Bus service is now worse for existing customers

LAST week, I wrote about the changes to the X41 bus route, which links Haslingden and Helmshore to Manchester.

It has been adapted to add Ramsbottom to its route, thus making the express service about 15 minutes slower – or adding about 25 per cent to the journey time from Rossendale.

Transdev, the operator, says it needs to do this to keep the service viable, but of course they are assuming those who travel on the bus from Haslingden or Helmshore won’t be tempted back into their cars by the significantly extra journey times.

Several readers from Ramsbottom have been in touch to say the X41 is very welcome for them – they’ve been without a direct bus service to Manchester since First removed the X35 a year or so ago.

But surely one area’s gain shouldn’t be at the expense of another area – particularly on a bus route which is so prone to delays for reasons beyond the operator’s control.

The roads to Manchester get congested very easily.

I know from catching the Witch Way – the X43 service from Rawtenstall to Manchester – that a journey can take 45 minutes or it can take two hours, depending on how clogged the roads are.

Simply adding new towns to the route doesn’t seem to be a solution to Transdev’s main point that Accrington, Haslingden and Helmshore alone don’t have enough people to support a half-hourly service to Manchester.

You don’t get more people on the buses overall by making the service worse for existing customers.

There has to be a cleverer solution.