sashinka | observation orientated, with a twist of lime | a blog

I Have A (Transport Infrastructure) Dream
I had a dream where I imagined the corporate advertising on my own personal bus shelter changed every day, and then yesterday I discovered it has changed for the third time, and still no bus stop.

Because I've done a huge amount of reading/research on Ken's BusPlus strategy, which is a £200m "flagship" (their quotes, not mine: I suspect it means "not really flagship") project in the Mayor's Transport Strategy, which aims to deliver fast, reliable and comfortable bus services, making bus travel an attractive option for Londoners.

I'd like that, too.

Part of the strategy is apparently to put bus stops closer together, so it's always a shorter walk to one. Sounds like a good idea. Except that, with more bus stops, and more people using the enhanced services, journeys take longer. So there are now five bus stops between my house and Kilburn tube, instead of the former two, and it now takes longer to travel there on the bus than it does to walk.

In town yesterday, I saw a Transport for London sticker on a bus that said something like "faster journeys, quicker at every stop" ( I knew should have written the exact wording down), and I though, "that's marketing bollocks". It sounds fabulous, but it's patently undeliverable, unless you get rid of the passengers. Now that would make it faster at every stop.

This, coupled with having to travel through London like I'm an extra in some proto-Orwellian film, replete with all those stupid "Secure Beneath The Watchful Eyes" posters, makes me feel that Big Brother is watching me, just not in a good way. I live in a city that purports to consult with me as a citizen, but then clearly states that my views will not be taken into account (more whingeing about the bus shelter, must stop, sorry), and where millions is spent on what appear to be faux-joke posters, marketing a service that doesn't work and is badly thought out.

Perhaps I'll leave the country.

And I may have a dream, but it's evidently a fantasy.