National Express West Midlands (the new name for the old "Travel West Midlands") is reviewing bus services in south Birmingham. It is currently in the process of consulting on possible changes and intends to finalise its plans over the summer for implementation in the autumn.In terms of the Selly Oak Ward, the main change is likely to be to the 69 bus service, which currently travels through the ward on its way from Solihull to Weoley Castle and back. The suggestion is that in future the 69 would go to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, providing a direct link to the new hospital. The 69 would start at Maypole (instead of Solihull) and follow its current route through Kings Heath, Selly Park and Bournbrook before going on to the QE via Harbone Lane.
The current route of the 69 along Gibbins Road and Weoley Park Road to Weoley Castle would be taken by a new 27 service, which would run from the city centre, turning off Harborne Lane onto Gibbins Road towards Weoley.
Residents are unlikely to see any difference to the main Bristol Road (61, 62 and 63) and Pershore Road (45 and 47) services (although there may be some changes south of Selly Oak towards the end of the current bus routes).
P.S. Short term changes to the route of the 69 service will be needed from January 2010 for around 9 months to allow for the rebuilding of the Dogpool Lane bridge and these are in the process of being finalised.
7 comments:
I have no real problems with changing the north-western terminus of the route, though whenever I use the 69 from Selly Oak to Selly Park there are always several people already on the bus who have come from the Weoley Castle end of the route so clearly there is some sort of demand. However, direct access to QE from Selly Park and beyond will become more important once the Selly Oak hospital closes.
Re. cutting back to Maypole, the general principle of splitting very long routes is a good one in terms of improving reliability, though inevitably impacts on the few people who are travelling longer distances.
I agree that direct access to new QE Hospital is crucial and there are also a number of other services to the QE planned (including an 84 service from the Kings Norton 3 Estates travelling up through Bournville using Linden Road).
The new 69 route would link up with other services - such as the 21 service from Weoley Castle at the Selly Oak Triangle and a more frequent 49 service to Solihull at Maypole. But that does of course mean that anyone travelling along the old route would have to wait for the other bus. I am not sure how many people this would affect, but anecdotal evidence suggest that a few young people in Selly Park may use the 69 service to travel to Solihull College.
It's interesting that what has actually transpired on the 69 is a different to what was proposed in the consultation, with the 69 to be largely replaced by a revised 76 route running from Solihull to QE. So it may be a consultation where the opinions really did influence the outcome.
On the Pershore Road, it seems a little disingenuous of Centro to claim both that Sunday services will be increasing (though overall they undoubtedly are) and that there will be no change to route 47, when in fact NXWM are reducing the Sunday frequencies on both routes 45 and 47. By my reckoning this will reduce the current 7/8 min Sunday shopping hours service between Cotteridge and the City Centre to 10 mins.
This reduction would be more palatable to me if they are using the same opportunity to reduce current 55 minutes gap between the two early morning Sundays journeys arriving in Corporation Street at 0836 and 0931 - but I'm not holding my breath.
Yes, apparently the 69 service will in future operate from Wythall to the Brandwood Park Road area via Maypole and Kings Heath.
The 76 will be extended from Kings Heath to provide a link to the QE Hospital following the current 69 route between Kings Heath and Selly Oak, as well as retaining a direct service to Solihull going the other direction.
I suppose this does establish that the consultation wasn't a done deal, even if it wasn't widely advertised.
I didn't realise the 69 route was going to be changed, the first time I actually heard of it was yesterday from my Mum who uses it regularly from Weoley Castle Square to get to Raddlebarn Rd, Selly Oak.
Whilst I agree with the principle idea of improving links to the QE I don't see how changing the 69 route is going to actually help very much as the 21 already swings by the area.
The local demand and usage of the 69 route seems to be quite high - every time I've used the route it was to get easy access to the other side of Selly Oak (which otherwise has NO direct link from Weoley Castle) and a lot of others I've asked agree.
Without this route I know that my Mum will find it excessively difficult to keep in touch with my Nan on any sort of regular basis - I imagine this will lead to my Nan not getting out of the house very often either thus degrading her own quality of life...
From what I gather though this decision has already been taken and will be actioned soon.
...Sorry for the longish rant heh.
The bus service changes are taking place from this Sunday (25 October). A full list of changes can be found on the Network West Midlands website.
The direct route to Selly Oak Hospital using the old 69 route will be more of a benefit to people living in Selly Park and Kings Heath than those in Weoley Castle. The 76 service from Solihull will from Sunday run from Kings Heath along the old 69 route to the Selly Oak Triangle and then up to the hospital. To connect with the new 76 service, I suspect that your Mum would need to catch the 21 service from Weoley Castle and then change to the 76 on the Bristol Road in Selly Oak.
Do report problems and gaps to National Express West Midlands as they have said that they make tweaks next year to the new routes.
Representatives from National Express West Midlands and Centro attended the Selly Oak Ward Committee meeting earlier this evening and I did make the point that there should have been more consultation before changes were made.
Hm well, thanks for the information - I'll pass it along to my Mum and I'll keep track of how using 2 bus routes instead of just the one goes for people.
The 21 route isn't exactly known for its reliability though to be honest so we'll see how that works out.
Anyways, keep up the good work Robert!
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