Monday 29 July 2013

Xelabus X7 changes from today

Xelabus X7 has a couple of timetable changes from today.

  • The 0745 from Eastleigh to Chandlers Ford will now also run on Saturdays.
  • The 0915 and 1615 services from Eastleigh to Chandlers Ford are withdrawn.
  • The 0940 M-S,1540 weekday and 1640 M-S services from Chandlers Ford to Eastleigh are withdrawn.
  • The 1810 service from Chandlers Ford to Eastleigh will now also run on Saturdays.

Here's the full new X7 timetable:

See the full timetables for all of Xelabus's Eastleigh routes here.

Please watch out for diversions to Bluestar 8 in Totton and Bluestar 3 in Botley. Also diversions coming up soon in Totton (again), Bishopstoke and Hounsdown.

34 comments:

  1. I notice you flag up that the X7 will be changing yet again in early September...

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  2. I hear its additional journeys from Velmore otherwise timetable is the same

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  3. new services x31/32/33 starting then too

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  4. Yes it looks like replacing the free buses that ran to Hedge End Retail Park. Out of interest, has any one noticed how standards are slipping at Velvet? Their orange bus is held together with black tape? Also rumours are that Phil Stockley owner of Velvet is working for another company in Yorkshire and having very little to do with his Eastleigh company!!

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  5. Anon at 08:58 - what company?

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  6. Rumours are rumours. I have no idea if there is anything in them or not. I know Phil reads this site so will probably reply himself when he has time. He of course has no obligation to do so.

    Anonymous comments hinting at safety flaws should be taken with a very large pinch of salt.

    I'm sure Velvet have a very capable team running the company day to day, whether or not the unsubstantiated rumour mentioned above is true.

    This site continues to welcome anonymous comments, but they should be taken in context. Some may be pure speculation that has no basis in fact. I'm not saying that's necessarily the case with the anonymous post above, only that it could be. We have no way of knowing.

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  7. He is working for TM Travel at Sheffield on a part time basis as General Manager. "safety flaws" and "capable team" take a look yourselves when next in Eastleigh

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    1. If standards have been slipping anywhere, it's at Exelbus (as if there were ever standards there anyway, ha!) I travel on the X7 regularly as I work at B&Q and this week, one of the drivers was complaining to all the passengers about not getting a pay increase and how badly the management treat them. There have been a lot of old fashioned buses on the X7 a lot recently which is something the management said would never happen. It's not good as the route has mostly old people and they can't get their shopping up the steps. Poor and lazy effort all round. I'd rather have First or Blue Line running this route than these incompetent fools.

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    2. I do check from time to time on this site and felt Mr Rileys message could not go unchallenged. Service X7 continues to be operated with low floor SLF buses and additional low floor double deckers operate as and when necessary. I will speak to our X7 team of drivers about your claim about complaining to passengers. We never operate step entrance buses so we do care for the elderly and have ramps for wheelchair users.In fact Mr Riley may be interested to know we are looking at new buses and have some demonstrator buses shortly to operate the X7. Not really poor and lazy effort ? And as for "incompentent fools" perhaps Mr Riley would care to come and see me at my office and let me and him discuss his concerns. Always prepared to meet our customers. Philip Blair, Managing Director, Xelabus Ltd

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    3. Will your X31,32,33 be a sort of pay as you go (but claim back) to Sainsbury's like the Tesco Bursledon services are? Be good to have the service back. Nice one Xela.

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  8. Quite what gossip about one man's employment status has to do with the success of a whole company is beyond me.

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  9. And where is any link to substantiate the claims about PS's relationship with TM Travel?

    ISTM that Mr Rumour Anonymous' posts have the marks of a grudge bearer.

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  10. Is velvet going to take over the E1 & E2?

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  11. Very interested in the withdrawal of the E1/E2 Bluestar. Have contacted them via email to the manager but still awaiting reply. Cant seem to find any new registrations from the major companies on VOSA's site either.

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  12. Ah well, since SotonBus himself has suggested I might like to take the floor, here’s my ‘state of the nation’ address on behalf of Velvet.

    To acknowledge an unpleasant truth, Anon (31/7/13 08:58) is not totally wide of the mark in pointing out some of our little local difficulties. We have had a tough time with vehicles this year. A cluster of major unit failures has accompanied some poor MOT planning on our part and resulted in too many long-term VORs.

    This has forced us to hire vehicles in on several occasions – with grateful thanks to the donor companies but a poor show for us in terms of reputation and presentation – and on occasions (such as on the orange decker at present where black tape is masking some accident damage) caused us to present a disappointing image of ourselves.

    Nevertheless, our first class team of drivers continue to weave their magic, lost mileage remains at virtually zero, feedback from customers remains highly positive and patronage is growing across our network. If that’s a sign of failure, I’ll take that!

    On the vehicle situation, there is light at the end of the tunnel, with our peak MOT season coming to an end, the arrival of another DAF/Spectra to bolster our low-floor double deck fleet in a few weeks, the acquisition of our first ever coach today, and further bus shopping planned for next week.

    On the network, we have just relaunched Ringwood – Southampton, a market we have been seeking to develop for years, and the next few weeks will see improvements announced in other areas too.

    The roll-out of ‘next stop’ audio visual information continues across our fleet, our customers continue to embrace mobile phone ticketing in growing numbers, plans are well advance for further innovations in ticketing, vehicle tracking and real time passenger information – all to be announced over the next few months.

    This weekend we respond to increasing pressure in society to make public transport more accessible to young people by expanding our young person fares to include 5-19 year olds – no ID, no quibble – one of the first bus companies in the UK to do so.

    We are currently developing an in-house driver training programme so that in future we can recruit bright, customer-friendly individuals who don’t have PCV licences as well as those who do, alongside other strands of training that we can offer to our industry partners as well as further enhancing our own staff’s capabilities.

    All this is being masterminded by a highly effective management team who have grown up with the business and know how we roll, and strengthened next week with someone who knows us well and will add further professionalism and gravitas.

    The fact that Wellglade – probably the most respected bus group in the UK (owners of TrentBarton for those who might not recognize the name) – has enlisted my help 2-3 days per week in sorting out their troubled TM Travel subsidiary shows their appreciation of what we have achieved, and the fact that I am able to accept the challenge is a sign of my confidence in my management team.

    Indeed, to ensure that up-and-coming individuals prosper rather than stagnate, it is healthy and rewarding all round to gradually feed them more responsibility and this is the quite deliberate consequence of me dividing my time in this way – even after four weeks my Velvet team has taken ownership of the day-to-day business in a way that is really impressive to watch.

    If I’m going on a bit, it’s because I feel more optimism and enthusiasm for Velvet now than at probably any time in our history, and rather than get bogged down by our occasional hiccups, we will learn and move on. Which is a strategy I would recommend to Anon x 3 (all the same person by the way), because it’s so much more rewarding than sitting on the sidelines firing pot shots!

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  13. I would agree with Phil Stockley that we too have not been immune of problems with the fleet although we are fortunate in having on site engineering people. So there is no further criticism (hopefully) of our fleet I can inform all those on here that we have purchased two "red" double deckers for a Fairthorne contract lasting 4 to 6 weeks and hired two coaches from a colleague at Crosville in Weston. The two deckers give capacity and have seat belts something the contract requires. They arrived from Glasgow days before the contract started but they have been fully safety inspected and had there been time to have had them painted we would have! They will join the main fleet in September after they receive the Xela livery.

    We are also looking at new ticket technology and trialling Ticketer for monitoring vehicles and better understanding of travel information.

    So, we too are not sitting still. We have a major programme of work committing our fleet from September and we hope with the demonstrator buses arriving shortly that we can decide on the vehicles we wish to have for our town services.

    With regards to Velvet we do have a good relationship with Phil S and both operators have respect for one another and will help when there is a problem.

    Running a bus company is not always an easy task and we are not "incompetent fools" which I take as a real insult. There is a lot of work and effort to manage and operate buses and we like Velvet have a very professional approach to this with a very good supportive team of drivers. Our staff don't leave because they enjoy the working conditions.

    Incidentally we are recruiting to expand so anyone who would have a licence may wish to apply???

    PHILIP BLAIR
    Managing Director
    Xelabus Limited

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    1. My 6 year old son went to Fairthorne all last week on the Southampton South service which was operated by one of the red deckers. He loved it (especially getting a nice view from the top deck!), and the driver was always friendly and polite to us parents dropping off and picking up the children. An excellent service - thanks!

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  14. Well said, Phil. Good for you.

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  15. I'm a different Anon, but I'd query the 'lost mileage remains at virtually zero' when I've seen Twitter feeds saying that certain trips on the A to Southampton are cancelled due to vehicle faults. As a statistician I would like actual percentages of route miles lost. But perhaps as Velvet is getting bigger & more miles covered the A lost trips are statistically less than 1pc. As for tape on the orange bus, so long as the bus is safe for passengers (bus MOT'd etc) there's no problem. Girlfriend's car stuck together with blu-tack & tape too but passed MOT!

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  16. Lost mileage for the last twelve complete months is 0.22% - for the non-statisticians among us that means we lose 1 mile for every 454 we are supposed to operate.

    As for Xelabus's red double deckers I had the good fortune to drive one a few days after it arrived. They are very clean and tidy inside and will undoubtedly fill a gap in the market locally for seatbelted double deckers. The drive was thoroughly enjoyable in the way of the Volvo B10M - an unbeatable product - and made me pine for our erstwhile Volvo Citybus fleet!

    People may not realise that to have a bus company start up from scratch (ie not by acquiring the dying embers of an existing operator but genuinely creating a business from nothing) is an exceptionally rare thing - indeed I can think of only a handful of others nationwide in the last ten years - and to grow to around 20 vehicles as we both have is even more remarkable.

    To have two such start-ups living next door to each other and apparently both prospering is an incredible scenario, especially as I'm sure Phil would agree it is a very very difficult thing to do, and to do well.

    There is no desire to court sympathy - we know we will be held to account if we don't meet people's expectations - merely to add a sense of perspective.

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  17. PS wrote "This weekend we respond to increasing pressure in society to make public transport more accessible to young people by expanding our young person fares to include 5-19 year olds – no ID, no quibble – one of the first bus companies in the UK." Isn't that what Wilts & District did a while ago, or is Velvet's scheme a little different?

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  18. Tell you what folks - having 2 bosses of 2 local bus co's being honest about their businesses is great to see. A credit to them both.
    Just hope they never merge as a Green & Purple bus livery won't do a lot for me!!

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  19. @cold head
    Looking at WD's current ticket info for young people, they recommend that ID is carried to verify age. Their child fares are from 7-19 years. The only other bus company I have ever seen advertise teen fares with no ID required is Norfolk Green.

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  20. Ipswich Buses use the combination. Doesn't look that bad.
    http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5328/6899461552_9da631173f_c.jpg

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  21. Anyone know what the Bluestar 18 changes are,in September?

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    1. I suspect we can all guess! Even more buses along Shirley, and less cross town services?

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    2. The 16 change is more interesting with a change to the route and increase in frequency !!

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  22. http://www.bluestarbus.co.uk/article.shtml?articleid=2819 shows the Sep changes. BS3 is being reduced again ! No surprise there then!

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  23. Use Traveline to get a BS3 timetable for after Sep changes. Sun serv down to 4 jnys each way! Daytime service hourly still - just with a gap M-F

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  24. Xela bus pay low wages,and when they started out staff had to fight for holiday pay, and threaten legal action.

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  25. The 3 has now become an embarrassment for Bluestar, and they're dragging out its death as far as possible. Passenger numbers have been going down increasingly since better alternatives have arisen in Hedge End, and not only are they not the number one choice; they're not even the number two choice in that area. Even with a complete monopoly on Sundays in the Peartree area after First withdrew from the area (somewhat non-sensically in my opinion considering Bluestar turned it into a battleground), people aren't using it. It's a waste of time and resources them operating it now, and I believe the only reason they're not axing it completely is to avoid bad publicity and admit defeat to the other operators.

    As for the 16, their proposed alterations are going to do a lot more damage to First than the current route is, and I can't realistically see what First can do in response considering they're already heavily trying to defend Townhill Park. It's their turn to respond now, so we'll just have to wait and see what their next move is.

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  26. Velvet are making changes to their "A" route ,from mid October!

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  27. Should all stop picking on Phil. He built that company from nothing and with the recession he could easily have given up but he stuck with it. Just like blitz spirit Phil! When are ur drivers gonna accept my bluestar guest pass? Hubby says you take them. Your drivers disagree!!

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  28. Can anyone tell me if the will be any buses running to Marwell zoo on the weekend of the 12-13 October for the Rhino weekend.

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