Saturday 7 November 2009

Public Transport getting even better

The rest of my family all live in towns and therefore compared with myself there are more facilities immediately available. I have to say that there are towns not too far from here in which I could be fairly content to live, Tavistock being the classic example. Cities - big, anonymous, noisy; not for me I'm afraid, I'll stick with this village right now. As I drive but don't have an imperative to make many long distance journeys the cost and frequency of public transport never used to be a big deal so far as I was concerned. That's changing now, partly as a result of the free bus service that I enjoy, having ahem passed a certain age. Good news then that local coach company DAC are making their timetable even more convenient when for instance I don't want to use the car for the four mile trip into Tavistock.

The branch railway to Plymouth now has its trains spread more evenly during the day. (I may have blogged that bit of information before) and another plus is that the train windows at last appear to get washed on a regular basis, important on the sort of scenic line we are lucky to have. My own occasional observations suggest that this line is getting ever more use and I think that I'm right in saying that all the branch lines in Devon and Cornwall are seeing greater numbers of passengers. Britain's public transport has been much maligned over the years but it looks as if the various operators are getting their acts together. Incidentally DAC use reasonably short 27 seat buses in the Tamar Valley, longer ones could be a problem around some of the lanes in the area.

I have to thank one Gordon Brown for the bus pass (the man is not all bad!) but it will be interesting to see if a new government in 2010 imposes any restrictions on the use of this popular scheme.

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