Bus firms put forward partnership proposals

West Yorkshire’s private bus firms have been working for some time on proposals for a new partnership with Metro, the county’s publicly-funded passenger transport authority. The plans are designed to persuade Metro to call a halt to its push for a quality contracts scheme that would see it wrest control of fares and routes from the profit-driven operators.

Now a Metro report has given an in-depth analysis of the partnership offer that the firms have put on the table, with key elements of their halfway house-style proposal including:

A commitment to stability from the firms, with routes and time-tables only changing once a year;

A single point of contact for complaints and the introduction of a formal appeals procedures for dissatisfied customers;

Infrastructure investment on the part of Metro and West Yorkshire’s five councils to reduce journey times and improve reliability;

Development of a multi-operator ticket system utilising smartcard technology.

The Metro report also indicates, however, that the operators still have plenty of work to do. It reveals that, at a recent meeting of Metro’s executive board, there was “concern about the need for clarity with regard to many of [the] partnership proposals”.

Metro was today expected to set itself a target of getting the necessary extra detail about the partnership by early autumn. That process is likely to be one half of a twin-track approach – Metro was today also expected to commit itself to completing work in the autumn on its quality contract documentation.

If both those targets are met, then Metro should be in a position to choose whether to go for quality contracts or a partnership. Bus operators conceived the partnership scheme as an alternative to quality contracts that would give Metro control of fares and routes.