Changing transport and destinations - looking forward to a good future
Archive - Originally posted on "The Horse's Mouth" - 2013-09-19 08:46:20 - Graham Ellis
Yesterday, I caught the bus at 07:38 from the end of our road into Trowbridge, arriving there at 08:19. It's service number 236 that runs each morning from Melksham town centre, via Bowerhill, Semington, Paxcroft Mead, Hilperton, Horse Road, Wyke Road, Victoria Road and St Thomas Road, and it replaced service 235 which provided the direct Bowerhill to Trowbrige service until this summer. There were ten people on the bus by the time it left Bowerhill, and it was full and standing from Wyke Road. I'm happy to report that there are now two services back direct from Trowbridge to Bowerhill - at 17:23 and 17:53 from Trowbridge Town Hall.
Driving along the new outer relief road to the East of Melksham, I'm delighted to see that bus stops have now been installed. All we need now is buses to serve the road, going where people want to go and at times they want to travel, and we'll have something really useful. Personally, I would like to have seen the stops built when the road was built (surely that would have been cheaper too) and services running, even if nearly empty, from when the very first houses were occupied. But at least we're getting there now, and there are probably a lot of people who aren't yet settled down and with extra cars purchased to cover them for a lack of public transport. I understood that the new service 15 was due to start this month... I must ask for a start date and timetable.
If you miss the 07:04 train from Westbury to Swindon, don't fret, there will be another one along at 19:32. Well - actually do fret because the service has been so inadequate and poorly timed that no-one has used it. Here's the 07:04, and it doubles up as an OPERATIONAL CONVENIENT way for the railway operators to get a train to Swindon to form the 07:54 commuter train from there to Gloucester. There's actually nothing wrong with having a train at 07:04, and it's a useful time - or it would be if there was a return commuter train from Swindon at around half past five. Well - from December there probably will be!
There's a new market in Melksham - it opened for the first time on Tuesdays some 2 or 3 weeks ago, and Lisa and I went down there this week. It's lovely to be able to buy fresh fish in town, and now that the greengrocers in the High Street has closed, the fresh local fruit and veg stall fills a gap. The bread and cake stall has been doing a roaring trade too and all of these make for a significant alteration in the flow of people and people's journeys, including now a lack of easy parking spaces on a Tuesday morning.
These are significant changes - and I can add others such as the coming of the Melksham Campus, the return of the canal, changes to buses that we've already been alerted to for early 2014 such as the Zigzag route's amendments and others. We spend a high proportion of our time travelling - especially if we commute to work - and there's a real need to help people to help themselves over the next six months - to educate our community so that they're aware of the changes / improvements and of new destinations.
Yesterday, I caught the bus at 07:38 from the end of our road into Trowbridge, arriving there at 08:19. It's service number 236 that runs each morning from Melksham town centre, via Bowerhill, Semington, Paxcroft Mead, Hilperton, Horse Road, Wyke Road, Victoria Road and St Thomas Road, and it replaced service 235 which provided the direct Bowerhill to Trowbrige service until this summer. There were ten people on the bus by the time it left Bowerhill, and it was full and standing from Wyke Road. I'm happy to report that there are now two services back direct from Trowbridge to Bowerhill - at 17:23 and 17:53 from Trowbridge Town Hall.
Driving along the new outer relief road to the East of Melksham, I'm delighted to see that bus stops have now been installed. All we need now is buses to serve the road, going where people want to go and at times they want to travel, and we'll have something really useful. Personally, I would like to have seen the stops built when the road was built (surely that would have been cheaper too) and services running, even if nearly empty, from when the very first houses were occupied. But at least we're getting there now, and there are probably a lot of people who aren't yet settled down and with extra cars purchased to cover them for a lack of public transport. I understood that the new service 15 was due to start this month... I must ask for a start date and timetable.
If you miss the 07:04 train from Westbury to Swindon, don't fret, there will be another one along at 19:32. Well - actually do fret because the service has been so inadequate and poorly timed that no-one has used it. Here's the 07:04, and it doubles up as an OPERATIONAL CONVENIENT way for the railway operators to get a train to Swindon to form the 07:54 commuter train from there to Gloucester. There's actually nothing wrong with having a train at 07:04, and it's a useful time - or it would be if there was a return commuter train from Swindon at around half past five. Well - from December there probably will be!
There's a new market in Melksham - it opened for the first time on Tuesdays some 2 or 3 weeks ago, and Lisa and I went down there this week. It's lovely to be able to buy fresh fish in town, and now that the greengrocers in the High Street has closed, the fresh local fruit and veg stall fills a gap. The bread and cake stall has been doing a roaring trade too and all of these make for a significant alteration in the flow of people and people's journeys, including now a lack of easy parking spaces on a Tuesday morning.