To think people don't use public transport as its so unreliable

[Outandabout43]

Have drove for the last 15 years so not really used public transport, however since moving area and now in walking distance to a train station have started to use this more.

It's actually cheaper to use the train to visit family if it's just myself and DD then it is to drive, and also takes an equal amount if time. Also cheaper to use the train into city centre then to pay for parking.

However, everytime I use the train, the train is either cancelled or delayed meaning we miss the connecting train and have to sit and then wait over an hour which is not fun with a 3 year old. Also nearest bus stop into the city is a 40 minute walk away.

Now I actually prefer public transport to driving, but not so much when an hours journey ends up taking 3.

We are being encouraged to use public transport more, but is there any wonder people don't.

I use the bus and train to commute every day, my husband drives his commute. All in, I’d say we are equal on unexpected delays interfering with our journeys. I just think it feels worse on public transport due to the lack of control you feel when it’s happening, therefore feels more stressful. My husband can be in a 15 minute traffic jam or face scheduled road works for a few weeks and tends not to think anything of it.

I like getting a refund with my delays though!

This. When I lived in Edinburgh we did not own as car as there was no need to.

Where we live now a car is essential.

You don’t need to penalize motorists to get people using public transport. You just need really good public transport.

Lack of convenient routing is my issue. My work is a 15 minute drive, cost approx £1 each way in fuel. By bus it's 1 hour 47 minutes and costs £4 each way. This is due to the hub and spoke nature of rural bus routes, they all go into the city.

@DdraigGoch Avanti here aren't "good" it's just the alternatives are even worse!

Also inconvenient- ds school is 3 miles away in another village - buses are infrequent and there is no direct route so he could get 2 buses and have to leave home super early due to bus times to spend an hour travelling to school which would also be expensive, or walk for an hour (crossing a busy dual carriageway) or it is 9 minutes to drive him - I drop him a short walk from school.

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Here buses are infrequent, they don't run in Sunday and stop early.

I do use trains to go to Liverpool and Manchester but they are not much cheaper than driving, one is actually more expensive and I still need to drive.to the station and pay to park, but they are less hassle than driving albeit only hourly and they are quicker. There have been cancellations which have been inconvenient especially when the next train is an hour later - you can't rely on the late evening trains which are frequently cancelled and would leave you stranded with no alternative other than an expensive (£60-90) taxi ride.

I never use it. We have no buses to the nearest city,10 miles away,and the last bus to our village leaves a nearby town at 2.11pm. So if you worked in the city,you'd have to leave work at lunchtime to catch a bus to the nearest town,to be able to catch the last bus home at 2.11pm. We all suspect that this is do that the bus company can pull the service,as 'there is no demand'.

Both my DDs knew the importance of learning to drive. DD1 commuted by train to uni,20 miles away,and trains were constantly cancelled or breaking down,leaving her stranded. I can't count the number of times that one of us has had to go and rescue her.
The last train between two major cities on a Saturday night is 9.30pm. If you fancied a night at the theatre,travelling by train would be useless as you'd have to leave before the end of the performance.

I think a lot of public transport is run for the convenience of the company,rather than the users.

Bus into town from my house - 45 - 60 minutes

Car - 8 minutes

This for sure

Sorry for a bit of London-centricity!

Daily, it's much better VFM to use a contactless card, then the daily Oyster cap applies £8.10. Remember that with a Travelcard, you are buying all travel within zones 1-6. If you are just coming in by car, parking and not using public transport, then that might make sense.

But if you need to travel once in London, then contactless PAYG is probably best. Remember that u11s are totally free on London Transport (not trains though) and then reduced child prices.

I thought one-day travel cards had been phased out, but looking online suggests they're still clinging on, despite being more expensive than other options. Travelcard price is roughly 3x typical tube journeys (or fewer if longer ones across many zones). They used to be available as part of your train ticket - is that no longer done?

London is the plave where public transport mainly works.

Buses go on diversion because of roadworks, crashes, other incidents. And yes, I think there could be better info on the tannoy about the diversion route. The random waits are to regularise the service. It's annoying when yours sits down, but it means that the bus is running ahead of schedule, and short waits are better rather than having it catch up with the bus in front, and then doubled gap to the one after.

Buses to my village don't always stop because they are often full, that means an hour till the next one. If you have a job or college to get to that's just too unreliable. We haven't been connected to the national cycle network just down the road so it would be a treacherous cycle on a fast 60mph winding road used by huge lorries to get to the nearest town with more buses and trains. I imagine that's echoed all over the country. We used to have a station here but it was closed by the Beeching cute. Now we have a dual carriageway. In cities the buses seem to be a much better option than a car but in rural area you need a car.

Yesterday I went to MIL's, on the very edge of London, for a family birthday. It's 40 miles each way, mostly on rural roads and takes an hour to 90 minutes, depending on traffic. Petrol cost around £12-15.

To do that journey by public transport I'd have had to get:

bus to the station, only half-hourly so I'd have had to get the 10.45 bus for the 11.21 train

an hour on the train, £24 return

bus to her house, min 30 minutes

Return journey would involve a taxi from the station, £7 approx, as the buses here stop at 5.15.

I don't know how much the bus would cost, but I wouldn't have to pay because I have an old fart's bus pass.

It would take more than double the time, and cost twice as much. That's why I don't use public transport, other than for daytime journeys into town, where the cost of parking outweighs the extra time involved.

YANBU. I live in London where the public transport is expensive but good. And unless I am going into the city or west end, it still works out cheaper and faster to drive.

However my borough has finally recognised that the only way to force people onto a more expensive, slower and less reliable form of transport is to literally block off the roads, so they are gradually doing that. Soon it will be impossible to drive at all.

I still use public transport for long journeys or to get in to our city centre, simply because I hate driving. Buses to our city are good frequent and reliable. However getting the train to see friends and family in different towns has been quite challenging! I've noticed a real decline in the last year or 18 months. Trains are frequently cancelled which means everyone squeezes in to the next one. I often have to stand for a two hour journey, squashed up against other people, feeling quite claustrophobic. The lines and overhead wires are in a bad state so sometimes the train gets stranded for ages. Once I was meant to get back at 9pm but got back at 3am because of problems with the overhead wires.
Sometimes several trains in a row are cancelled and then I have to take some convoluted route home.
Adding to this, the cost of trains are very high in this country especially when I compare them to other countries - which have a much better rail service!
It needs huge investment!

Totally. I could get the bus to work but the times I did it was late or didn't turn up. Plus for ages you couldn't tap on you had to get a separate pre-paid card. So annoying. I am going to try it again over the summer in the hope it's improved.

We live on a TfW route although don't live in Wales.
Using the train means you need a plan B as trains are often late or cancelled or replacement buses are put on, which take longer (fine if we're just going to somewhere on our line but useless if you're heading for a connection from the main junction station). I've lost count of the number of times I've had to drive to Crewe to rescue family members.
We're planning an Interrail trip around Europe this year. The one bit I'm most worried about is whether the train from our home station will arrive/be on time as if it isn't, the rest of our plans for that day (including Eurostar) come crashing down. (We only have a 2 hourly train service at our station!)

Reliability, lack of flexibility, and cost.

Reliability is a major consideration. I wouldn't rely in trains to get to the airport, for example. The route we would need to use is always delayed or has cancellations. It's not worth the risk. And once you've paid for 2 or more of you the parking charges may well not be much different.

Train prices here can be extortionate especially if booking last minute, and even more so if you want any form of flexibility in times coming back.

It costs about £5 per person one way to go to town on the bus here. It's a 20 minute bus ride. As I have an electric car I can park in town for free, so it makes no sense for me to go by bus unless I want to have a drink or two when out. The buses also become less frequent as the evening goes in and the last bus is fairly early. So you end up using a taxi instead.

Not much help if you have to catch a place though, or trying to get to an important meeting, or even if just trying to get to work in time.

Indeed.

Trains are unreliable, very expensive, dirty and overcrowded.

The tube is equally awful, expensive and lately full of angry people who would step over you to get in or out faster if they could...

I can completely understand why people choose to use their car.

Bad for the environment but until public transport improves nothing will change.

Where I am (seaside SE town) trains are constantly messed with or completely suspended at weekends which must have a real effect on businesses as people find it hard to travel to nearby towns for leisure and shopping activities.

At least my local buses are fairly reliable and the staff is really friendly.

Unreliable, expensive and patchy service where I live. I could get the train to work, but I'd either have to walk 40 mins to the station or drive to the station and there is minimal parking near it. Whereas driving to work takes 25-30 mins and dh and I go in the same car. My station is one of the worst in the country for late and cancelled trains, apparently!

SW market town. Very few buses and those that take you anywhere worthwhile are infrequent and take forever to get to the destination. There is a station but I've only used the train a handful of times since I moved here 12 years ago as they are so expensive and unreliable. So we either use the brilliant local coach company service to London though its only once a day or drive and use the P&R in our two nearest cities.
Currently in Nice and have been using their brilliant and cheap tram service and the coastal train service which has been spot on. They are packed.

Agree. And if you don't know the public transport at the other end it's tricky.

After my c section I went to visit my gran in her care home with baby.
Train from my town to the town nearest her then a bus.

A journey that's an hours drive each way took me all day and cost a fortune.

I missed three busses because where Google maps said they picked up, and where there was a stop, turned out to be out of service - but with nothing at the stop to say so.

By the end I was tired, cold and sore from the uncomfortable seats.

Public transport only really works in local urban terms, not as a way to get between places or rurally.

I am always shocked when I visit my mum in Yorkshire at how patchy and difficult using public transport is. I live in London and I think we're shielded from the problem nationally because London public transport is generally pretty good. I really worry for the day when my mum has to stop driving.

My car has been in the garage for a couple of weeks as it's got a major fault which has been tricky and time consuming to repair and I've been getting two buses to my work which is 8 miles away.

I'm having to leave the house two hours before my 8am start time to make sure I get there on time and coming home can be an absolute ballache at times. If a bus doesnt turn up (which seems to happen frequently) then I usually have to stand after boarding and I've got back problems, which means I struggle to tolerate standing still for more than 10 mins.

I'm really missing my car and leaving home/getting home within 45 minutes!

I quite happily pay for parking when i have 2 young kids, as my bus can take 40 mins to get to town and is quite often late on the route back. Drive takes 16 mins and I don’t have to worry about pushchair space etc.

I got a car when I was 27 as there was no public transport route between my flat and my office.

When I was a student, it was cheaper to get a taxi into town if there was 2 of us, instead of paying bus fare for a 5 min journey. Bus would also often just not turn up on Sundays.

I feel zero guilt over driving everywhere.

Return train to Cardiff is £7. Goes once an hour and takes an hour each way because it stops 500 times. I can drive it in half an hour and spend £4 on parking regardless how many of us are in the car, and leave whenever I like. No brainer.