In early September, eastbound Lothian Buses stopped serving the bus stops on West Maitland Street; they are now served only by East Coast Buses, express and NightBus services.
Local residents, workers and Murrayfield Community Council told EBUG of the inconvenience this has caused; it’s over 600m between the stops at Haymarket and Shandwick Place, well over the limit for a dense urban area just west of the city centre. The stops on Shandwick Place are also further spread out and have no shelters.
Community representatives heard that Lothian Buses withdrew from the stops because delays incurred were not counterbalanced by heavy passenger use. EBUG visited the sites twice. It was clear that West Maitland Street illustrates many of the problems on which we campaign throughout Edinburgh.
Bus volumes hadn’t changed significantly; total traffic volumes have returned to/near to pre-Covid levels. Bus journey times have increased generally in Edinburgh; 1% per year is a figure often quoted.
The stops don’t comply with the Council’s guidance, specifically “Bus lay-bys…make it difficult for the bus to re-join traffic, resulting in delays…there is a presumption in favour of removing bus laybys…https://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/downloads/file/24985/pt-2-bus-stops
Historic laybys aren’t unusual, but this is at the convergence of two busy corridors. One stop is so close to the layby entry that it’s difficult for drivers to align correctly. The other is on the layby exit; a bus there either overlaps into the through lane, or stops short of the boarding area. Buses usually cannot depart when the lights are red.
Often other vehicles park in bus laybys, as happened while EBUG was on-site.
Usually, where two major corridors meet should be a good location for passengers to interchange between bus routes, although in this case Haymarket itself offers a wider choice (with tram and rail). The stops at Haymarket require a walk, and a road crossing.
But at West Maitland Street the road layout is particularly poor for buses. It has probably been unchanged for years. In the meantime general traffic volumes have grown; the layby compounds the problems, and there are no bus priority measures.
The building of tram line 1 could have been an opportunity for bus improvements, including at Haymarket, but these were not considered, either then or during later redevelopment of adjacent office buildings.
As traffic volumes grow, bus schedules are stretched to their limit. Bus operators respond by avoiding stops where they are prone to delay. So walking distances to bus stops increase, and bus use becomes more difficult.
West Maitland Street may well be a harbinger of what is to come, unless bus journey times are improved by more priority measures on the network.