Give Us Shelter from the Storm
There is not much worse than waiting in the rain for a bus with nowhere to shelter especially if the next bus you need is an hour away.
In our little village a few years ago with all the arguments about using public transport over private and a local zealot green councillor some of us tried to do without the car for a week and report back how we had all got along.
The short answer is that it was a nightmare with a public transport system in pieces. This was in a rural but popular part of the Cotswolds with plenty of hamlets, villages and towns about. In order to get to the Saturday market at the town twelve miles from where we lived the only way by public transport was by bus to a village half way there.
Once at this half way point the next bus to complete the journey was a fifty five minute wait.
Both buses ran once an hour but as they were different bus companies they did not think to coordinate the timings.
The wait at the half way village point was in pouring rain with no shelter at all near the one and only village bus stop. This is a wealthy village and perhaps that was the problem. Everyone lived in expensive properties and would never dream of going anywhere other than in the car and in this part of the world quite frequently, chauffeured.
The return journey was a mirror of the first only this time burdened down with shopping and with worsening rain conditions.
Reporting back at the Parish meeting the following week it turned out that all but the stoically Green chairman had given up the one week experiment after just that one dreadful Saturday.
A better bus system with some decent dry bus shelters could have made all the difference but it seems very few countryside councillors put their money where their mouths are.
Bus shelters come in many shapes and sizes and are maintenance free so let’s see more of them in the countryside where they can blend with colour or stand out as adverts anything are available on that score at http://www.aceshelters.co.uk/
In our little village a few years ago with all the arguments about using public transport over private and a local zealot green councillor some of us tried to do without the car for a week and report back how we had all got along.
The short answer is that it was a nightmare with a public transport system in pieces. This was in a rural but popular part of the Cotswolds with plenty of hamlets, villages and towns about. In order to get to the Saturday market at the town twelve miles from where we lived the only way by public transport was by bus to a village half way there.
Once at this half way point the next bus to complete the journey was a fifty five minute wait.
Both buses ran once an hour but as they were different bus companies they did not think to coordinate the timings.
The wait at the half way village point was in pouring rain with no shelter at all near the one and only village bus stop. This is a wealthy village and perhaps that was the problem. Everyone lived in expensive properties and would never dream of going anywhere other than in the car and in this part of the world quite frequently, chauffeured.
The return journey was a mirror of the first only this time burdened down with shopping and with worsening rain conditions.
Reporting back at the Parish meeting the following week it turned out that all but the stoically Green chairman had given up the one week experiment after just that one dreadful Saturday.
A better bus system with some decent dry bus shelters could have made all the difference but it seems very few countryside councillors put their money where their mouths are.
Bus shelters come in many shapes and sizes and are maintenance free so let’s see more of them in the countryside where they can blend with colour or stand out as adverts anything are available on that score at http://www.aceshelters.co.uk/