My wife is unable to drive at the moment due to a neck injury so, with our girls being on school holiday this week, she decided she'd get the bus into town with them. It's a 2 mile journey and it cost £8.50 for a return journey for the three of them (they are 9 yrs old so half fare I presume). The cost to park would be around £3 so even taking into account the negligible 'running cost' of a 4 mile round trip in the car, where is the incentive for people to use buses? Utterly crazy.
The cost to park would be around £3 so even taking into account the negligible ‘running cost’ of a 4 mile round trip in the car
Cost of the car, insuring the car and running the car all need to be taken into that negligible amount.
Around here its MUCH cheaper than a car. and 4 miles in a car costs you at least £2
Its government policy tho - buses have to pay their way, car drivers are massively subsidised from the general taxpayer.
even taking into account the negligible ‘running cost’ of a 4 mile round trip in the car
I think you need to do the real calcs. That car is costing money every day, even if you don't use it. That said public transport should be better funded to make it cheaper.
Parking is too cheap?
Using car is financially attractive because most costs already paid - depends on time of day - no congestion? - good argument for "road pricing" - most arguments around public transport focus on inconvenience/private space rather than price
Ps Hope Mrs recovers
Did she look around for any deals on family tickets?
We have family day tickets available and they can work out very good value.
TJ - you are very lucky in Edinburgh that you have a publically owned bus service and its so horrific to drive in the city that out of towners use the park and ride as well. The opposite case would be Glasgow.
The cost to park would be around £3
Plus
Fuel
VED allocated for that day
Insurance allocated for that day
Maintenance allocated for that day
Cost of the car allocated for that day
etc
Guaranteed the £8.50 works out cheaper
to me my car cost is a sunk cost, as I guess for the op, so petrol/ wear and tear and parking.
I'm always shocked how much the bus is, but if i didnt have a car that had its mot and insurance paid for then cars likely far more expensive..
i get the train down south once or 2-3 times a month, its £128 each way, car fuel would be circa £55
(slightly more with passengers) but again public transport rates are so so high..
I'm using the train on Saturday for a return trip to Newcastle I'll be there for around 7 hours, it's a 70 mile round trip by car. If I can get on a charger it'll cost me about £5 in fuel and £7 to £14 to park depending where I can park. So total of £12 not including the cost of the vehicle per mile.
A train for just me is £11 return the following week I'm going with my daughter the train with for us both will be £9.35 as I can use my railcard.
Yes it needs to be cheaper but you're not always saving as much as you think.
I have the envious pleasure of working in public transport and it is a well known fact that people largely ignore the sunk costs of car ownership when comparing the price of a journey on bus to driving themselves.
That said, there is a huge need for improvement on the transparency of fares and best price for a given journey, most of the time the first point you find out the cost is when you get on and ask the driver. Public subsidy can go some way to offsetting the cost for more vulnerable groups but it’s fair to say that the bus industry is in somewhat of a crisis at the moment.
No one has pointed out that driving to town in your car is lot more preferable than sitting with all the loser low-lifes and weirdos on the bus...
VED allocated for that day
Insurance allocated for that day
Maintenance allocated for that day
Cost of the car allocated for that day
etc
Well that's not taking into account that you are paying for ved and insurance regardless, assuming you feel the need to have a car for other longer journeys, as most folks do.
What we should be doing is charging VED according to mileage, as an incentive to leave the car at home.
I have 2 cars, which I drive about a total of 2000 miles between them a year. I find it a bit bizarre that I pay significantly more for road tax and insurance than someone who drives 25k a year.
Cost of the car, insuring the car
Fuel
VED allocated for that day
Insurance allocated for that day
Maintenance allocated for that day
Cost of the car allocated for that day
But we need the car so that isn't a fair comparison - we have those costs whether or not we use it on any given day.
What Squirrelking says.
But not using the car for that trip wouldn’t change the cost of the car or the cost to insure it.
It increases the cost per mile though.
Has your wife looked a weekly or monthly pass if this is going to be regular and prolonged occurrence?
It's not just cost .
I can't use public transport for my commute as there is no direct link .
The options available require multiple changes and arrive after , leave before my contracted hours .
this option would also take nigh on 3 hours to do a 20 mile journey if all the links in the chain ran on time .
So I drive 3 times and cycle twice a week .
Cost of the car, insuring the car and running the car all need to be taken into that negligible amount.
No, they don't. The car will be bought and run for a whole host of other uses, not just that single trip into town. Getting the bus for one journey doesn't mean the car can then be sold.
Guaranteed the £8.50 works out cheaper
You don't get any of that back if you do take the bus though. You lot could work for PWC, the amount of creative accounting on display.
Original point stands though - public transport is shit, and it needs subsidising. But you can't just whine about the cost, you need to understand what needs to be done about it. Not voting Tory is a good start.
Has your wife looked a weekly or monthly pass if this is going to be regular and prolonged occurrence?
No because when the girls go back to school she wouldn't be able to use it as the school isn't on a bus route. On days I can't do drop off we are relying on neighbours (we are fortunate to have several neighbours with children at the same school) helping out with school drop off/pick up and she can walk to work.
Ohh, and the school is two miles away without footpaths for some of it so not really an option to walk the girls to school every day.
No, they don’t. The car will be bought and run for a whole host of other uses, not just that single trip into town.
Errrr! What?
No because when the girls go back to school she wouldn’t be able to use it as the school isn’t on a bus route. On days I can’t do drop off we are relying on neighbours helping out with school drop off/pick up and she can walk to work.
Ah! That's a bugger.
Anyway I hope she gets well soon.
^^ Cheers - looking like neck surgery though 🙁 (see my previous post about that particular story - still being run in circles on it)!
So the real issue is how much public transport costs when you already have a car. There is so much dead money in car ownership just by having one, the more miles you do the more this cost is spread out. There is probably a golden ratio of mileage vs initial ownership costs, however trying to calculate this when weighing up whether to take the bus or car is beyond most of us without a complicated spreadsheet algorithm.
Interesting thread. I am always amazed at how heavily subsidised driving is considering how harmful the collective impact of everyone driving everywhere is and the fact that is uses up a scarce resource doing so. The thing is I'm pretty sure I'm in the minority in having this point of view, I think the price of fuel is incredibly good value for money all things considered. I would love to know how far some peoples journeys are that sit in jams in rush hour every single day morning and night. I bet a fair few are less than 5 miles.
So the real issue is how much public transport costs when you already have a car.
Well yes I guess it is. Our local council (Harrogate) claims to be trying to get people to use public transport (good luck with that with all the Range Rover-driving mummies we have) and leave the car at home to reduce congestion around town. But if you already own a car there is no real incentive to take a bus which is more inconvenient and costs more than the fuel, depreciation and parking costs to drive right into the centre.
Driving isn't "subsidised" in any normal sense of the word.
Oh yes it is - massively. roads are paid out of general taxation - whether you own a car or not you pay for roads . Most parking in cities is free or very cheap but is using land that belongs to everyone and is very valuable but is hogged by car drivers at low / no cost. The cost of all the illhealth and deaths caused directly and indirectly by car drivers is paid for out of general taxation. the subsidy depending on what you include is around £1000 per car per year - much more if its city only usage.
If car drivers and car drivers only paid the costs of their driving without subsidy from general taxation then car driving would be massively more expensive
Oh yes it is – massively. roads are paid out of general taxation – whether you own a car or not you pay for roads .
A little disingenuous - most of the roads are needed to also move frieght around and also for the busses themselves to drive on.
Most parking in cities is free or very cheap
It's not TJ most is pay per hour and not exactly cheap.
damage, congestion and the sheer size of roads needed would be much less just for trucks and buses.
Taxation on transport doesn't cover the costs of providing the infrastructure, it's subsidised.
For me though I get tram travel all over Manchester for about 20 quid a week. Amazing value.
Drac - is it the several thousand pounds a year that the land is worth in rental - and most is free on suburban streets
Why should public land be hogged at low or no cost by a minority?
roads are paid out of general taxation – whether you own a car or not you pay for roads
Of course roads are paid for out of general taxation. Roads aren't just used for private cars. Whether you own a car or not, you still need them. They are pretty fundamental to any modern society.
Why should public land be hogged at low or no cost by a minority?
Given the majority of households in the UK have a car I'm not sure why you think it's a minority?
https://www.statista.com/statistics/314912/average-number-of-cars-per-household-in-england/
I use my car cos I can do 4 steps from my front door and plonk my fat arse down in a nice familiar seat. Brmm. Away. And I already pays £400 a month for it (forever!) to Ling so why wouldn't I use the fing.
So my annual car costs are £500 VED, £500 insurance, then say £500 maintenance (I only do a few k per year, so a service every year to 18 months, tyres will last years). So £1500.
Then my car cost me £4600, say I keep it for 4 years and it's value is zero at that point (which it won't be), that's £1150 per year.
So, £2650 per year, excluding fuel. £7.26 per day. Fuel cost for that particular journey of 2 miles: £1.20 at 10mpg.
Don't think I'm missing anything?
Yeah, I'll take the car.
Public transport (apart from trains into London, and the tube) are rubbish and expensive.
How a local 2 mile bus ride costs £2-3 per person when you can sit on the tube and the buses for hours if you wanted going round London, for £6.10 a day maximum, is stupid.
Were public transport a better (cheaper more reliable option) I'd use it more.
I live in Malvern & work in Ledbury so around 10 miles each way so just petrol costs around £3.50. A return ticket is £5.40 so I'd probably spend a bit more (when you take into account VED etc) by using the car.
The issue I have is that there is one train at 6.11am, then the next is 8am. I normally start work at 8am so I'd either have to get up stupid early or be late, every single day.
If I was going in the opposite direction (to Worcester) there's 5.59am, 6.47am, 7.02am, 7.16am, 7.36am, 8.07am...
e subsidy depending on what you include is around £1000 per car per year – much more if its city only usage.
That's a subsidy of 30 billion pounds.
Where has that unusually rounded and precise figure come from?
The train to work is £12 (for a single), it's 23.5 miles so at 40p/mile it's £9.40 (ie £2.60 less expensive to drive). Bonkers!
A return is £19.20 so even then it's £0.40 cheaper to go by car.
Buses just don’t go where I need to be. Not even close
..and buses have lots of horrible, stinky people on them.
My car only usually has just the one horrible, stinky person in it and it goes exactly where that person needs to be.
Guaranteed the £8.50 works out cheaper
It's only any good if it works out cheaper and you can do away with a vehicle. If you will need to have a car anyway for other regular journeys or reasons then the public transport has to be cheaper or significantly more convenient than fuel plus parking costs for that journey.
Getting people to mix up their transport use is the step forward rather than expecting it to be either or.
Cost of Public (much of it is in private ownership) transport is bonkers. And own randomly expensive or stupidly cheap.
I needed to get to Gatwick, from County Durham. Company booked me a flight to Heathrow, and told me to get to Gatwick on the train. Just the train across London was £77, forget the cost of getting to Newcastle, and then the flight south. Train from Darlington to Gatwick, £62. And it was quicker door to door.
If you will need to have a car anyway for other regular journeys or reasons then the public transport has to be cheaper or significantly more convenient than fuel plus parking costs for that journey.
Getting people to mix up their transport use is the step forward rather than expecting it to be either or.
This +1
That said, there is a huge need for improvement on the transparency of fares and best price for a given journey, most of the time the first point you find out the cost is when you get on and ask the driver. Public subsidy can go some way to offsetting the cost for more vulnerable groups but it’s fair to say that the bus industry is in somewhat of a crisis at the moment.
Helen Pidd, the North of England editor for The Guardian, was having a twitter debate about this only the other day:
https://twitter.com/helenpidd/status/1099772164214005760
Deregulation and privitisation was, pretty much nationwide, horrendous for bus passengers. Manchester had, at the last count, about 25 bus operators with a combined total of over 100 different ticket options and prices - all those operators were competing for custom on the busiest routes and then largely ignoring the non-profitable routes so some areas were over-served, many were very under-served and there is zero consistency. Live tracking is very difficult because you could have any one of about 5 different bus companies using that stop.
London is really the only place where buses work well at the moment and the pricing is entirely open and consistent.
Here in Croydon (South London) I think TFL have got it spot on for bus and tram travel. Trains are expensive but kids under 5 travel free on buses and trams across London. 5-10 is around £10 for an oyster card covering the 5 years. 11-15 is £15 and 16+ (in education) is £20.
After the initial purchase of the cards, it's essentially free travel.
For me it's £1.50 per journey with a hopper fare if I get two buses or trams or combo within one hour of beeping in. Capped at £4.50 a day or £20 something a week.
I'm going to drive about 250 miles tomorrow. I haven't used my car all week although I did go to Sainsbury's last Saturday. I have cycled 2 days, and yesterday I caught a train, then 2 tubes, and took a bus. My van is still on the same tank of diesel that I put in sometime in September.
