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I bet many folks heard Ms Dunwoody on the radio today saying motorists felt persecuted but really we are a privileged lot who get motoring on the cheap. Mr Brown is apparently our champion who taxes us lightly etc etc. We should use public transport more often etc etc. We should look at road pricing intelligently and stop moaning. It would be interesting to know how many roomers could get to work by public transport, I certainly couldn't and none of my colleagues could either.
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No problem for local trips by bus. But then I planned the initial move to the NW to allow for easy travel into Preston, whilst living well out of it. Time consuming if I had to travel 40 miles each way to Merseyside, as I used to. Would have been feasible by bus/rail, but the track layout precludes a direct link between Preston and Merseyside, thus rail journey takes far too long currently.
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Public transport ? -------------------- Do me a pink fluffy dice favor !
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The only new public-transport experience that has impressed me is the Turkish dolmus. Very frequent minibuses along fixed routes, stopping to pick up and set down anywhere on request. That could make sense in some areas, but try convincing any of the knuckleheads pushing their own agendas in murky government circles (murky-government circles too).
Never forget: G. Brown does not hold a driving licence. Ministers have chauffeurs. Politicos live in major urban areas. The academics advising them ride bikes in anti-car cities. And the amount of common sense between the lot of 'em is barely detectable.
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The only new public-transport experience that has impressed me is the Turkish dolmus. Very frequent minibuses along fixed routes, stopping to pick up and set down anywhere on request. That could make sense in some areas, but try convincing any of the knuckleheads pushing their own agendas in murky government circles (murky-government circles too). Never forget: G. Brown does not hold a driving licence. Ministers have chauffeurs. Politicos live in major urban areas. The academics advising them ride bikes in anti-car cities. And the amount of common sense between the lot of 'em is barely detectable.
Absolutely - the Turkish Dolmus is the ultimate form of public transport.
I was at a Council/Residents meeting last week, discussing the nightmare parking situation in since our new town centre was completed.
Councillor said there was no money for a "Hoppa" service - I offered to run a Dolmus if they would license it - he took my name - still waiting....
The guy next to me said I would be a milionaire in a few years if I got the license - I agree
Instant solution to the public transport problem - but nobody is realy interested - don't want to spoil the motorist milch cow.
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Very frequent minibuses along fixed routes, stopping to pick up and set down anywhere on request. That could make sense in some areas,
What happens there if you dont live near the fixed routes, or do they have lots of overlapping fixed routes? Is it a town-centre-only thing?
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The woman whose name graces this thread is my local MP. You can imagine how proud that makes me, particulalrly when there is a delicious irony that the public transport in her borough is shocking! Mind you, these ego-ridden halfwits who rule us don't often visit their constituencies do they, so they are not going to know!
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What happens there if you dont live near the fixed routes, or do they have lots of overlapping fixed routes? Is it a town-centre-only thing?
'Jitney' type buses exist in many places abroad, and seem to work well.
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One great feature of the South African way of life is the Black Taxi. "Go anywhere, stop anywhere" is their motto, with a driving style to match. They are past masters at the Far Queue style of driving,(OK, DD?), their job being to get from the place A to the place B as fast as possible. More miles = more passengers = more bucks! Simple. And it solves the problem of widely scattered commuters being able to - er - commute.
Should bring them over here! That would teach the local dozy drivers a thing or two!
--
e Prof
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Or the>> One great feature of the South African way of life isthe Black Taxi. Should bring them over here! That would teach the local dozy drivers a thing or two! -- e Prof
Or the grey VW Microbuses they used to have in Lagos (Transits and similar now I think) carrying up to 15 or more passengers, with one end of the sliding side door unhooked so that it could flap wide as the thing charged up to a bus queue, with the conductor, an athletic youth usually, clinging to the end of the door and bawling out the thing's route to attract punters. Sometimes you would see ten or fifteen of the things jostling for position at busy places and times.
A bit sweaty as a mode of transport but quick, efficient and very cheap if sometimes more than a bit alarming...
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There isn't a bus that gets me from East Northants to Great Billing, Northampton by 0500. We are about 20 miles from centre of Northampton and I have cycled it quicker, though not recently.
I reminded our MP once about their election pledges, in particular, the "integrated transport system", which does exist in Australia, but then they all live in convenient places of course. He did say there was the minibus called TACT, the Thrapston Area Community Transport. Great.
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It would be interesting to know how many roomers could get to work by public transport, I certainly couldn't and none of my colleagues could either.
It takes me about 40-50 minutes to drive from Nottingham to work in Chesterfield every morning.
Using public transport I would have to walk to the tram stop and wait for a tram - 6 to 12 minutes. Tram ride into town - 20 minutes. Walk to station and wait for a train - 10 to 15 minutes. Train ride to Chesterfield - 40 minutes. Walk to the office - 10 minutes. It would take at least 1.5 hours to go by public transport, so an extra 1 hours travel per day.
But, I work in the construction industry so have to visit building sites which can sometimes be a long way from public transport links. It would be impossible to be effective in my job without a car.
Five or so years ago our nearby Local Authority Building Control department had some sort of dispute over business mileage with their superiors, so to prove a point they decided to only use public transport for site visits. It caused chaos, it was taking them hours to reach sites for inspections, etc. so site work was being held up, or in some cases carried out incorrectly, with knock on costs to building contractors, and clients. Instead of doing the normal 4 or 5 visits per day, they were doing 1 or 2 and giving up. Things very quickly got back to normal with cars being used again.
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i live in our capital city.......for 15 years i worked at the same place, which is 10 miles from my home and also within the capital city...
one day, when the car was being serviced i decided i'd use public transport.....the tube line is direct, but it's the other end of the line and goes through central london first...
the outward journey took me 2 and a quarter hours (with one change i.e. the line branches)......which i hadn't allowed for, so i was late.......the return journey was slightly shorter
a 4 hour daily commute is/was wholly unacceptable to travel 10 miles, when my normal one way journey in the car was at most 50 mins and at least 20-25 mins
i researched the buses at one point after this (to get to a leaving drink ,near work) and it would have taken 3 changes.......i didn't bother
then when you factor in the anti-social behaviour on public transport, crime, chewing gum/feet on seats, people eating god knows what right next to you, walkmans, people who don't wash enough etc.... i'd rather drive thankyou
even if i was low on cash flow a £200 moped and freeze in the winter would be preferable to the above
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3 trains and 4 buses an hour, all within 2 minutes walk of the house and five minutes walk of the office at the other end - about £2 return on the train for a 15 mile round trip, no probs getting a seat and it's nearly always on time.
If I didn't need to take my daughter to nursery and need my car for the job I'd use the train every day - indeed when I first moved to the house we chose it because of it's excellent public transport links as we didn't have a car.
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I reckon one day we should all do our weekly/monthly shop and go by bus. Can you imagine the chaos of people loading 15 bags of shopping onto a bus, let alone where would they store it.
One of the above posts says it all when the local council has no money for public transport initiatives. How do you encourage people out of their cars when there is no viable alternative. Unless charging them more is just to riase more money for government....no that wouldn't be the reason would it.......I trust our government......
I'll go and lie down in a dark room now.....
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Well chaps.
Dispite the formidable Ms Dunwoody, the government have consistantly failed on their promise of an intergrated transport policy. Several schemes intended to provide modern European style transport have been killed off by this government, without reason. So I believe apart from an extension of the Tyne & Wear Metro and the Nottingham tram, no other schemes have been planned and completed in the 10 years since Tony et al came to rule the roost.
France, and other European countries seem to find the money to build nice new roads, and have a 1st class public transport system, so there is a choice - public or private.
Perhaps the next interviewer of Ms Dunwoody may like to ask her that question?
Toodle Pip
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One of the most capitalist cities on earth, Geneva, has a brilliant integrated tram and bus system where the ticket cost is based on time valid (the shorter, the cheaper). The point is that the alternative transport system has to be in place first - no good taxing the motorist to death to fund these necessarily long-term projects. Remind me (and Gordon), how much has our little excursion into Iraq cost so far?
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Some public transport has improved.
I live 2/3 miles from Kingston so it is hardly a rural area. Until a few years ago there were no buses on a Sunday. If this is the standard in my urban area then I have to believe the reported rural situation.
I looked, online, using a well known transport web site, into the public transport options from T4 Hearthrow to home. The options calculated from the database were very very bad whereas I know there were other much much better alternatives including free transport within Heathrow. This is a crazy situation that does not encourage use of public transport.
This also ignores the probable journey time, for us, of up to two hours with cases.
A minicab at £25 seems good value I:-(
My time for commuting was 25 - 50 min vs up to two hours by bus.
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Don't think I will be using the bus. By car my daily round trip is 94 miles, in under 2 hours.
By bus. Leaves home 12 noon, arrives 17:15 (or 17:55).
Leaves office town 10am (latest) arrives home 16:05.
6 hours and 5 minutes to drive 47 miles.
Using the train would add roughly an hour and a half to my daily commute at the very least, and no doubt would increase current costs (I have a lift share so is not too bad currently).
With tow very young and energetic children at home my wife would not be very keen on me being out of the house for that sort of time.
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A year or two back, I remember watching a house of commons select committee, where Ms Dunwoody argued that building homes with parking spaces was a bad idea as it encouraged people to have cars.
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If Gwyneth Dunwoody actually spent any time in Crewe and Nantwich, the constituency for which she is allegedly the MP, she would realise what a stupid, pompous, pointless, classist, London-centric, arrogant comment that the above is.
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Take the last "that" out! Am too annoyed to type!!!
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If more people decided to use public transport, particularly at rush hour, it couldn't cope.
Furthermore, it rarely goes where you want to go when you want to go.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
What\'s for you won\'t pass you by
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The Black Tak (black taxi) service works very well in Belfast on the routes they serve - pick up & drop off anywhere along the route, fare £1.10. Usually get a chatty driver too.
--
andymc
Vroom, vroom - mmm, doughnuts ...
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"motorists felt persecuted but really we are a privileged lot who get motoring on the cheap."
Interesting when comments like this come from MPs who can claim expense of "travelling to and from Parliament from their home". Most of us whether we use public transport or our cars have to pay to get to and from work.
Interesting also that some of these MPs manage to claim such high expenses for travel eg "Janet Anderson, MP for Rossendale in Lancashire, submitted the biggest claim for car use at £16,612. This suggests that she travelled 60,448 miles to her constituency, approximately 220 miles away, which suggests that she made 270 journeys." but I bet if road charging comes in, MPs will be excluded from the charge.
Some also were hardly "environmental" with their air travel - "There were 27 MPs with expenses for air travel for more than £10,000. The highest were Alistair Carmichael, from Orkney & Shetland, with £34,347 and Eric Joyce, from Falkirk, with £30,578. Almost every MP with a high bill for air travel has a constituency in Scotland or Northern Ireland."
Incidentally, Mrs Dunwoody claimed £1,120 for taxi fares.
So who exactly is it who are a "privileged lot who get motoring on the cheap."???
--
Phil
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The newly published list of our MPs travel expenses is a good thing - it's our money they're spending. But I think PhilW is unfairly critical of Alistair Carmichael. His constituency is Orkney and Shetland. How else is he realistically going to visit his constituency if he doesn't fly?. Many other MPs are better targets for wasteful expenses.
And by the way, whilst many here seem to think that Ms Dunwoody has it in for drivers, she is actually a royal pain in the side of this government on rail issues. She is trying to press Labour to live up to its promises on integrated transport (which is a good thing because it would allow more people to leave their cars at home, freeing up road space for the rest of us). Sadly none of the ministers are listening to her.
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"Most of us whether we use public transport or our cars have to pay to get to and from work"
Parliament is not their place of work, their constituency office is.
If I need to go to another office from where my desk is I claim mileage.
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Don't complain about Mrs Dunwoody.
Complain about politicians in power who promised the earth and when elected made sure ...
err
their pensions were safe.. unlike anyone else's ..
err
built the dome...
err
Have a foregn policy built on ethics...
(I think the latter failed.. bu then they never said whose ethics:-(
madf
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OK, maybe I am "unfairly critical" and maybe their "place of work is their constituency office" but their are some pretty high expense claims there (and , by the same token some very low ones as well.)
House of Commons sits for about 155 days per year. Janet Anderson claims for equvalent of 270 journeys - does she sometimes go home for lunch? Unlikely since she also claims the max £21,634 allowance for staying away from home, as does Carmichael who says "My family home is in Orkney, we also have a home in Shetland. Being the MP for the UK?s most northerly constituency means that you spend a lot of time travelling. Most weeks when Parliament is sitting I leave home on Monday morning and am in London until Thursday or Friday when I travel back to either Shetland or Orkney. "
Quick Google suggests that return air fare from London to Kirkwall is about £250 (most expensive about £500 ). £34,000 worth of return flights is 136 at £250 a time or 68 at £500 - but Parliament is in session for only about 30 weeks per year.
Anyway, the main point I tried to make (unsuccessfully!) was that it's a bit rich for MPs to accuse the rest of us of getting "motoring on the cheap"
Good site for viewing your MP's expenses
www.theyworkforyou.com/mps/
--
Phil
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If I understood the answers correctly the travel included all official business, not just constituency to Westminster and return.
One who struck me was the Member for Hemel Hempstead who drove to and from his constituency "so as to be with his family in the evening", claimed IIRC well over £6k. There are trains from Euston to HH every 20 minutes, or half hourly until nearly midnight. An annual season (which his constiuents pay for out of their taxed earnings) would be around £2.5k.
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