling on the bus is "Devizes" - good - the "via Box" part of the display is gone by the time it reaches us; how easy for someone not knowing and headed for Box to have got on?  I board - confirmation from the driver that here in Wiltshire the senior pass is now accepted from 09:00 (thank goodness - it makes operational sense too, levelling out the old post-09:30 peak) and there's about half a dozen on the bus, which is on time.



And so towards Devizes.  We do a detour around the residential 'burb of Bowerhill, twisting and turning around streets named after WW2 aircraft and commanders; the odd person gets off so I suppose the detour was a useful one, but there's often a handful off and on around the estate and all the little flows do add up to mass transit.  Twists and turns make it very hard for me personally to read, to type, to do much more than watch and think, and the speed humps don't help.  This bus has USB power points if I had wanted to make use of them, but as far as I could tell no WiFi connection.  No announcements of where we were, or screen telling us - for the regular traveller announcements of every stop can be irritating, for the newcomer they are very re-assuring and helpful - almost vital, except to note that we never had them in the past.

Out of the estate, onto the main road towards Devizes ... and in a couple of miles the hamlet of Sells Green.  3 or 4 people picked up here; always a busy stop which feels unexpected until you realise that it's serving a campsite where for some reason (I must investigate) there seems to be a high proportion of people using public transport.  Contrast that later to another campsite on the next bus which was zero off, zero on.

And so up the hill into Devizes and onto the back of a queue / traffic lights / road works with single alternate way traffic over Prison Bridge. Just a couple of minutes.  And then a bit of a queue to the old brewery which I expected, knowing that the road into the Market Place was closed a couple of days ago due to a major file and the service still being on the scene.

We turned left into New Park Street - the inner bypass road in Devizes - and were dropped off, virtually on time, at 09:50 at the National Express Coach Stop in front of the Police Station. About 15 on the bus by this point after a number of local pickups on the (direct) road we took into Devizes. End of journey for the bus and everyone knew to get off.

I crossed the road and walked down the narrow "Snuff Street" into the Market Place - anxious to observe how the Bus Island was labelled for being out of use / alternatives, and indeed not knowing where my bus to Salisbury, which usually starts from there, was going from today. In hindsight, I saw nothing at the police station bus stop directing me to the centre / Market Place though it might have been there.



Considering it was only 48 hours since the major blaze, "The Council" (and I think that means Wiltshire Council, public transport section) has done a good job of waymarking and pointing people up Snuff Street to the alienate bus stop, and it does make it clear that it's all buses that normally go from the Market place including the 2, 3A and 3C which start there and do not use the closed road section.   Good series of pointers up Snuff Street too.



One minor criticism - at the top of Snuff Street, signage points left to the bus stop - sorta-right, but has you crossing the congested traffic of New Park Street away from any pedestrian crossing if you're taking a bus that would normally go from the bus island front.  Ideally something to suggest using the zebra that's just to the right?



The bus stop (National Express Coach stop) outside the Police Station in Devizes normally sees one service a day. It may be adequate for that, but it's totally inappropriate as the major town stop for many services per hour, lots of which start and end there. It's all they have at the moment, and it's totally understood that it's going to be far from perfect.  No level access, no shelter, no space for the number of buses nor for the number of people waiting. Tough, but understandable for a few days.  And temporary bright coloured signage listing the bus service that stop these, attached to the lamp post that has the dogeared National Express sign, provides an immediate reassurance that, yes, this is where the buses are calling ... but ...



No "next bus". No timetables. Go online to bustimes and it tells you nothing about buses from here. There are at least 4 companies running services here - Faresaver, goAhead, Stagecoach and National Express. Wiltshire Connect is running from here too.  I know the Faresaver tracking app, and that others have similar, but I need to know which company I am to be going with to find out even electronically about my bus. It could be more joined up than it is!   There are real time bus displays and something as simple as a screen in the window of the Police Station tracking the stop real time would do wonders.   The biggest value of real time displays is to inform when things are going wrong, and to say "things are wrong so we can't bring you data" is - err - destroying one of the very reasons for them.

10:10, the time for the Salisbury bus, come and goes. And at that point I go on to bustimes (my own app I am working on) to see what buses are expected here and nearby. Nothing - at all - for the New Park Street stop (well, I am in a develop and test mode) and I try the stop 200 metres away - the bus island - and it lists upcoming services.  Not the 10:10 because that time has passed, but rather 11:12 which is the time of the next Salisbury bus. Where has my bus gone?  Some 20 minutes later, a Salisbury Red 2 passes going the other way ... and at long last - 10:38 (some 28 minutes late) it comes in and we set off at 10:40. A fellow passenger tells me that the Salisbury bus is always late, more so today because of the Market Place closure.



Another bumpy bus ride - nature of the beast - as I try to use my phone to message the person in Salisbury meeting me.  No charging points on this bus, but it does have a "next stop" screen and irritating announcements of next stops as we go along the way.  But, yes, keep those announcments.



The 2 runs from Devizes to Salisbury, but all around the houses and of the 6 people on from Devizes I may have been the only person going all the way.  Diversions off the direct route through Market Lavington, through Orcheston, and then from Shrewton across to the A36 and a diversion through the village of Great Wishford, turning round there are going back through the village and then on to the A36 again.   Road works on the back "B" Road and a major jam at Wilton where road works on the main roundabout reduced the flow to a 4 way set of lights ... and it was 12:00 when we pulled into - err "Windsor Street" which is the same stop that Google had as the "United Reform Church".  Good job I know Salisbury and knew this was a sensible place to get off, though these was a further clue in most people getting off there.

Further notes on the "2" - at one point the tracking seemed to stick at "Rickbarton" and I think anyone relying on it for John o'Gore's Cross would have missed their stop.  And I do with people had their fares / tickets ready when boarding rather than being seemingly surprised and fumbling around once they have stepped on.

Lessons?

That buses between town are dealing with three flows - the interurban between the towns, the flows to and from the villages, and the flows within the towns which are much more biased towards the mobility restricted.  On the traffic I saw, there is little point in running a direct service as it would not make economic sense - however that could be because what's currently offered is so slow it puts people off

That there is a need for information and tracking that is consistent and correct even as circumstances change.  Having a system to tell you about how your service is disrupted that fails when services are disrupted ... and is misleading or plain wrong ... is pretty poor. I'm not saying "worse than useless" because the knowledgable can guess!

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My report - So return, Salisbury to Melksham, as recommended by Google. How did that go?

Return trip ... planned to go via Warminster and Trowbridge.  Unlike outward journey, return had a random start ("when I had finished") just after 1 p.m.

Crossed the road (from where I arrived) to the bus stop - nice, neat, clean, long list of route and timetables.  Where is the 24 - timetable missing and it turns out that it's a different operator.  Real Time display for all the various Go-Ahead routes and along the top usefully says that the 24 is being delayed due to road works but no times given anywhere.  I know it's hourly and a search on my phone reveals an app to live track.  Go to that and I think it tells me that there's a service on its way out at Wilton and nothing showing inbound.   There might be a vehicle in Salisbury on turn around (but then there might not) and I'm not going to risk it.



Checking for route 2 - back via Devizes - nothing showing on the departure screen and the timetable suggests almost an hour to wait.  Ouch. And I know that the 2 is not exactly running to time today. Decision made to use the train instead.   So walk to station.



Knowing ahead that trains via Melksham were replaced by buses, I bought a ticket to Trowbridge which was not on the front panel, so I selected the A to Z of stations button. Useful to have suggestions coming up, but why not suggest the most common destinations?   Trafford Park, Trefforest, Trefforest Estate ... not exactly common destinations from Salisbury.  Trowbridge was the 4th most popular destination last year with 2,850 journeys ... Trafford Park listed at no, 1557 - zero journeys last year but there was one in a previous year. Trefforeest 57 journeys last year, ranked 311th ... anyway, carried on typing and got my ticket, through barrier, to platform.



Train arrived on time, got on, found seat.  Much better able to work on train than on bus.  Display screen said "Next Station: Southampton Central" which I and everyone else was ignoring. Didn't notice and audio announcements at all.



Left on time ... a couple of minutes before the London to Exeter (Axminster short run this week) arrived.  Regular hourly pattern, still failing to connect. 



And so on - Warminster - Westbury - Trowbridge all on time.  Still saying "Next Station - Southampton Central".   Got off at Trowbridge.

Station departure board has "Chippenham via Melksham" showing as a but at 14:53 (currently 14:19).  Sign points to bus stop out of station - not obvious if it's for this bus but I wander across to the stop at the top of the station approach and find it advertising a bus at 14:30 ... the x34. Timetable suggest it was actually due at 14:25.





Bus stop - filthy. No other word for it. Mixture of graffiti, other vandalism and lack of cleaning.  Not good for a key interchange.  And so to Melksham - Market Place at 14:57.  5 minute walk home / back to starting point, which was around 30 minutes earlier than had I taken the bus advertised at Trowbridge Station, assuming it had been on time.

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My Outbound was 158 minutes from leaving the house.
Return was 115 minutes but includes 20 minutes wait at start
Google suggests 56 minutes driving - 30 mile journey

 
From my summary of my Wednesday trip to Salisbury


But yet we are not really comparing like for like - 56 v 115 v 158 minutes is simplistic

I have taken the comparison of modes and times further -

Comes to a choice of which route to take (no, this is not a Melksham picture)



going from here:



to here:



and here's my evaluation ...

 
2. Is a Melksham picture. 

CfM.