Kingsferry Commuter Coach Services Withdrawn Permanently
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kentishphil
Dec 16, 2021, 11:39:43 AM12/16/21
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Neil Gow
Dec 17, 2021, 1:17:46 AM12/17/21
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And also, as it happens, a link to the Kent Online coverage in their article about the Stagecoach merger.
DerekJ
Dec 17, 2021, 8:42:11 AM12/17/21
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It's passed largely without comment that the King's Ferry commuter services were first launched forty years ago, by early October 1981, preceding by a few months the collapse of Olsens in January 1982, whose services were replaced by several different operators.
An article published in Commercial Motor in 1984 described the King's Ferry operation at the time (and quoted August 1981 as the start date) -
Derek J
adam williams
Dec 17, 2021, 10:27:58 AM12/17/21
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Those Volvo/Berkhof coaches are among my first memories of public transport, as a King's Ferry commuter route (along with the M&D 146) ran past my home on Tyler Drive in the early 80s (I left the area when I was seven in 1985). Those coaches really did look the part at the time, that's for sure - and KF coaches have always been immaculately presented since, too.
It's sad to see the services end, but understand why in the current circumstances.
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Chris
Dec 20, 2021, 8:03:32 AM12/20/21
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Granted my most recent experiences were in March 2020, when we never returned to the office after our 'one day' Work from Home test, there are a couple of perspectives that need to be picked up on, given some of the comments in other threads.
Firstly, I'm not at all convinced there will be spare drivers or vehicles as a result of this. Although there was a short period in summer 2020 when routes had multiple journeys in each direction, there have only been 10 coaches in use on commuter services throughout 2020, already a major reduction from the 30+ pre-Covid for Kings ferry alone, not including the Clarkes operation. Any departures, of staff or vehicles, are likely to have already happened. We have already seen some retraction, with the former Clarkes base at Kingsnorth being deregistered as an operating centre, but still being used for storage - at least last time anybody went past. There was also a certain degree of use of casual drivers, who I assume will have been used to a lesser or greater degree for coverage.
The commuter service has also long served as an adjunct to the private hire operation, being a convenient way of earning some money to get coaches into London for private hires. Whilst some work may be down, they used to provide extensive hotel shuttle work (I believe for VSOE, or whatever the 'Orient Express' people are now called), as well as school contracts (at one point they had a large, all-encompassing contract for Harris Academy). It could be something of a nightmare for the controllers to rearrange things if traffic delays heading into London caused issues, or conversely if coaches were delayed returning from 'in betweens' to reach the PM service. Kings Ferry are not known for being cheap - one reason why cash-strapped schools in Kent (at least in my day), and the Club, tend not to use them for private hire! If there are staffing issues (see above), not having to worry about the commuter service being used by so few people may help the private hire operation.
As for an entry into bus work, it remains to be seen whether this happens as part of the NatEx/Stagecoach merger, but it seems unlikely. Kings Ferry have never been particularly interested in bus work - or at least not tendered cheaply enough for it - and have not exactly pushed to take local bus contracts. Many coach drivers are pure coach drivers and wouldn't want to work on buses - there were enough complaints when the ticketing system changed from volunteer ticket collectors to e-tickets with drivers selling any paper tickets required. The last "major" bus operation was the Dockside Shuttle, which was widely held to be a carrier of fresh air and the driver, and was fairly promptly withdrawn when its regular driver retired! The E200s seen at both Kingsnorth and Rainham are leftovers from their previous work on BA Staff Shuttles at Hounslow (also now deregistered as an OC): whether there is anything to be read into the fact they have not been shuffled off or repurposed into the West Midlands bus fleet would be pure conjecture.
It's also a definite fact that passenger numbers were dropping well before Covid (a coach that when I started in 2010 would overload if it wasn't a double-decker, as we regularly carried 60 passengers, was down to 35 when I moved in 2016, and dropped further thereafter. Granted some of that loss was to the provision of a direct Maidstone service meaning people were no longer driving to Blue Bell Hill, but others were turned off by increasing journey times - what was fairly reliably 90-100 minutes in 2010 was regularly taking over 2 hours (especially in the mornings) by 2019. I'm rather glad that I/we haven't had to fight our way through the roadworks at Bean Interchange these last two years, and the works to build the Silvertown Tunnel can also have only had a negative effect. Transport for London also tend to treat commuter coaches more in line with private hire vehicles than as public transport (to their detriment), except when the journey planner wants them to carry passengers on strike days, as a non-tube route to Canary Wharf, or my personal favourite, from Canary Wharf to Bluewater!* (Note: The coach timetables at Blackfriars were still showing Chalkwell times up to my last day of travel in March 2020...)
I'm very prepared to proved wrong in time, but for the immediate future, I cannot see a mass influx of bus work or oodles of space in the yard.
Chris
* "What time do you run back until this evening?" / "We don't... the next journey back is 6am tomorrow." / "Oh." / "If I were you, I'd get the DLR to Woolwich and then the 96. Takes longer, but at least you get home tonight."
Matthew Arnold
Dec 23, 2021, 1:01:16 AM12/23/21
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Chris,
Just a point of clarification; the Dockside shuttle was in fact withdrawn when the subsidy for the service (provided in equal share by Dockside Outlet Centre and the Odeon cinema as part of their planning consent) was transferred under contract to Arriva’s then 140/1 services which gave an improved level of service at reduced cost.
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