An important aspect of any operator or PTE performance is the service it provides over Christmas and New Year. The UK coach and bus awards do not have a specific award for breadth of service, so here is one to fill that gap.
For want of a better name, I shall modestly call them the PK Passenger Awards for Breadth of Service.
These awards take into account important factors like population, existence of other public transport (light rail and trams) and existence of a comprehensive night bus network.
Top of the tree and Gold Winner has to be Southern Vectis on the Isle of Wight: It has at least some buses running on every single day over the festive period. That is a fantastic achievement, especially for such a small population.
It can also maintain a night bus service when many mainland cities with up to five times its customer base are not able or willing to. So many congratulations to Richard Tyldsley and his team on the island, and parent company Go-Ahead Group.
The Silver Winner is Lothian Buses in Edinburgh. The lucky residents of Scotland’s capital city have services on every day over Christmas and New Year, and it runs a comprehensive night bus network. Well done Richard Hall and all at Lothian Buses. In the Highly Commended category are Morebus and Cardiff Bus.
The best of the PTEs in my opinion is Merseytravel, and deserving of an overall Bronze award.
Frank Rogers and co in Liverpool fund services on every day over the festive period, and give their residents free Christmas Day buses on 11 routes to hospitals on both sides of the Mersey.
Highly Commended of the PTEs is Network West Midlands, which has four 24-hour routes run by National Express West Midlands.
Sadly many PTEs have presided over a decline in night buses in their regions over recent years, including Manchester, Liverpool and Newcastle. This has been great news for taxi firms but not helpful in keeping drink-driving statistics down, among many other downsides.
Unfortunately, there is one PTE that is a long way off receiving any award for overall breadth of service. The Metro area in West Yorkshire has the third highest population outside London, but its largest city Leeds has no tram/light rail system or night bus network.
In 2016 Arriva and Transdev introduced a small number of late-night buses into their territory from Leeds, but Metro and First Leeds seem unwilling to commit to a comprehensive service for the suburbs and surrounding towns.
Yet First Bristol with a similar population to Leeds can provide a night bus network, as indeed can operators in Bournemouth, Reading and Brighton.
Paul Kirby,
Wetherby,
West Yorkshire