This Routemaster with the Logo of the South Devon Railway displayed in the destination blind was seen in Newton Abbot this afternoon. I haven't seen this bus about before but for more info click here
A slightly less welcome sight but not unexpected was a brand new litter bin back in the firing line in Fleet Street. It would appear the Honorable Guild of Litter Bins carry less weight then the litter bins themselves.Meanwhile what a day! For me it started about 11:15 when I signed on. I catch a bus up to the depot to start work and when I get on the driver usually tells me if there are any problems around the Bay. Nothing was said. When I signed on and collected my running board the controllers didn't report any problems so I walked down to the Newton Road to pick up my bus for Brixham with a song in my heart. It's a beautiful sunny day. Bus is due at 11:34. I wasn't too concerned at 11:40 when it hadn't turned up but 11:50 arrived and the bus hadn't. Then 12 noon, then 12:10. What was of more concern was the fact that the 11:24 hadn't arrived either. Then at 12:12 two buses arrived, the second one was the one I was taking over and it was 38 minutes late. This is excessive and could only mean either road works or an RTC. Well it was road works, a hundred yards before the Penn Inn roundabout. The buses were being held up on the way into Newton and on the way out. Traffic was being controlled not by temp traffic lights but by stop go boards. Stop go boards usually work better than traffic lights as the operators can watch the flow of traffic and alter the timing to suit. I don't think much watching flow of traffic was taking place here today. When I got there 4 hours later, after a trip to Brixham and a lunch break in Paignton, there seemed to be 50 vehicles coming the other way and 5 going towards Newton. Four buses arrived in the bus station together which was full of school children from the two local secondary school as well as lots of shoppers on their way home. I pulled out first with only about 20 children on board but picked up at every stop as far as Jury's Corner and by the time I got into Torquay was pretty much full. Then someone ripped their ticket out of the machine with a disproportionate amount of violence considering the ticket is only made of paper, thin paper at that so a further few minutes was lost while the machine was given some first aid due to the fact it got jammed by the paper being twisted. Please wait for the paper to cut before removing it from the machine.
By the way, it really was a lovely sunny day again down here in beautiful Devon.
7 comments:
With regards to the Wayfarer ticket machines -- V cutting blade requires you to pull the ticket at a horizontal angle. Many people pulled down or up which meant the paper was contacting the length of the blade as opposed to being pierced.
Bit late to say now but never mind.
What Fleet Street needs is KERBS.
Ticket machines? You aint seen nothing yet...
http://www.ticketmachinewebsite.com/
Dave, why not take the ticket and hand it to the passenger yourself? That's what some of the drivers do down here
No sign of roadworks at 4.30. We sailed through Kingskerswell.
It must take a special kind of eejut to mess with a ticket machine.
I struggled into Newton ariving at 4:05 and dropped off and was the first bus of 4 out of Newton which means there would have been at least a 30 minute gap. One lady asked why she had been waiting so long and I said "Road works, you will she them when we get past Penn Inn." No she didn't, they'd gone by the time I got there. I felt a right ........
Hi Paul in Exeter, Fleet Street was going to get a complete makeover, kerbs and all; then Rock Walk fell down so the money has gone elsewhere.
Post a Comment