Published 09/03/2022

First of all, apologies for the lack of reviews. Uni, incredibly busy and all that jazz. But I'm back for the first of hopefully many more reviews to come! We start close to home first! Enjoy!

A brief history

After fifteen years, four batches of buses and three contracts, First Essex’s operations of the Chelmsford Park and Ride network has ended. On 31^st March 2006, Essex County Council opened Chelmsford’s first Park and Ride site at Sandon, just off Junction 18 of the A12 and situated about a ten-minute drive from Danbury village centre, with buses running at around ten-to-fifteen-minute intervals with brand new Scania buses – and a couple of spare older Scanias to start with. The service initially ran from 7AM until 7PM. The popularity of the service saw the opening of the Chelmer Valley Park and Ride site, just to the north of the then town, with easy road access for people from Braintree, the villages up towards Great Dunmow, and Stansted, as well as residents of Broomfield and Springfield. The 700-space site came with new buses for both services, Wright bodied Volvo B7RLEs, as well as a ten-minute frequency running from 6:30AM until 9:30PM. However, unlike the situation for Sandon patrons, there are no other buses to the Chelmer Valley site after hours. The next contract saw at the beginning of 2017, new buses in the form of air-conditioned Enviro 200 MMCs as well as the conjoining of the Park and Ride services. A cross-city service between Chelmer and Sandon began running initially every ten minutes before dropping to every fifteen. After closure due to Covid, passenger numbers plummeted and subsequently, with help from driver shortages, the Cross-City service dropped to a bus every half an hour. I doubt the 2018 fare hike of day tickets to £3.60 on weekdays and a £1.50 surcharge on Concessions helped either. By the end of first’s tender, Sandon had a bus every fifteen minutes, with its additional shuttle, and Chelmer Valley every half hour.

New beginnings

Monday 7^th March 2022 saw the beginning of the next Chelmsford Park and Ride tender, with independent Vectare winning the contract. Founded by University friends Peter Nathanail and Dominic Kalantary in 2016 and winners of the 2018 ‘New Horizons’ Gold UK Bus Award, this Nottinghamshire based independent launched in Essex following the demise of EOS Buses. While I have no prior experiences on their services, I do hope to pop out to the infamous West of Essex, they have a very good reputation and shine out in an area where their opposition fail to impress. Having grown a reasonable portfolio of routes in the west of the region, Chelmsford’s Park and Ride is by far the biggest route Vectare’s Essex division have run yet.

Day One

The first day of the contract, I was travelling back to Cornwall in the afternoon meaning I had a little bit of time to try Vectare’s new service out. I made the sensible decision to try it after Rush Hour due to roadworks resulting in key City Centre roads being either closed or busier than usual. To compensate, Essex Council and Vectare have published detailed guides to diversions and stopping arrangements while this work was going on as well as drivers and controllers on hand to help confused passengers as and when they need it. The network has once again been split in half, a Sandon service and a Chelmer Valley service, with both services enhancing from better peak and off-peak frequencies. A ten-minute frequency in the peaks from both sites and off peak and Saturday frequencies being set at Fifteen at Sandon and Twenty at Chelmer.

I boarded my first bus at Anglia Ruskin University’s Chelmsford campus heading up to Chelmer Valley – paying £3.60 for a day ticket. For the first four weeks, whilst they apply the finishing touches to their new buses for the network, they are temporarily using brand new, demo spec 8.9M Enviro 200 MMCs. My journey up to Chelmer was just myself and the driver, however we were going against the peak flow and, this was to be expected. Chelmer Valley is my local site, with myself and my family having used it from day one due to its convenience. However, when I arrived at about 9AM, of the seven hundred spaces available, only about 100/150 at most spaces were occupied. It is a real shame to see this site struggling to attract customers considering the easy access to Chelmsford for occupants of previously mentioned places and the number of new houses within a five-minute drive from the site. An info desk, toilets, working information screens and well-advertised ticket prices and timetable boards.

After a quick fifteen minutes at Chelmer’s site, my next bus turned up with a very friendly driver at the helm. Not afraid to tell everyone about the change, inform them about stop changes and wait patiently for stragglers who would have had a twenty-minute wait otherwise. The bus had a fair load with around ten onboard, including myself, which is the busiest I have seen an off-peak Chelmer service in a long time! With the development of the Channels and new Beaulieu estates, traffic between the Chelmer Valley site and Anglia Ruskin University is busier than ever. However, a benefit of the scheme is the dedicated bus lanes implemented by the council after the opening of both sites. While traffic on this run was not great, the benefits of these bus lanes were definitely felt with queues of cars being skipped and us reaching the University stops, with additional help from the uni’s busway, within about six minutes. A great advert to use the bus over parking in the city centre! We arrived at the temporary stops on Market Road, with the High Street stops closed, and the driver kindly informed me of where to pick the Sandon service up from. If Vectare bosses are reading this and want to commend this driver, YX22 OGJ on what should have been the 0850 off Chelmer.

After a ten-minute wait at Market Road, which isn’t the greatest place to wait for a cab in Chelmsford let alone a bus, my next bus up to Sandon’s site arrived. As with the first journey, nobody else onboard but again going against peak flow. When I arrived at Sandon, I had a quick look around the car park to get a gist of patronage as it had been a while since my last visit. While it wasn’t as busy as I have seen it before, there was still good demand for the site due to its perfect position next to the A12. As with Chelmer there are toilets and an info desk, this time with plenty of helpful staff on hand to answer questions, with the building being perfectly positioned between the Car Park and the bus stop with an entrance to both. An even healthier load of about fourteen including myself boarded for the quick run into town. When I arrived at the station, I was once again kindly informed about the stopping arrangement and disembarked before walking home. Bags still needed to be packed before my 16:20 service off Waterloo.

My Final Thoughts

I think there is a lot of potential for this service with a new operator. A fresh start perhaps? With a roster of friendly, helpful and overall passionate drivers and controllers, along with an enhanced service, what more is there for a passenger to want? I, like many locals who’ve made heavy use of the P&R over the years, felt that by the end of the contract First had absolutely destroyed the service and feared it may go down the same lines of Maidstone’s in Kent and close. While it was only day one of a five-year contract, I believe, from what I experienced it seemed to be running smoothly. Even they said Many people know how highly I praise Purfleet’s Ensign Bus in terms of how they set the bar for how an independent should be run. Vectare are very much in a league of their own in West Essex with how they entice passengers, their social media posts as well as their investment into their fleet and are definitely up there with one of the better operations in the County (from what I have seen and what other patrons have told me). Perhaps in a few years’ time we will see them expand their profile, who knows. I wish Vectare the best of luck for the contract and, who knows, we may see another review once the new buses enter service!

Cheers

^WL