City of York Council along with partners First York and Optare have been shortlisted for an award at the prestigious UK Bus Awards.The nomination is for the Environment category and notes the work that the council, First York and Optare have completed by creating and running a fully electric Park&Ride service from the newly built site at Poppleton, which was opened in June 2014.
Two months ago it said it would consider
“Three options; two which would guarantee minimum levels of bus service to areas within the York boundary where the council currently supports a bus service (and for which no commercial alternatives exist), or a third option to retain the current criteria, which does not guarantee any minimum service level”.
The item has now been withdrawn from the “forward programme” without explanation.
We asked for performance information on 20 key Council service areas (see left). They are the kind of services that every resident is likely to use – or see – each year.
Performance information had been gathered routinely, and reported publicly, up to 2011. However, over recent years, the York Council has seemed to be increasingly reluctant to provide information about basic service standards.
The Council said that it didn’t measure how many issues it received – or how it responded – for five public service areas. They were:
Garage area maintenance standards not recorded
That shocked us – not least because some involve safety issues.
We asked for information on the:
A Number of issues reported
B Average time taken to resolve issue
C Target completion time
D % of issues resolved within the target time
E Longest outstanding issue at the month end
F % quality checks which were considered to be satisfactory
The Council was able to provide volume information, on the number of issues that had been reported, for most of the activity areas.
Areas where the number of problem reports were increasing included
The number of reports in other activity areas was fairly stable over an 18 month period.
Looking at how quickly issues were resolved, the only target times regularly achieved were for clearing full litter bins “within 3 working days” (a fairly generous target) and removing “obscene” graffiti within 1 working day.
If you telephoned the Council offices in August you had a 75% chance of your call being answered in 20 seconds.
A visitor would have waited, on average, 8 minutes to be seen.
However residents emailing the Council and expecting a response within one working day, would be disappointed. The Council has stopped recording the length of time taken to deal with electronic communications.
Well the Council doesn’t measure the longest outstanding issue. So no one knows.
Some issues like weed growth never seem to be resolved
Well actually no. The Council says that it doesn’t record the results of quality checks undertaken by inspectors nor does it undertake any customer satisfaction surveys with complainants.
So work undertaken isn’t routinely checked and recorded.
Maybe the issue hasn’t even been resolved? Just ticked off on the work management computer?
Poor management practices, Councillors, Directors, computer systems? The Chairs of the Council’s Scrutiny Committees – who should guard the public interest – have generally failed to table performance information.
So perhaps everyone shares the responsibility?
Maybe. The, still relatively new, Council deserves some time to put things right. But they need some quick wins to restore public confidence.
They could start by putting these, and other, basic KPIs on their “open data” web site and updating them each month.
The full set of results, covering the last 18 months, can be downloaded by clicking here or here (Sendspace Excel spreadsheet)
Our thanks to the FOI team at the Council who clearly tried very hard to provide the information that we had requested.
First buses have responded to complaints about unreliability and lack of capacity on some bus services.
click to enlarge
A major change to the number 4 – the best used bus service in the City – means that it will no longer travel to the University. Instead it will loop through Skeldergate and over Skeldergate Bridge to reach its new terminus on Clifford Street. There are frequent buses from there to the University.
The last change to the route of the number 4 -which took the service on a meandering journey through Tang Hall before reaching Heslington – was heavily criticised by passengers. On occasions 3 or 4 buses would arrive in Acomb in convoy. We hope that the new service – which retains a 10 minute frequency during the day – will prove to more reliable when it is introduced on 22nd November. The Sunday frequency will be 20 minutes while buses will continue to run every 30 minutes in the evening.
Some minor timetable changes are promised on the number 1 service which links Chapelfields to Wigginton. A twelve minute frequency is promised at peak times between Monday and Friday.
Other changes affect service 6 (which gets a direct link to York University) and service 10 which will run via Battlefields Way, while an additional morning service will be provided between Dunnington and York College on Tadcaster Road, with an early morning service between Bishopthorpe and the railway station also being introduced.
City of York Council is calling on York’s bus passengers to tell bus bosses their views on local services at a ‘bus surgery’ event on Parliament Street on Thursday 8 October, from 10am – 4pm.
The ‘bus surgery’ event will give residents a chance to speak with representatives from York’s bus providers including First York, Arriva and Transdev. The event will be held on a bus provided by First York giving people who don’t normally use busses a chance to look at one.
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The problems seem to have arisen since the changes to the timetables were introduced last month.
Checks – taken in the mid afternoon this week when congestion shouldn’t be a major issue – suggest that only about 40% of buses are now arriving on time*
This compares to an 80% reliability rate in the City reported in the lastest DpT “snapshot” survey recorded on their website.
First, and some other bus companies refuse, to release reliability figures although commendably Transdev – who now run the 44 link down Hamilton Drive – say they will release service reliability figures. This would bring them into line with train operating companies who release reliability figures each month.
They also operate a “mystery passenger” audit which they use to improve journey quality
The York Council used to check reliability and the quality of bus journeys in the City but this was ditched when Labour took control of the Council in 2011.
Since then they have relied on the computer system which generates “next bus due” information on mobile phone “apps” as well as on the signs at some bus stops. The contract for renewal of the service is currently being let. However the historic reliability information generated by a sub set of the system – cannot be released by the Council without the agreement of participating bus companies.
The York Council, will shortly agree how to spend around £7 million this year on improvements to the transport system in York.
Of this £1.6 million will be spent on public transport improvements.
£104,390 will go on “off bus ticket machines” which will be funded by West Yorkshire CA.
There is little in the programme for improvements to sub-urban bus stops. We continue to believe that busy suburban stops like Foxwood Lane should have a “next bus due” screen.
*Up to 5 minutes after scheduled time or 1 minute before.
The York Council’s Executive will be presented with a progress report by City of York Council’s trading organisation, City of York Ltd (CYT Ltd), at a meeting on 27 August.The report provides limited information on the results of services traded under the “Work With York” brand, which include the supply of casual/interim staff, and supply teachers.
The report claims that a profit of “almost £300,000” was made in 2014/15, although how much of this was made through “internal trading” (“selling” services back to the York Council), is not revealed.
Much of the work is understood to be undertaken by a pool of former Council employees who otherwise would be redundant (e.g. saving on the costs of using Agency staff to fill temporary vacancies) .
The company is wholly owned by the York Council. It is currently governed by four Executive Directors. All are senior Council officials. A non Executive Director was also appointed (a Labour Councillor).
There is now a move to appoint “external” Directors. Such appointments are likely to be made “behind closed doors” by a four person “Shareholders committee” which is comprised of Councillors.
This committee will also review the companies business plan – a role currently undertaken by the Council itself. It is not obliged to meet in public or publish the agenda for its meetings. The proposed “Shareholder Agreement” is entirely silent on the issue of transparency and accountability.
The company is able to borrow money to fund its expansion plans but it is unclear where liability would rest in the event of a financial failure.
The Executive is being asked to remove “the requirement for formal consent from the Council for a number of specific matters including: incurring material expenditure or capital liabilities exceeding £10,000, sponsoring events or supporting charitable activities, paying certain remuneration, settling claims and approving the charging policy”.
In a media release the Council says,
It looks like a poll of businesses located in the City centre will be held in November to decide whether to establish a Business Improvement District (BID) in York City centre. The plans were approved by the Council’s Executive last week. The ballot will be run on behalf of the Council by the Electoral Reform Society.
For the bid to be approved it will need to secure the support of over 50% of the businesses in the area both in simple and in rateable value terms. If there is a yes vote, then the first levy on Business Rates will be available for investment during the next financial year starting in April.
Over £800,000 a year is expected to be raised from the levy each year.
The four priorities for funding have been identified as:
Further details here (and see footnote)
This is the second attempt to establish a BID in York
The BID team still have to clarify several issues before the poll.
When suggested in the last decade it was the multiple stores that sunk the plan. Now the new BID promoters must convince the likes of Morrisons and Waitrose that they should vote for a scheme which may only be of marginal benefit to them.
The BID plans are described as
| Change Date | Service No. | Operator | Brief summary of changes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 01/08/15 | 44 | Transdev (Unibus) | Revised route: University (Hes. East Interchange) – York Station – Hamilton Drive – Acomb |
| 02/08/15 | 1 | First | Minor timetable changes. |
| 02/08/15 | 4 | First | Revised route: Acomb – Foxwood – City Centre – Tang Hall – Osbaldwick – University (Heslington East) |
| 02/08/15 | 5 5A |
First | Revised route: Strensall – York – Poppleton Road – Beckfield Lane – Acomb |
| 02/08/15 | 6 | First | Revised route: Clifton Moor – City Centre (Station Rd). |
| 02/08/15 | 10 | First | Revised route: Poppleton – Leeman Rd – City Centre – Stamford Bridge |
| 02/08/15 | 10 | Transdev | Revised route: Poppleton – Leeman Rd – City Centre – Stamford Bridge |
| 02/08/15 | 12 14 |
First | Minor timetable changes. |
| 02/08/15 | 13 13A |
First | Cancelled. |
| 02/08/15 | 13 | ConnexionsBuses | Copmanthorpe to Haxby (West Nooks) via City Centre. |
| 02/08/15 | 66 | First | New route: York Station – York Sport Village via University (Heslington Hall). |
| 02/08/15 | HB1 | Transdev | Cancelled. |
| 02/08/15 | HB1 | First | University of York – York Hospital. |
| 23/08/15 | CB2 | Transdev | Cancelled. |
| 30/08/15 | 944 | Coastliner | New route: Crossgates – Tadcaster – York College |
| 21/09/15 | 56 | First | New route: University of York – City Centre circular. |
| 28/09/15 | UB1 | Transdev | Cancelled. |
| 28/09/15 | UB1 | First | University of York campus shuttle service |
The timetable can be downloaded by clicking here
First recently announced that they were scrapping their 13A service via Hamilton Drive.
Later the Council vowed to step in and fill the gap although it is now less clear what the long term plans are for bus services in the Hamilton Drive area.
Although during term time the 44 “unibus” is mainly aimed at York University students, anyone can use the service.
Green Lane to University bus timetable click to enlarge
University to Green Lane bus timetable click to enlarge
