Back in my day, which was many decades ago and growing up in the Woolwich borough, the 96 from Woolwich and the 101 from North Woolwich were two of the most frequent bus services outside Central London. All that car traffic only goes to show that the Elizabeth Line should have been planned from the start to go out to Gravesend at the very least. There's plenty of capacity on the North Kent line for half the trains to go beyond Abbey Wood.
Hey 101 is near my borough its now 101 to wanstead from beckton bus station via east ham newham town high street south high street north manor park station then wanstead keys. Now 474, 473 SL2 serves north woolwich ferry terminal. Newham borough.
3:54 this reminds me of the approach from the Halfway House from the Navan side, heading down the Navan Rd towards Dublin, through Cabra and past St Peter’s RC Church through Phibsboro where the traffic is always like this, until people turn right for the Mater Hospital once through the junction - that part of Dublin in both directions is eternally busy, day and night, summer and winter and if there is an all-Ireland GAA Match on in Croke Park nearby that Sunday, “you might as well forget it”
As someone that takes the 96 often, I can confirm it is quite frequent. Unfortunately, this good frequency can also lead to buses getting curtailed at Plumstead Bus Garage, Welling, Bexleyheath, Dartford and Darenth Valley
To be fair, unless you actually remembered where it was (south side of the junction of Wickham Lane with Kings Highway), the site today is completely unrecognisable. It was over 40 years ago!!
Some shots there brought back old memories .... much I barely recognise Grew up half way between Woolwich and Welling (more specifically, half way between the Who'd a Thought It and The Glenmore Arms). I worked at Plumstead Bridge and at Bexleyheath Broadway (back when George and Florrie ran the Kings Arms). 45 years on and the traffic problems in Bexleyheath *still* haven't been sorted. Good to see local councils are still as (in)effective as they were when it was my stamping ground! The old 696 trolleybus mentioned replaced an earlier tram service, Bexley tramways having end on junctions with the LCC tramway at Plumstead Corner (service to Dartford via Welling & Bexleyheath) and just past Abbey Wood Tram Depot (service to Bexleyheath via Lower Belvedere, Erith and Northumberland Heath). Tram services had at one time extended past Dartford to Horns Cross, not far from Bluewater, the terminus almost within shouting distance of the western extremity of the Gravesend Tramways. There was occasional talk of linking the systems, but it never happened. LPTB took over in 1933, by which time a catastrophic fire at the Dartford tram depot meant Bexley trams were *operating* the Dartford network (with some ex LCC cast-offs). In reality, the Dartford route was pretty much their entire system (IIRC, the junction between Bexley's network and Dartford's was at Crayford). Partly due to the rundown track on the old Bexley and Dartford systems, partly LPTB's avowedly anti-tram policy and partly political boundaries, trolleybus routes isolated from the rest of the network replaced trams before WWII. The purpose built ex-Trolleybus depot at Bexleyheath still serves London buses to this day (and is just to the left of the almighty bus snarlup you ran into behind Bexleyheath Market Place). Dartford looks as if Bluewater has finished off what the M25 started. From a moderately prosperous and historic Kentish market town, it just looks like another entry on Turd Towns' Kent list.
It’s because there are way too many private cars on the roads within 50 miles of any major cities, with city centre multi-storey car parks making the problems even worse, as is building tolled motorways and park and ride that people will not use, despite also not needing their cars, which make both buses and trams inefficient and unreliable - I’ve long argued for a total ban on all car ownership and use within 50 miles of any major city
I'm sure the reason that the 428 goes the long way round from Darent Valley to Bluewater is because when the 96 was rerouted via the hospital using the Fastrack roads TfL had proposed to cut back the 428 to operate between Erith and Crayford only so they never negotiated for that route to also use the Fastrack roads. Even if there are roadworks on the long way round the 428 will terminate at the hospital leaving just the 96 being the only TfL route between the hospital and the shopping centre.
I’ve used the 96 a few times it’s a nice route but I never went to Bluewater with it the longest journey I did on this route was from Crayford to Woolwich
The first time I took the 96 was when the Omnicities were the main allocation. It was a nice time on them, going all the way to Bluewater for the first time, too. Shame that the allocation is the bog standard Plumstead stuff now, but the route itself is pretty nice.
In my 24 years living in Manchester U.K., I’ve noticed a similar thing with Bus Éireann and Transport for Ireland buses out of Dublin, as my family live in Rural Ireland - this seems to have been going on since before Covid with some Bus Éireann routes and after Covid with Transport for Ireland, my last visit home being in October 2022, as I go home on SailRail (train and ferry) between Holyhead to Dublin - these buses can be problematic if you have a suitcase when travelling as I do, as I usually go home to Ireland for 5 days at any one time - aside from the roads of Rural Ireland, the roads around Dublin are in a terrible condition, full of potholes, especially when travelling from the Irish Ferries Terminal at North Wall into Dublin City Centre, which can make for a very rough ride
You're right about Crayford; there are quite a lot of London stations 8 or more minutes walk from their town centre (e.g. Sidcup, Eltham) but often there are decent frequency buses to shorten that walk. Not at Crayford - only the 492 every 30 minutes between the station and the shops. Perhaps all TfL routes, bar the school buses, should run every 7/8 minutes?
Is train (partly) a possibility from Woolwich? It seemed to me that the man cursing the bus company had the wrong target in sight. It was clearly all the private cars which were stopping the job. If those car drivers were all on the buses there would be no jams.
Yes. Frequent stopping services to Dartford from Woolwich Arsenal (which is a couple of hundred metres south of Lizzie Line's Woolwich Station ... pretty sure there's an Out of Station Interchange between the two), some fast services too. If you come from the Elizabeth Line, probably best to change at Abbey Wood, as it's 'in station'. TfL routes 96 and 428 connect Dartford Station with Bluewater in about 10 mins (theoretically). Beware a couple of local routes which take *much* longer to get out to Bluwater
3:03 a bit of both to be honest. This is one of the most unreliable bus routes ever, it has to be, because of the Dartford Crossing. I use it once a week and I'd say at least once every 4 weeks you get delays in hours, not minutes. And thats just based on 4 days. Then the mix of vehicles means you get overtaking, catching up, which then dominos the rest of the route and it all falls apart.
both the TfL buses that serve darent can use the fast track route into Bluewater. in fact I've had a 492 take the fast track route all the way to Dartford, and a 96 take the regular route around
I assume that Bluewater is well outside of the TfL fare zones... But can you still travel ok the TfL buses using an oyster card and / or paper travelcard?
Using the fastrack slope into Bluewater is since my time using the 96, as is stopping at DVH - surprised at that, surely that abstracts revenue from the local operator? \m/
What is crazy enough is that when I first rode route 96 back in April, Plumstead garage had a full selection of omnicities on the outside, I can only guess that those got sold off now
In future videos, I’d love to see you highlighting just how bad Dublin Busaras Coach station is, which is in an utterly disgraceful condition, despite its being an iconic and beautiful listed building in central Dublin and has been totally neglected by both Bus Éireann, CIE and Transport for Ireland, as it gives a terrible impression of our country to foreign visitors - given that Bus Éireann has direct coach services to all other parts of Ireland from Dublin Airport, I just cannot understand why they don’t do the same from the Irish Ferries and Stena Terminals at Dublin Port, despite being so close to both the Dublin Port Tunnel and the M50 motorway - these ferry terminals don’t even have a LUAS Tram connection into Dublin City Centre, despite the fact that Dublin port was expanded to take cruise ships and the number of passenger ferries from both Holyhead, Liverpool and Douglas in the Isle of Man into Dublin is growing constantly
The returning 69s could be school peak extras on return ? or the service is totally kaput. Terminating in Dartford made sense if there were other buses for folk to take beyond so only annoyed folk on the bus , not folk waiting
You can ask the driver of the original bus to give you a paper ticket to pass onto the new bus - often in practice you won't even need that if the new driver sees a stream of ppl coming from the old bus \m/
Ive beeb requesting TFL to stop the bus at Cugley Road or Myrtle Place between Dartford and Darent Valley. The bus goes express on Watling Street, and it’s only an 8-minute journey on a CLEAR road. I’ve sent them so many emails, but they’re still refusing. Here are the points I made to them: 1. Bus 96 and 428 become express while bus 492 stops at all places in Dartford but uses Brent Road instead of Watling Street. 2. Why not get rid of Hanau Bridge because it’s less than a minute drive? 3. I asked them to do a survey to compare how much people would use bus stops on Watling Street. All they keep saying is that it becomes unattractive to customers when London bus stops in Kent. While stops like Maiden Lane, Bird in Hand, Hackney Bridge, and Hanau Bridge exist.
Route 96 is NOT an express bus. It has been the regular Woolwich to Dartford bus for decades and decades since it replaced the 696 trolleybus. The only 'express' bit is between Dartford Town Centre and Bluewater Shopping Centre as, being a red London bus, it is not allowed to pick up local passengers and compete with local bus services on this section of the route outside Greater London.
To be fair, this bus is tragic, but its not their fault as southeastern are really incompetent, especially after london, as well as the road quality being awful. This is why we need an extension on the elizabeth line from Abbey Wood to at least Gravesend or otherwise this problem is going to get more problematic over time as the KCC is not improving anything whats so ever (Regular bus if i dont want to pay too much for the ridiculously high fares on southeastern)
Nice video - Need to take a ride on this bus!!
Deffo!
Matey, at 5:30.... Exactly my kind of reaction to this situation 😂🤣😂🤣
thought the exact same thing bro🤣🤣🤣
You'd probably hear some variation of that, were it me😂
ur channel is acc so underrated this needs more views!
Back in my day, which was many decades ago and growing up in the Woolwich borough, the 96 from Woolwich and the 101 from North Woolwich were two of the most frequent bus services outside Central London. All that car traffic only goes to show that the Elizabeth Line should have been planned from the start to go out to Gravesend at the very least. There's plenty of capacity on the North Kent line for half the trains to go beyond Abbey Wood.
Hey 101 is near my borough its now 101 to wanstead from beckton bus station via east ham newham town high street south high street north manor park station then wanstead keys. Now 474, 473 SL2 serves north woolwich ferry terminal. Newham borough.
3:54 this reminds me of the approach from the Halfway House from the Navan side, heading down the Navan Rd towards Dublin, through Cabra and past St Peter’s RC Church through Phibsboro where the traffic is always like this, until people turn right for the Mater Hospital once through the junction - that part of Dublin in both directions is eternally busy, day and night, summer and winter and if there is an all-Ireland GAA Match on in Croke Park nearby that Sunday, “you might as well forget it”
This somewhat my regular bus when i used to live in Dartford
As someone that takes the 96 often, I can confirm it is quite frequent. Unfortunately, this good frequency can also lead to buses getting curtailed at Plumstead Bus Garage, Welling, Bexleyheath, Dartford and Darenth Valley
You missed pointing out where Plumstead bus garage used to be. You went past it in Wickham Lane.
You saved me mentioning it! I remember the 696 and the 698. Were they originally tram routes (possibly 96 and 98?)
To be fair, unless you actually remembered where it was (south side of the junction of Wickham Lane with Kings Highway), the site today is completely unrecognisable. It was over 40 years ago!!
Some shots there brought back old memories .... much I barely recognise
Grew up half way between Woolwich and Welling (more specifically, half way between the Who'd a Thought It and The Glenmore Arms). I worked at Plumstead Bridge and at Bexleyheath Broadway (back when George and Florrie ran the Kings Arms). 45 years on and the traffic problems in Bexleyheath *still* haven't been sorted. Good to see local councils are still as (in)effective as they were when it was my stamping ground!
The old 696 trolleybus mentioned replaced an earlier tram service, Bexley tramways having end on junctions with the LCC tramway at Plumstead Corner (service to Dartford via Welling & Bexleyheath) and just past Abbey Wood Tram Depot (service to Bexleyheath via Lower Belvedere, Erith and Northumberland Heath). Tram services had at one time extended past Dartford to Horns Cross, not far from Bluewater, the terminus almost within shouting distance of the western extremity of the Gravesend Tramways. There was occasional talk of linking the systems, but it never happened.
LPTB took over in 1933, by which time a catastrophic fire at the Dartford tram depot meant Bexley trams were *operating* the Dartford network (with some ex LCC cast-offs). In reality, the Dartford route was pretty much their entire system (IIRC, the junction between Bexley's network and Dartford's was at Crayford).
Partly due to the rundown track on the old Bexley and Dartford systems, partly LPTB's avowedly anti-tram policy and partly political boundaries, trolleybus routes isolated from the rest of the network replaced trams before WWII.
The purpose built ex-Trolleybus depot at Bexleyheath still serves London buses to this day (and is just to the left of the almighty bus snarlup you ran into behind Bexleyheath Market Place).
Dartford looks as if Bluewater has finished off what the M25 started. From a moderately prosperous and historic Kentish market town, it just looks like another entry on Turd Towns' Kent list.
Is it one of those buses where the timetable is theoretical.
It’s because there are way too many private cars on the roads within 50 miles of any major cities, with city centre multi-storey car parks making the problems even worse, as is building tolled motorways and park and ride that people will not use, despite also not needing their cars, which make both buses and trams inefficient and unreliable - I’ve long argued for a total ban on all car ownership and use within 50 miles of any major city
I'm sure the reason that the 428 goes the long way round from Darent Valley to Bluewater is because when the 96 was rerouted via the hospital using the Fastrack roads TfL had proposed to cut back the 428 to operate between Erith and Crayford only so they never negotiated for that route to also use the Fastrack roads. Even if there are roadworks on the long way round the 428 will terminate at the hospital leaving just the 96 being the only TfL route between the hospital and the shopping centre.
I’ve used the 96 a few times it’s a nice route but I never went to Bluewater with it the longest journey I did on this route was from Crayford to Woolwich
There Is Also The 492 that Stops Everywhere After Dartford
492 is Erith town center to Bluewater shopping center (greenhithe) via dartford station
@@adarsh.m1999 don't lie it is from Sidcup Station to bluewater via stone crossing.
@@adarsh.m1999it’s from sidcup station, i saw it today
this is my local, its kinda express from darent valley hospital - bluewater
The first time I took the 96 was when the Omnicities were the main allocation.
It was a nice time on them, going all the way to Bluewater for the first time, too. Shame that the allocation is the bog standard Plumstead stuff now, but the route itself is pretty nice.
Great video!
In my 24 years living in Manchester U.K., I’ve noticed a similar thing with Bus Éireann and Transport for Ireland buses out of Dublin, as my family live in Rural Ireland - this seems to have been going on since before Covid with some Bus Éireann routes and after Covid with Transport for Ireland, my last visit home being in October 2022, as I go home on SailRail (train and ferry) between Holyhead to Dublin - these buses can be problematic if you have a suitcase when travelling as I do, as I usually go home to Ireland for 5 days at any one time - aside from the roads of Rural Ireland, the roads around Dublin are in a terrible condition, full of potholes, especially when travelling from the Irish Ferries Terminal at North Wall into Dublin City Centre, which can make for a very rough ride
Been on it before from Dartford to Bluewater
You're right about Crayford; there are quite a lot of London stations 8 or more minutes walk from their town centre (e.g. Sidcup, Eltham) but often there are decent frequency buses to shorten that walk. Not at Crayford - only the 492 every 30 minutes between the station and the shops. Perhaps all TfL routes, bar the school buses, should run every 7/8 minutes?
492 is basically just 428 but feeds up the non express section of 96/428
Is train (partly) a possibility from Woolwich? It seemed to me that the man cursing the bus company had the wrong target in sight. It was clearly all the private cars which were stopping the job. If those car drivers were all on the buses there would be no jams.
Yes. Frequent stopping services to Dartford from Woolwich Arsenal (which is a couple of hundred metres south of Lizzie Line's Woolwich Station ... pretty sure there's an Out of Station Interchange between the two), some fast services too. If you come from the Elizabeth Line, probably best to change at Abbey Wood, as it's 'in station'. TfL routes 96 and 428 connect Dartford Station with Bluewater in about 10 mins (theoretically). Beware a couple of local routes which take *much* longer to get out to Bluwater
I totally agree with you. The 96 route doesn’t look like it’s an express service at all.
The ‘fun’ of the 96 said no one ever.. off to the X80 I am guessing?
Spot on with the X80!
I used to take this bus to got to Bluewater.
3:03 a bit of both to be honest. This is one of the most unreliable bus routes ever, it has to be, because of the Dartford Crossing. I use it once a week and I'd say at least once every 4 weeks you get delays in hours, not minutes. And thats just based on 4 days. Then the mix of vehicles means you get overtaking, catching up, which then dominos the rest of the route and it all falls apart.
Im wondering if the amount of traffic in Bexley is because of the car dependency of the area
And mostly because Crayford gives out free roadworks every 2 days so you pretty much can’t be on time
The steep road around bluewater looks dangerous.
both the TfL buses that serve darent can use the fast track route into Bluewater. in fact I've had a 492 take the fast track route all the way to Dartford, and a 96 take the regular route around
I assume that Bluewater is well outside of the TfL fare zones... But can you still travel ok the TfL buses using an oyster card and / or paper travelcard?
wow, someone was a bit unhappy when the bus was curtailed
I thought it a rather understated response for round those parts.
I wonder if that happens a lot in London it doesn’t grow away😂😂😂
I saw that restaurant Turkistan and thought, I have to try it.
Using the fastrack slope into Bluewater is since my time using the 96, as is stopping at DVH - surprised at that, surely that abstracts revenue from the local operator? \m/
What is crazy enough is that when I first rode route 96 back in April, Plumstead garage had a full selection of omnicities on the outside, I can only guess that those got sold off now
Yh some have been scrapped sent to other routes outside London and used as training buses
Yeah think the Omnicitys got withdrawn sometime last year
In future videos, I’d love to see you highlighting just how bad Dublin Busaras Coach station is, which is in an utterly disgraceful condition, despite its being an iconic and beautiful listed building in central Dublin and has been totally neglected by both Bus Éireann, CIE and Transport for Ireland, as it gives a terrible impression of our country to foreign visitors - given that Bus Éireann has direct coach services to all other parts of Ireland from Dublin Airport, I just cannot understand why they don’t do the same from the Irish Ferries and Stena Terminals at Dublin Port, despite being so close to both the Dublin Port Tunnel and the M50 motorway - these ferry terminals don’t even have a LUAS Tram connection into Dublin City Centre, despite the fact that Dublin port was expanded to take cruise ships and the number of passenger ferries from both Holyhead, Liverpool and Douglas in the Isle of Man into Dublin is growing constantly
The returning 69s could be school peak extras on return ? or the service is totally kaput. Terminating in Dartford made sense if there were other buses for folk to take beyond so only annoyed folk on the bus , not folk waiting
The 96 Is Very Frequent it has a PVR 24
when I did the 96 the same thing happened and the bus after was packed
So...if they terminate the bus early, do you have to pay again when you get on the next one?
So long as it is within 65 minutes of you first tapping your Oyster card, there's no issue
You can ask the driver of the original bus to give you a paper ticket to pass onto the new bus - often in practice you won't even need that if the new driver sees a stream of ppl coming from the old bus \m/
@@officialmcdeath This used to be the case, but not anymore. Ticket machines stopped printing out tickets in late 2020.
@@KingRockhammer grrrrr thanks for the update \m/
Hi what was the app u used to track the bus
Bus times
What app do you use to track buses
Nice video for 12347 SN64OGW 96 Bluewater and 12378 YX16OGS 96 Bluewater too whats better ride 12347 SN64OGW or 12378 YX16OGS
Ive beeb requesting TFL to stop the bus at Cugley Road or Myrtle Place between Dartford and Darent Valley. The bus goes express on Watling Street, and it’s only an 8-minute journey on a CLEAR road. I’ve sent them so many emails, but they’re still refusing. Here are the points I made to them:
1. Bus 96 and 428 become express while bus 492 stops at all places in Dartford but uses Brent Road instead of Watling Street.
2. Why not get rid of Hanau Bridge because it’s less than a minute drive?
3. I asked them to do a survey to compare how much people would use bus stops on Watling Street.
All they keep saying is that it becomes unattractive to customers when London bus stops in Kent. While stops like Maiden Lane, Bird in Hand, Hackney Bridge, and Hanau Bridge exist.
I’ve got a mission to send them email every week about this bus stops, if anyone can help me request for this bus would be appreciated.
Hi, what bus tracking App do you use?
It’s just a regular website, bustimes.org. It has a database and timetables of all scheduled bus routes in the UK
@ thanks
It feels like an express
So Express, you miss your huge-margin connection 😭 rip Someone Explores
Happens to the best of us haha!
Nicee 👍🏿🤫
Cash machine outside of a church, definitely sus 🤔
Needs to be 24 hours but they won’t make it
Risky route after crossing dartford criminals will attack at 1am
Route 96 is NOT an express bus. It has been the regular Woolwich to Dartford bus for decades and decades since it replaced the 696 trolleybus. The only 'express' bit is between Dartford Town Centre and Bluewater Shopping Centre as, being a red London bus, it is not allowed to pick up local passengers and compete with local bus services on this section of the route outside Greater London.
That's exactly what he said in the video?
@@adamwest4981 Didn't bother to watch the video. Only read the clickbait title.
how comes the 498 doesn't do the express thing when it leaves london?
@@Name-iq8te Cant'really answer that but 498 would be an ex-London Country (green bus) route.
@@Ben-xe8ps but the title says it’s not an express route how is it clickbait?
To be fair, this bus is tragic, but its not their fault as southeastern are really incompetent, especially after london, as well as the road quality being awful. This is why we need an extension on the elizabeth line from Abbey Wood to at least Gravesend or otherwise this problem is going to get more problematic over time as the KCC is not improving anything whats so ever (Regular bus if i dont want to pay too much for the ridiculously high fares on southeastern)
5:32 Nah really
London Bus Route 96
well done sherlock
(but seriously, why does this guy literally comment this kind of stuff on literally every transport video)
@@tastybloxikr it's super weird like it's literally in the title