I do know. They don't.

 
And, in Bradford, despite the hills, it took 'till 1971(?) for the internal combustion engine to finally lay electric traction public road transport - by then represented by trolleybuses - on its back.

Mark

 
Do you know if taxi drivers have to pay a fee to use Melksham station's forecourt?

Mark

 

Carrying on from my previous answer, yes, Uber has come to Melksham.   I feel disloyal to our local taxi drivers to use them, but it has been and can remain a challenge to find an available taxi - as (I have heard but not experienced) to find an Uber.

As a hotel, our reception team was familiar with the pleasures of finding a taxi for people at short notice and we learned who was most likely to be available, and who would share views inappropriatley with our guests.  One driver, no longer in the business, regained Lisa and me with a monologue about how all people from abroad should be kicked out of the UK as he drove us back home from Bristol Airport.  Which was 'interesting' for Lisa, who originated from a different continent.

Here's the list that's on the wall in our local Chinese take away, which gives you some idea of the fluidity of our taxi drivers:



and here's the list for today (random order changes every midnight) on the https://www.mtug.org.uk/ Melksham Transport User Group website.  And, yes, I am aware that one of those has ceased trading and another retires next month, and at that update there are others who may wish to be added.



"Solution" - none, really, right away.  I am aware of the Taxi office at Bradford on Avon station and I suspect that "Information at the Station" may well provide a service in this area.  Could even ask for the can companies to sponsor us?

 

"Friction" is an extremely apt word.  I wish I'd thought of describing it that way

 
Simply shocking

You have to wonder why the more "anti violence" measures and response policing we have, the worse the situation becomes.  Some people's willingness to be violent in an an attempt to get their way is simply startling.

I say this as someone who's business property recently has been raided by a gang armed with baseball bats and crowbars.  Considerable damage and inconvenience, but, thank God, no one hurt.  2nd break in in 2 years.  I can't help but think a more robust approach from Staffordshire Constabulary (who have almost pulled-out of Tamworth, where my business is situated) and the legal system might just provide a bit more of a deterrent.  At present, despite all the fine words about clamping down blah blah, the opposite seems to happen.  The chances of anyone being apprehended and comprehensively punished for any "low level" crime are very, very small

 

I am considering changing one of the stations to "your local station" and the most natural one to change would probably be Birmingham New Street - it's the ONLY one we list which does not host any GWR (or GWR|GW) trains. That would go to a page which would check that you're allowing geographic tracking and if confirmed and you'r in Nailsea (or Backwell) would give you current running.  I have the code available to do that - here's an example hidden in the research:



I am, however, on one of those days where seemingly everything isn't going to plan and feel calculated to either enrage or upset, so I'm not in the right frame of mind to write good code!   But it WILL be rather useful when I get to it.

 

Massively surprised that ICE omnibuses date from that far back!  Every day's a school day.  Maybe Diamond will get round to replacing their fleet around here in Worcestershire with something newer now

Also wondering if the Transatlantic telephone cable was thought to have very lavish provision with it's 36 pairs.  "Surely there will never be a need for more than 36 people to be making calls to the other side of the pond at once?!"

 
Source: RMT

Can anyone explain what's going on here? Presumably Go Ahead recognise RMT elsewhere, so why not in Cornwall?

 
OK, this is a good example of a deceptive image. Or perhaps it isn't. Bath bus station at eleven minutes past five yesterday afternoon. The deception is that the image doesn't show what was behind the camera - the eastern half of the bus station wasn't empty of passengers (though it wasn't exactly heaving). The western half of the building hosts the stands used by Faresaver, Flixbus, National Express, First's Number 8 service (an every forty minutes or so Optare that heads into the southern suburbs, useful for the Two Tunnels route) Lastly the five or so times a day council supported minibus that serves a number of areas that would otherwise miss out - but this last service also misses out the segment of the route that runs to and from from the bus station sufficiently often that passengers for it have dried up.

Most of this vacant appearance is the result of the Manvers Street closure but it would have been really good to see three things:

* During the Manvers Street closure, some sort of additional provision for passengers needing to travel across the city.

* Quality information provision at the bus station. The screens themselves when in use are pretty terrible in design, but switching them off completely is a naff approach. There is now, months after the start of the disruption, an A2 written notice but it would be embarrassing to sling a photo of it here.

* Plans for a formal relaunch of the bus service once the Manvers Street works conclude. Those works will immediately be followed by three weeks or so of Christmas Market road closures, which while it brings additional passengers, itself disrupts bus routes.

I've no idea why this is all so bad or where the aspiration is. The current prime minister visited First's bus depot here. Our local MP, on social media, has just pushed 'National Catch the Bus Month'. WECA's response to various things seems to be that decisions are commercial and there's nothing they can do. Without the bus fare cap and concessionary passes, the passenger numbers would be bleeding away faster than they are - and the concessionary pass aspect leaves the passenger with no mechanism to pressurise the providers into providing services that are actually useful.

I'd love to spend a couple of hours on the buses with the PM or local MP and they could experience that even when it's not bludgeoned by road congestion, how the public transport here is often set up to fail.

 
Cowley Branch News
Railfuture, Oxon County council and Oxford City Council, have a meeting, all coffee shop members are welcome to attend. It looks very interesting, facts not speculation.
Reminder: Railfuture Thames Valley Branch meeting, Oxford Town Hall, Tuesday 29th September 2026
Invite below :-

Railfuture members (and their friends, colleagues and families and Coffee Shop Forum viewers )  have the opportunity to attend a meeting about the Cowley Branch reopening project, which is being hosted by Oxfordshire County Council on Tuesday 29th September at 5.30pm to 7pm in the Long Room at Oxford Town Hall, St Aldates, Oxford OX1 1BX.

There will be two guest speakers: Simon Lymn of Oxfordshire County Council — he is leading the reopening project for the council — and the project sponsor at Network Rail, Sarah Cook.

This is great news for Oxfordshire , do come along.

 
With a "thank you" to the poster in a private group who put the basics of this table together, here are the prices this weekend in pounds per day.   With continuous passes 50% off and n days in y passes just 15% off, there'a a fare anomaly - don't buy the "15 days in 2 months" as the 2 month continuous costs less!

 
It's run using single deckers for the time being. First run it, and experienced seven broken bus windows courtesy of a tree branch that had descended but not fallen. (An overheard conversation - I don't know if this was seven windows on one bus or a single window on seven buses...)

Mark

 

Like https://tiger.worldline.global/NAILSEA/ciss;graphic=1 ?

Long station name - takes up a lot of screen real estate.  Consider moving to Rye or Wye (or Ayr or Ely).

I remember Derek Twigg saying "we can't run a train service just for Mr Ellis" on Today on Radio 4.  He had a point and the solution was to be far more general an look for everyone.  I have a cunning plan.  Watch this space ...

 
Does this work by... first encounter with the card, the system simply accepts it and issues a ticket, but then if the transaction isn't honoured, subsequently refuses it? If so, I'm wondering what the mechanism is to 'Reset' things so the card is accepted?

The background to this: on a rare trip on Bath's 6/7 bus service, the guy in front of me to his surprise found his card rejected so I paid his fare but I then wondered if his debit card was forever blacklisted.

Mark

 
Flew myself with Laker Airways in 1979: London to Los Angeles for £99. Ate my own sandwiches on board before clearing US immigration at Bangor, Maine which was about the halfway point. Landed at LAX and unloaded miles away from the terminal - just some wheeled steps and the luggage unloaded onto the tarmac. I left through a back gate to the airport to meet my US hosts.

 
From https://www.beautifulbritain.co.uk/htm/onthisday/September/u225.htm


Confirmed at https://localtransporthistory.co.uk/fleetlists/bradford1/


Great things from small beginnings ... "first bus service" turns out not to be easy to tie down to a particular date, with early experiments being more bleeding edge than leading edge.

 
Launch of Skytrain

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laker_Airways

Lisa and I actually met Freddie Laker, who's later Laker Airways ran a Fort Lauderdale to Gatwick service in 1996/7/8.  Lisa was living in Naples, Florida, I was living in Wiltshire and had been over there for a holiday / to spend time together and she had driven me to across Alligator Alley to catch my flight home which boarded and then sat on the gate while a technical issue was being addressed. 

In those days, people seeing you off could go to the gate area, and Lisa was there and waited ... and when it was obvious the delay was not short, asked if the crew could get me off to spend a few minutes longer together.  Made out it was a special occasion / day.  And they did let me get off.  Freddie Laker, who was based in an office at the airport had come down to support his team and customers at the gate, was there and as I recall we exchanged a few friendly works.   One of the two most memorable partings around that time ... the other was at Reading station after our very first meeting, at a time we thought we would probably never meet again.  As the doors of a 165 (or was it a 166?) closed.  Funny how things happily transpire.

 
A follow up - as shared on FacePlant:

Many friends and family (older crowd, as well as younger ones) ask me about travelling Europe by train and "wish they could do it".  For many, it is more practical than they think, and I've taken the opportunity post (locally to my home town of Melksham, Wiltshire) something of an advert / positive review, especially at the current time with 50% off continuous passes for the  next few days.

May I encourage readers who thing "should I?" to consider purchasing a pass in the next few days?  But bear in mind that the pass price will only be a small proportion of your spend.  What will you gain?  An adventure, an ability to see places you would not otherwise see,  and to meet people you would not otherwise meet.  This is NOT a tour with a guide in an air conditioned coach, rushing through selected honey-pot mega-museums and looking out onto the locals.  This is getting a real feel for parts of Europe of your choice, and at your pace.  Places from Bergen to Messina are wonderful after the cruise ships have left, and places such as St Polten and Angers simply aren't reached by the cruise ships at all!



But Coffee Shop readers know much of this already!

Lisa and I will be working out over the weekend what to buy in the sale - very unlikely to be "nothing"; now is the time to look forward into 2027.   We have some plans already, and I would anticipate sticking with the formula of the last couple of years with a variety of together and just-graham trips, with the former being far more town and location bases and the latter taking on more adventurous / exotic rail network stuff.

I am not a great one for family / friend company in large swathes, but rather it works really well in shorter segments and I would be happy to link up with members for a day or few, especially to help newcomers to this sort of educational / learning holiday set their feet under the table of these adventures. 

 
I'm rather inclined to ask grahame, perhaps somewhat cheekily, whether he could please add 'Nailsea & Backwell' to the Coffee Shop forum links to Tiger in 'Next departures' at head of this page.

CfN.