‘Running our full service seemed a bit futile – we were carrying a lot of empty air around’
nottingham’s tram operator has had to overcome difficult challenges throughout the pandemic – including managing hordes of people queueing in the wake of the 10pm pub curfew. Head of operations mike mabey spoke to JAMIE BARLOW about how the company kept services running – and why he thinks passenger travel habits may change in the future
THE city’s tram operator, NET, noticed an impact immediately after the Government announced the country’s first lockdown in March last year.
Head of operations Mike Mabey said patronage “dropped dramatically”, as people were told to “work from home if you can”, and non-essential shops closed.
At the time, the tram network was mainly being used by key workers.
“Predominantly our service was to ensure key workers could get to and from their place of work and that was mainly the QMC, post offices and other businesses,” he said.
“At one point our patronage levels went to five percent of the norm. Running our full service – 32 trams – seemed futile because we were carrying a lot of empty air around.
“We had an agreement with the authority and our client, Tramlink, to reduce the services to a Sunday service. When I say a Sunday service, what that effectively means is that it’s a 10-minute service, which, to other networks operating around the country, was as good as their full service.
“The roads were quiet, the streets were quiet, the city centre was like a ghost town and it was mainly the morning peak and afternoon peak where we saw the majority of people travelling.”
Various measures were introduced to ensure customer safety and allow for social distancing.
Mr Mabey said: “We increased our cleaning regime on the trams so that they got more deep cleans than what they would normally get and then a further wipe down of touch points. Social distancing in the initial lockdown was two metres. Now on a tram with the capacity for 200 customers, this reduced it to 24 passengers that could effectively travel with a two-metre distance.
“We put a sticker on each seat that couldn’t be occupied and there were vinyls on the tram windows explaining where people could sit that would maintain social distancing. In another effort to protect customers we advised our drivers to open the doors at all tram stops.”
Revenue officers who would normally check tickets and issue penalty fare notices provided customer service only, advising passengers how to use the ticket machines.
Moving into the summer, restrictions started to ease and work began in the city centre to replace track between the Royal Centre and Old Market Square tram stops.
Mr Mabey said: “It was around mid-june when social distancing was reduced to one metre. That allowed us to put an extra eight people on the tram so capacity went from 24 to 32, so nothing major. But at the same time it became mandatory for customers to wear a face covering using public transport.”
It was at thta time that nonessential shops, pubs, restaurants and leisure facilities reopened.
“Through the summer then we had our track works in the city centre, we replaced all the rails in Old Market Square.
“That was quite a challenge because the contractors were still working under social distancing regulations so it took longer than what was originally anticipated. What was to be a two-week closure ended up being a three-week closure.”
Passenger numbers gradually increased, particularly in August during the Government’s “Eat Out To Help Out” scheme and NET began to operate a full service from the start of that month.
Then came the 10pm early closing time for pubs and bars in September, leading to long queues at tram stops at the end of the night.
Community protection officers started patrols of the city to limit numbers on trams following concerns of overcrowding.
Mr Mabey said: “That actually coincided with freshers’ week.
“So there was a big influx of new students. At 10 o’clock everywhere closes, everybody wants to go home all at the same time.
“Pre-covid when pubs and clubs varied their times of opening and closing you had a staggered finish, whereby you could maintain service levels and capacity levels. But now we were on a capacity of 32 and maximum people wanting to travel.
“We increased the number of travel officers on duty at night time to try and maintain social distancing, we used barriers at all the city centre stops to allow social distancing queues to be formed. We brought in a security company to assist us.”
In following months, when the county entered tiered restrictions and then a second national lockdown, NET maintained a full service.
In the second lockdown, patronage levels reduced but Mr Mabey added there was “nowhere near the drop we saw in the first lockdown”.
“We kind of expected a bigger increase when the shops became open in the run up to Christmas because the shops have been closed for such a long time. But it wasn’t as big as we expected.
“Patronage rose to about between 18 and 20 percent and they are starting to gradually rise again at the moment.”
Looking to the future, he believes passengers might travel in a different way.
Mr Mabey said: “Ultimately we all hope this vaccine works and we can start going back to leading some form of normal life. But we accept it may take some time before we get back to 100 percent patronage levels.
“Some of that is because a lot of people are working from home. They’ve found that is as efficient, if not more efficient, than actually coming into work.
“We may find that, rather than people travelling into the city centre, they go more local, they use the tram to visit local supermarkets and [there could be] a reduction into the city centre.”