National Bus Strategy

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Wednesday 16th December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

My Lords, roadworks have been quite a focus for the Department for Transport over recent months. It is the case that nearly all local authorities operate a permit scheme for undertakers to have access to the road when they want to dig it up, and they have powers to co-ordinate those works and to charge the undertakers when the works are not done in time. Not only that, the department has set up the Street Manager system, which is a digital service that puts all the information about roadworks in one place. It is open data that is available to bus companies, so they can see where roadworks are taking place.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, the first traffic lights in this country were installed outside the Palace of Westminster in 1868, since when the technology has improved; they can now detect an oncoming bus and go green. What more can my noble friend do to promote this capability so that more buses arrive on time and we improve the reliability of this important form of transport?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

My noble friend is quite right that we have come on in leaps and bounds since 1868. In the first instance, many buses have transponders fitted to them, which will communicate with the traffic light controller and can cause the light to change. However, newer technology uses GPS tracking rather than transponders; again, that can communicate with traffic lights, but it can also provide real-time bus information, which can be made available at bus stops.