LIFE IN MY NORTHERN TOWN

I HAVE been very lucky in my life in that I have been in virtual full employment for the vast majority of it and therefore can afford to run a car.

Actually, luck has no part to be honest as it is all down to hard work and endeavour.

Anyway, it means that I have very little need to use public transport, which is fortuitous really as, when I do use it, it is invariably a bad experience.

In fact, the only time I do use it is on a Friday or Saturday night when I want to go into town for a drink.

Now I don’t know if any other bus service is run in the same manner, but the one that runs down Whitworth Road is dreadful.

Admittedly, I only use the one bus and usually at the same time, but if the rest of the service is run in the same way then I do feel sorry for the people who use it regularly.

The timetable which is on the bus shelter thingy is about as much use as a chocolate hen – what is the point of printing precise times when the service is run according to when Vesuvius erupts rather than a stopwatch?

And it is not as though there are any diversions either. It is a straight road from Bacup through to Whitworth and on to Rochdale town centre. One road. No housing estates or minor roads to wind through, just one long road.

Now working on the assumption that each bus can travel at the same speed and the number of passengers rarely changes – usually about three – myself, Mrs Giddins and a sleeping security guard - then it must be down to either the road conditions or the driver.

And since it has been a full week since they last dug up Whitworth Road, I cannot blame roadworks either.

So it must be down to the driver, which sounds about right since most times I have had the misfortune to follow a bus down a road, it never goes more than 10 miles per hour and then sticks its back end out when it stops at a bus stop rather than parking straight in the bus stop box thingy.

So come on bus companies of Rochdale, try not to employ drivers who wear slippers and don’t know what an accelerator does and let’s have a proper service.