Lignes d'Azur - The Nice Tramway

Lignes d'Azur is actually the name of the municipal public transport undertaking throughout the Nice area.  It currently only has one tram line, through the city of Nice, alongside urban and inter-urban bus services.

The Nice Tramway serves the heart of the city's shopping centre, Avenue Jean Medicin.

Nice Tramway is operated by a fleet of five-section domestically built Alstom Citadis trams.

Clear maps showing tram lines and local buses are at each tram stop.

Real time information is at every stop.  I'm not sure of there's such a thing as a Tram court amongst the seemingly homogeneous fleet of Alston Citadis.

I do like a simple ticketing system.  Ticket choices are a single ('solo'), 10-trip carnet ('multi'), a one day or 7 day pass, or a ticket which includes the bus connection to Nice Airport, the latter attracting something of a price premium q.v.

And even better when the ticket machines looks exactly like the printed fare information.  Very simple to use.

Trams have next stop displays on board: like the ticketing these are simple and clear to understand.

As the Tramway rounds Promenade du Paillon the tram's track are sunk in to grass.  I think this helps a lot with the post-construction aesthetics of tramways. 

Information booth in central Nice about the planned extensions ti Nice Tramway.  Sadly, closed at the time of my nocturnal passing.

The bus service between Nice centre-ville and the Airport is operated by Mercedes Citaros as routes 98 and 99.  These two routes command a considerable fare premium, with a single fare of 6 euros, compared to 1.5 euros on other local buses. However the local buses are only a short walk from Terminal 1 on Promenade des Anglais.  It remains to be seen which pricing model the new tram adopts.

One final gratuitous tram shot.

MyCiti - Cape Town's BRT

In the summer of 2017 I took advantage of a cheap air fare to visit South Africa for the first time.  I included Cape Town on my travels, and as usual, sought to use local public transport to get around.  Prior to my arrival I was aware Cape Town had two separate bus networks, but wasn’t aware of the newer network’s adoption of some of the more interesting elements of bus rapid transit.  Having never been to Curitiba or Bogota it was my first time seeing ‘proper’ platform boarding on a bus.  I didn't have time for an extensive ride around the MyCiti system, but here's a few images from the travels I did make.

The Airport Station looks like the entrance to a metro system: the physical attributes and gate line do not suggest a bus-based service, or even light rail (which typically has open platforms too).

Airport services are in the hands of rigid Volvo B7Ls.  This one is at the down town 'Civic Centre' bus station,

Some of the MyCiti vehicles have two third height doors and a ramp that folds out which also forms the bottom third of the door.

Some MyCiti services are operated by articulated Scania buses.  Most of the buses on MyCiti were constructed locally - I presume using chassis imported from Europe mated with a locally built body.

Boarding a MyCiti bus in the Civic Centre bus station.

On some buses the ramp folds down from inside the bus.  This is the Airport service, numbered A01.

The down town Civic Centre bus station has many boarding gates.

Entry to most of the MyCiti stations is via ticket gates.  There is a contactless smart card system: even single tickets from the airport are issued on a solid plastic smart card (rather than the paper tickets with a chip inside which some systems use, such as Glasgow Subway).  I believe the idea is that such tickets should be handed back and re-used, although the gates do not collect them automatically.  Beijing Subway uses a similar system for single tickets, where it is a smart card on entry but has to be inserted in to the gate for (re-use) on exit.

A down town Cape Town MyCiti station, with off-side boarding on a central island platform, and again showing ticket gates in use.

View of a MyCiti station from the outside.

Feeder services to MyCiti are also provided using locally built Optare Solo buses.  These have an offside door within the low floor area which necessitates the interchange stations to have two platforms: one at the Solo height and one for the high-floor height doors on the main MyCiti service buses.

Connecting buses at the Civic Centre interchange.  The rear vehicle is not in service as it is parked at a high floor platform.  The front two buses are at platforms which are commensurate with the height of the low floor section of the bus.

The connecting services also use conventional bus stops, such as this one at the V&A Waterfront.

Crossrail Class 345

The first Class 345s for MTR Crossrail, the operator of the Crossrail/Elizabeth line service, have entered customer service operating off peak trips between Liverpool Street and Shenfield.  These are the initial application of the new Bombardier Aventra platform, and were expected in service in mid-May, but it took another six weeks or so before the public could get on board.  However once they could, it seemed rude not to go for a ride!

Initially just one train a day operated, at 10:35.  This was additional to the timetable...if it failed it didn't count towards Charter!

And this is what they replace, the humble Class 315.

One of the more unusual features of the '345, at least far as the public can see, is 26m long carriages (a first for the UK although the IEP will also have 26m vehicles) and three sets of doors per carriage. 

Class 345s made grown men and women take selfies.  With a train! 

The 'SFE' (sexy front end) might be the attraction, and looks rather sleek compared to the '315.  Also of note is these are first trains of recent times (since steam trains?) to not have yellow ends.  New regs mean sufficient brightness (luminoscity? lux?) from lights rule out the need for the yellow visible ends.

Until the end of 2018 the '345s will be operating as seven-car trains between Liverpool St and Shenfield.  Once operations commence through the Crossrail tunnel the final two vehicles will be added.

Designed for standing!  The interior of the 345 has plenty of standing room, tip up seats and longitudinal seating.  These will no doubt be extremely busy once running through central London, but like Underground S8 and Thameslink '700s they are both metro and commuter trains beyond zone 6 so some degree of compromise has been taken with the interior layout and availability of seating.  The bare metal grab rails are quite unusual, certainly unlike any other train in use in the south east, but will be familiar to MTRers who have transferred from Hong Kong operations.

Four bays of four seats are in each vehicle, two each between the three sets of doors.

There are modern flat screen customer information displays, although not as visually appealing as those on the Thameslink Class 700s. I found it surprising the service was mot described as the 'TfL Rail service to Shenfield'.  Indeed the driver made a manual announcement calling it an 'MTR Crossrail service to Shenfield'.  Announcing MTR Crossrail (or for that matter, Keolis Amey Docklands or Arriva Rail London) will only serve to confuse customers.

The automated system then decided we were skipping Stratford and our next stop is Maryland.  The driver's announcement confirmed we would be stopping at Startford.

People like shiney new air conditioned things, though these trains will be real crowd movers before too long.  They seem well built (I tried to break everything I could).  Clearly there's some teething problems which delayed entry to service and the very cautious single daily trip in customer service. Best to sort before out on all day diagrams, and as Roger Ford often says, nothing ever works out of the box!

Leigh Guided Busway - not playing to its adVantage!

Back in late-May 2017 I found myself with some time to kill in the north-west of the Greater Manchester conurbation.  What better idea than to go and ride on the newest kerb guided busway in the UK, from the town of Leigh, opened just over a year ago.  There are two services currently operating on the busway, branded Vantage by First Manchester, with route V1operating from Manchester Royal Infirmary (MRI) to Leigh and the V2 from MRI to Atherton.

1. INFRASTRUCTURE

The Leigh terminus is the bus station, which seems to be one of the more recently modernised bus stations in the Greater Manchester conurbation.  All ticketing is done on-vehicle and is normal First Manchester fares.

V1 service loading at Leigh bus station.

Park and ride site on the outskirt of Leigh town centre.  All the stops on the kerb guided section follow this model of being more akin to a rail/tram stop with larger shelters, a platform type kerb and a supposed real-time information display (more later).

The two services come together at Astley Street.  The V2 from Atherton does not run on any guided sections between Astley Street and Atherton.  Astley Street has another park and ride facility, and is also served as an interchange by non-guided bus routes.

Cars encroaching on to guided busways has been something of an issue in recent years, with cars driving on to Manchester Metrolink also something of a trend following the substantial expansion of the Metrolink network in recent years.  Therefore plenty of signage is provided on the entry to guided sections.  Unlike the Luton-Dunstable guided busway there are no speed limit signs on entry.

Car traps are provided at the entry to the guided sections too.

The Busway does seem unduly hilly and twisty when a much straighter alignment looks achievable.  On the Sunday of my visit the adjacent footpath was busy with walkers/runners/cyclists etc.

Another typical stop on the Busway.

Less than halfway from Leigh to Manchester the Busway ends, at the junction with Newearth Road.

The one stop on Newearth Road is more conventional in design.  There has not been an 'end to end' approach to passenger facilities for the Vantage service.

However there has been some attempt at creating bus priority measures end-to-end.  This is the East Lancashire Road.

However when the space (or money) runs out the Vantage service rejoins the main carriageway on the East Lancashire Road.  in the morning peak I expect this is extremely busy.

As the Vantage routes approach Salford they are subject to numerous speed bumps.  Again a full end-to-end approach has not been adopted.  Putting speed bumps in bus lanes on busy radial routes is both crazy and loses a lot of the attempt at creating a higher quality, smoother service.  This road is used by many bus routes,  I think if traffic calming must be installed a speed cushion , which a bus can straddle, would be more appropriate.

2. SERVICE

A fleet of  Wright bodied Volvo B5LH buses have been branded for the Vantage service.

Interiors featuire large comfortable leather seats with branding for Vantage.  Downstairs the seats are more conventional bus seats, although still in purple leather.

Smart wood effect floors are provided, and the corporate purple of First Group slips through in the chair legs!

The Vantage route from Tyldesley in to Manchester.

3. IN OPERATION

At-stop timetable information produced by Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) from Astley Street to Manchester is rather unhelpful listing the V1 and V2 separately when they operate an identical route and combine to a higher frequency.

The timetable format used by First Manchester is much more user friendly in both layout of the timetable and presentation.

The timetable on a Sunday is half hourly to both Leigh and Atherton, resulting in a quarter hourly service over the common section.  Therefore the sight of two vehicles running together westbound suggests major delays.....

Especially when it happened again!

The information screen at the westbound stop was not working, so no ability to pass any information on to customers....

Not that the working screen eastbound was much use.  Every bus appeared with Chorlton Upon Medlock as its destination before later changing to the MRI.  Chorlton Upon Medlock does not feature on any timetable or map produced by either TfGM or First Manchester!  Each V2 bus arrived three minutes before it was expected, whilst the 12:15 V1 service counted down 3 3ins...1 min....bus approaching....and then disappeared off the screen, with no bus.  Therefore these are not real time, and who knows where the data on them is coming from.

So the next departure on the V2 was bursting at the seams.

Passengers who were jammed in standing downstairs certainly were not being treated to a VIP experience.

Loadings were such that the bus drove past this girl (who's expression I love).....

And straight past these people......

And stopped short of these people.....

And these, who somewhat expectantly started walking towards the bus.

4. CONCLUSION

I left the Leigh Guided Busway feeling somewhat disappointed.  There are people who want to use it: every bus stop had a queue, and there were plenty of cash fares going over the cab door, so it can only be a profitable operation (there have been frequency increases on weekdays post-launch).  But I also saw too many people walking away when buses didn't turn up, when there was no information when they might turn up, and many intending passengers passed by an already full bus.

The infrastructure does not provide an end-to-end rapid transit experience. with the journey time and reliability benefits that should bring.  It relies on running with regular traffic, which on a weekday will be a detriment to reliability, and the Salford area inexplicably is speed bumped.  TfGM/Salford City Council need to address these ridiculous pieces of infrastructure for the benefit of all bus passengers.

The at-stop electronic displays are neither use nor ornament.  Where they work they are not providing accurate or real time information; many did not work.  The provision of accurate real time information for a 2-route bus network should not be expensive or rocket science, and TfGM and First Manchester need to get this working.

I think First have the right idea by taking this beyond a conventional bus service.  Premium bus products appear to be doing well:  Stagecoach Gold, Arriva Sapphire and West Midlands Platinum all seem to be expanding to more and more routes.  Vantage has by far the nicest interiors of any, with USB charging and wifi provided.  Drivers were consistently well presented and friendly.  But then it's let down by TfGM applying its conventional bus information standards which are stuck in the 1980s.  I don't know how the guided busway is accessed, i..e if First Manchester have any kind of sole access rights, but it seems that applying more Vantage and less GMPTE style branding would be a good thing.

And finally reliability. Whoever told the guv'nor "yes sir we're ready for marathon day" was plain lying.  Half hour gaps in what already looks like an inadequate frequency combined with buses being not just full, but standing throughout the lower deck, does not provide a remotely tolerable experience for the new users to public transport that guided busways and Vantage should be attracting, let alone the promised 'VIP experience'.  Add to that the forty-or-so people left behind on one trip.  Am I being harsh?  The day I visited was five days after the bombing of the Manchester Arena, and on the day of the Manchester Marathon/Half Marathon.  Both should surely justify more resource?  It seems that a quarter hourly frequency on Sundays in inadequate in any case. 

#WeLoveMCR but not enough to get you there.