Edinburgh transport chief ‘distressed’ by passenger tales about new city buses

CITY transport convener Lesley Macinnes has voiced concern about “serious issues” over Edinburgh’s new 100-seat double-door buses.

And she said Lothian buses should “sit up and listen” to the 3700 people who have signed a petition protesting at the new buses’ lack of space for buggies.

Speaking at a public meeting organised by the new Edinburgh Bus Users Group, she said: “I am quite distressed by some of the stories I have seen appearing in my inbox.”

The new fleet of 42 eco-friendly Alexander Dennis Enviro400 XLB buses, running mainly on the 11 and 16 routes, has been at the centre of a row over the single reserved space which Lothian buses insists is big enough for both a 
wheelchair and a buggy, but which campaigning parents say is not. There have also been concerns raised over the middle exit door after an 87-year-old woman was injured in a fall and complaints about the exit being blocked by railings at some stops.

Cllr Macinnes said: “It’s absolutely clear to me there are some serious issues here.

“I’ve been asked what the council is doing. We don’t have the right to interfere in this, but I do have the right to talk. And so I have been talking with the chair of Lothian buses about this and the conversation will carry on because I am genuinely concerned.

“Any petition that produces 3700 signatures is one that would make the council sit up and listen and I expect it to do the same for Lothian buses.”

She said the company had “good operational reasons” for introducing the larger buses – cutting the number of buses on the road and coping with peak-hour demand. “However, we are a historic city. We said very clearly from the beginning we would not be in a position to retro-fit the city to fit these buses – and we are now seeing some of these issues.”

She said the major issue was whether the new buses were “fit for our city”.

The meeting heard from several bus users who had had problems with the new buses.

Colin Chess, whose son is in a wheelchair, said he had gone to catch a No 11 bus in Morningside and there was a woman at the bus stop with a pram. “She said to me ‘Both of us cannot get on this bus’. I was embarrassed. She had been there ten minutes. I said ‘You go on first’. She said ‘No’. But I said the next one was another ten minutes and I couldn’t keep her waiting all that time, so she went on first.”

Corrie Brown-Swan, one of the petition organisers, said: “Lothian buses has always offered such a fantastic service, we are quite sad to see this decline in service.”

And wheelchair-user Mike Harrison said: “I’m concerned there is a lack of consultation between Lothian buses and the users.”

Nigel Serafini, Lothian buses commercial director, told the meeting there was a statutory minimum space which buses must provide for wheelchairs. “What we have provided is considerably greater. We have trialled it and evidenced the fact both a wheelchair and a buggy can use this space. It’s not an either/or, it can be both.”

Network performance manager Ian Bieniowski said he attended community councils and gathered feedback.