Lochaber's Public Transport Crisis 2024
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00:00Hi, I'm Sarah Riddle, I'm proud to be the chair of Lochaber Chamber of Commerce, also
00:14of our own local business, and here desperately to talk about the need for an integrated transport
00:18plan. I think when they work, it's amazing. And we did have a good timetable that was
00:24frequent. We get people to doctors, hospitals, works, and activities as well. But what we've
00:30seen in recent times is that we have had to cut, because of the congestion, the number
00:35of routes available. And that has a serious impact on people making their appointments,
00:39making their work, and feels like we've gone backwards with our bus transport, which is a
00:44vital part of roads, cars being off the road, and people being able to be employed in many instances.
00:52It is a shame to say, but yes, many people are being forced to
00:56tie in a lift, or not actually make shifts as well. And that does worry me.
01:04We are seeing these bottlenecks becoming greater, so the Malig road congestion,
01:08and we are seeing that road being congested well over an hour of a peak time. That is every day,
01:14it's not just the weekend now. When you see buses snarled up out as far as
01:19Torlundie and beyond, that's a hell of a journey to consider. And it's putting people off. It's
01:25making people not make appointments that are booked. If you speak to many of our members,
01:29hairdressers, etc, they're being stood up for appointments. So loss of earnings is significant.
01:41Yes, my name is John Curry. I'm a Visitor Service Manager here
01:45for the National Trust for Scotland at the Visitor Centre here. We're in the middle of,
01:49or towards the end of the peak of our busiest ever year, which we didn't think we could ever
01:54get much busier after last year and the experience after COVID. People are still coming,
01:58and the draw for Glenfinnan is increasing year on year. We're doing what we can to encourage people
02:04to come to Glenfinnan by more sustainable means. So on the bus service, via Shield buses,
02:11or using the train service, but we just don't have the right amount of trains coming at the
02:17right times for people to see the steam train, which is the main draw for most people to come
02:22here, and to get away in a reasonable time. And then the bus service is often
02:27full because a lot of the days we just get a little mini bus coming by, or there might not be
02:31quite the number of buses coming through to accommodate the amount of people that want to
02:34get onto it. But also a lot of people just don't actually realise what the other options are. So
02:39we're trying to encourage that but it's difficult. Most people who come to Glenfinnan this afternoon
02:44actually are going to end up leaving disappointed because they're not getting in to park here.
02:49So most people that seem to come here in the afternoon certainly are having to drive on by
02:53with their cars because we're just at capacity all day long. So it's an incredibly busy place.
02:59So my name's David Phillips, I'm the Manager and Director of Shield Buses.
03:02I think what you've got in this environment is a beautiful part of the world, it's a place where
03:06people want to come to, it's a place where people want to have a holiday, relax and have a great
03:11time. And obviously we, as a business, meet that need basically. We have a responsibility to our
03:18regulator, the traffic commissioner, and we have a responsibility to our business to ensure that
03:24We have a responsibility to our regulator, the traffic commissioner,
03:28which means that our services have to operate to the scheduled timetable.
03:32And unfortunately, times of the year that can be very problematic in and around Lochaber. And
03:38really what we're struggling with is out of date infrastructure that really needs to be challenged
03:44and tackled and put right for the future. The A830, the A82 are the key sort of problems.
03:51But we have infrastructure issues with the Bannaby swing bridge as well too,
03:55and the ongoing traffic calming measures in and around the town as well. So when you put them
04:00all together and then add in sort of the summer peak time traffic as well, it makes it a very
04:05challenging environment to operate. So in simple terms, we operate a 30 minute service. The traffic
04:11delays have got so much over the years that that timetable is unsustainable. It really needs a
04:17fourth bus in which to operate. We don't have the luxury of the ability to, through council funding,
04:23to operate that fourth bus. So therefore we have to look at the existing route and how we can save
04:28time to operate. Really what we're looking for here is consistency of operation of services.
04:34So therefore when we get these pinch points really affecting us, we'd like the ability to
04:38keep running those times consistently. And that's really what we want to see, the ambition to
04:42actually give us consistent running time through the town, which allows us to run the services as
04:47and what we want and not have to make sacrifices like we've seen here. I genuinely believe this can
04:52be solved if we're together, if there's a collaboration with business, with government,
04:57and we look for solutions that can work. We understand the bottlenecks. Also I won't
05:04hesitate to say when I do travel, as I do a lot in Norway etc, and I see some of the solutions
05:08there that are built, that they are coping with similar infrastructures as ours, but they're
05:14creative in terms of how they have built bridges, tunnels etc. It can be done, but it needs a team
05:19effort and a collaborative effort by everybody, business and government, to pull together.