Gone are the college day extensions to Barton Peveril and the 1635 weekday service from Horton Heath to Eastleigh is also cut. The whole route will run for the last time on 19th April. Keep coming back to see if it will be replaced by anything. Brijan 8 of course covers the whole route and more anyway.
Bluestar 4 also has some minor changes to early morning journeys, also from Monday. The weekday 0705 journey from Southampton to Romsey will now depart at 0700 and run 5 minutes earlier throughout. On Saturdays, the 0739 and 0814 short journeys from North Baddesley to Romsey will now run 1 minute later, departing at 0740 and 0815. All other journeys on Bluestar 4 are unaffected. Full new timetable here.
Xelabus X1, X2 and X4 are being rejigged again with new timetables from 22nd April. Full details as we get them.
So much for a stable Xelabus network.
ReplyDeleteAlthough, the cancelled X8 could possibly mean another attempt at a Marwell service.
A stable network from March didn't Xelabus say in another thread !!!!!!
ReplyDeleteWas this the second or third attempt at running the X8 from Xela? I loose track of all their service changes...
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile they have been busy buying ex GoAhead vehicles, saw one today still in Damory livery and a very poor attempt to peel off the logos making a right mess in the process. Not very professional at all.
I drive for Xelabus and I have to say they really are the best company I have worked for. No late turns, no long weekends. The management had a meeting with all staff last week and notified us of forthcoming plans and engaged us for our views. Its a combined decision about the future and they really take our views on board. They held a customer surgery recently and had drivers taking part talking to passengers. This is the mark of a company that cares. Yes the X8 is being withdrawn but only because after attempts to market the route with low floor reliable service it simply cannot attract any further customers because between Brijan and us the maximum number wishing to travel has been reached. Why run a bus without support or enough passengers? Yes the fleet is old but there is a desire to keep the vehicles clean and presentable and have a strong presence on the road. The Damory bus which is still in livery should have been painted this week during half term but the company has let us down. She is kept now for college work and will be painted at the next opportunity. The latest Go Ahead purchase has been painted into all over white and will be branded for a local college. Overall unless you can do better don't knock a company doing their best with limited means.
ReplyDeleteI think comments on what the company owners/management have themselves stated and then done are very fair !
DeleteAttempts to ruin the established business of other small operators is not good practice and wins no friends in the industry.
I hope the drivers enjoy playing while you can - sooner or later the company will fold !
You can not claim that 'the X8 is being withdrawn but only because after attempts to market the route with low floor reliable service it simply cannot attract any further customers because between Brijan and us the maximum number wishing to travel has been reached',when the X8 ran shortly before the BJ8 service. If it had run at times giving an apx half-hrly frequency on the route combined BJ8 & X8 then that would have been a fair trial. Poaching BJ's passengers not good. Attempting to co-operate with a combined half-hrly freq would have been a better move.
DeleteThe overall service on the BJ8 route doesn't attract enough people to make it viable as it's a HCC contracted route ...that may have given a BIG clue as to the number of people needed to make a commercial service on the X8.
Xelabus won't do late turns as they vary rarely have late journeys!!
However, I've got to be unbiased & say yes I've been on the free shoppers Xelabuses & staff always polite & buses clean. May not be new, but ok.
Surprise,surprise...now why doesn't that come as any great shock, Xelabus are consistant if nothing else!
ReplyDeleteLet's face it with all respect to the Xela driver,i suspect the only reason you're not working late turns is because the company haven't won any evening tenders yet, but give it time.....
If any good has come from this Brijan/X8 saga(part 2) it's that Brijan have now started introducing, albeit older low floor buses into it's fleet.
I have stood in Eastleigh bus station in the evening peak and watched loadings on the two services quite often queued one behind the other and whilst the Brijan step Dart has departed with quite a healthy loads the Xelabus SLF has left with a handful of people if that.
This tell's you that passengers will vote on their feet, their more inclined to board the reliable service than something that will be seen to them as no more than a gimmick.
Apparently Brijan is also undertaking some of Xelabuses maintenance work.....i'd say that's a win win situation for Mr Botley when all's said and done.
As the driver of Xelabus we appreciate not having late turns. The company view is that they don't wish to put their staff in a position of unsocialable hours and therefore the daily work fits well with all colleagues and they are satisfied with that. The X8 has been well loaded on many occasions and those that do travel are mainly Twyford Rd residents who have appreciated a low floor bus every time. Brijan have always used step buses and only rarely does a low floor appear. No we get on well with Brian Botley and do give him maintenance work as well as his staff understand and sympathetic towards Mr Blairs heritage collection. So it is a win win for Xela by saving money on running the X8 and getting their buses maintaine dmuch cheaper and better.
ReplyDeleteGood that you admit that BJ can maintain Xelabuses much cheaper & better.
ReplyDeleteCompletely off topic, for which I apologise, but hot off the press, and from the horses mouth (cant tell you which horse, of course), but First are about to pull out of their 11 route disaster. Watch the VOSA website over the next couple of weeks for confirmation.
ReplyDeleteWhat horses' mouth didbyou hear that from?!
DeleteMy understanding is that there big changes coming for the 11 and x2.
You cant get any bigger than completely scrapping them both!
DeleteX2 is an important route. I don't think first will scrap it any time soon. Specially because the loadings are improving and the x2 is a route that shouldn't be analysed isolated but as a bundle x2 , 2 and 2a.
ReplyDeleteI doubt that it gets much better if you include them. Millbrook to Lordshill and Harefield to Thornhill are pretty poor sections. Suggest routes are making (or losing) money in this order: 3,7,1,6,2/2A,8/8A,9,5,10,X2 and 11.
DeleteI agree with your analysis of First routes.... You missed off the S1....thats being scrapped completely too. The X2 is most certainly going. They have decided that they cannot keep losing money at that rate. Orders from above, I am told.
DeleteThe S1 is not being scrapped. Where did you hear this rubbish from?
DeleteYou will find out very shortly about all the cuts,but my info came from within your union who are in deep consultations, but cant tell you yet....!
DeleteWell I hope first don't scrap the x2 as this will really mess up with the 2 series that currently serve Milbrook every 5 min.
ReplyDeleteReturning to the XELA theme - Xela aren't running the Havant Tesco Freebus anymore. It's Stagecoach again as I saw it today!
ReplyDeleteYes our company have carried out a schedule change and transferred the Tesco free bus to Stagecoach for operational reasons. Good news is that Xela have one a 3 year contract for continuing the C3, C4 and 507. From May the X1, X2 and X4 are being tweaked too to be part of the X7 rota. We have heard that the management are looking at new buses for the X7. I am very happy driving for them and they work with us and it is a breath of fresh air working for a bus company that gives time for the driver rather than long hours, poor managers and weekend working. I'm staying with Xela.
ReplyDeleteWell, at least all the major operators can now rest easy in their beds, knowing that Xelabus are not intending to try to expand into a proper bus operator, instead continuing to under price any contract work and under invest in their business by running even more of their rusty old nails around the streets. It had the makings of a great threat, but we are all very happy that they continue to pander to their staff in order to be a "local" company.....
DeleteJust shows what a prat you are when you did not even take what was said by the guy at 7 March 0946. Xelabus are a breath of fresh air I think and I have nothing to do with the company. I am amazed how you seem to think you know it all?? Stick your neck in and keep playing with your Dinky buses
DeleteActually I agree with anon @0156, a company is doomed if it basis it's shift patterns around what it's drivers prefer than what it's prospective customers require.
ReplyDeleteI think you'll find that this company is doomed full stop!!!
ReplyDeleteIt appears to me that Xela are being built to look like a proper operation, in the hope of a sell off to one of the major operators, as we have often seen in the past, as an organisation becomes a "thorn in the side". What they seem to have failed to spot this time, is that no major operator needs them, nor do the big boys have the appetite or funding in the current climbate! I still predict that they will come crashing to earth, as they have underpriced just about everything that they do.
DeleteFirst time posting:
ReplyDeleteThe reason Xelabus no longer run the Tesco Havant Bus is because the area manager of the Tesco Xtra Group, got on the bus and was shocked at the rude regular driver, and also the driver was caught not making the correct amount of journeys that Tesco's pays for, they was given a Formal Warning, this I know as a Fact as a department manager for Tescos
But apparently XELABUS subcontracted the bus to stagecoach as it was costing a lot to run an empty Double Decker running Light/Dead from its school run from Fareham I have been told by the supervisor in Havant this week.
its not stagecoach for your infomation its emsworth and district , the last laugh is they have giving the work to the above , but xelabus will always have a chance at shopper work due to pb marketing win win for all ........
ReplyDeleteIt is Stagecoach! Emsworth & District run the service 75 which is paid for by Scottish & Southern Energy & serves Tesco as well as their site
ReplyDeleteCan Say its stagecoach have the tesco bus As I have done it this week on overtime guys/girls :)
ReplyDeleteHad been warned that Tesco will be checking up on the bus/drivers, :)
Most of these shopper routes are box ticking exercises to allow the stores to be built.Previously,stores had little interest in usage numbers or reliability.Contract rates often fail to keep pace with operating costs,hence operators getting fed up dealing with the middle man.
ReplyDeleteI think fares have to be charged for intermediate use now,as other operators didn't like a sponsored freebus creaming off commercial custom en-route.
There is little commecial value in X-Bus cheapo contracts so why would anyone buy them out? Everyone I speak to can't wait for them to fold.The 'here today gone tomorrow' nature of their constant route tinkering hardly helps grow any real custom does it? Nice clean buses though.
thank you for your remark regards nice clean buses , people out there do not care much for xelabus , but its a job for people who work there . could it be the workers are better then the managers are they the ones causing the problems . yet again workers , work and managers cock up ....
ReplyDeleteAre you saying you and the staff don't think the owners know what they are doing then ?
ReplyDeleteno i have looked at alot of comments in the past and feel the drivers at xelabus get a hard time . and it looks like the management have a very different understanding regards running routes and letting them run a course of time to see how they get on .....
ReplyDelete