A new bus service, with dedicated roads and lanes, that goes from Dartford to BlueWater and on to Gravesend.
I use it sometimes to collect my son from nursery - the buses are new and clean. OK, it's not 100% reliable (the displays that tell you how long it is to the next bus aren't always spot on..... last week it was 3 mins to the next bus for nearly 10 mins.... turns out there was a big hold up locally and the bus couldn't get around the roundabout!)
Unfortunately it's not being used that much so far - certainly not enough to justify the disruption that took place building it and the impact of some of the bus lanes and extra traffic lights. Having said that, if the impact on car users means that more people use the bus, then GREAT! I'm all for it..... it's certainly encouraged me to walk to nursery and get the bus back more than I used to (at the end of the day nearly 2 miles carrying my son home on my back is a bit much, so I'll walk there and get the bus back, reducing the walk to less than 5 mins at each end - much more bearable, and much better for the environment)
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Fastrack have now introduced mobile ticketing as well as all of the more conventional ways of buying tickets. I've used it and although at the moment it's rather clunky, it certainly has potential and saves messing around with paper tickets (it really annoys me when they litter the bus and around bus stops).
Having said that, some of the work that they are doing on the extension to Ingress Park can't be particularly green! I can only hope that it's used enough to counteract the impact of the engineering work that's taking place during the construction process. I'm all for public transport, but in this instance, at what cost...
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As an old person, who travels on Fastrack (and other routes of course) with my free bus pass, I cannot understand why they issue me with a paper ticket for each journey. So if an inspector gets on and wants proof that I am entitled to be on the bus? I just show him my pass as I did to the driver when I boarded. There is absolutely no need for a ticket; if they issue it to prove passenger numbers or to claim money back from the council, surely they could just press a button without involving a ticket. I am hoping that now that they have the mobile readers on board, they could let us use these to read our passes but I am not holding my breath.
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You're right there, that is crazy. They don't issue tickets to under 5s so why issue them to you... you have your pass, which is more than an under 5 has!
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