Comment posted Herald promotes SPT Daytripper journey via Helensburgh ferry? by newsroom.
Sorry – spotted on the day but, with the electoral convulsion in Argyll and Bute there were priorities.
This was information we were given from local sources and are unaware of anyone else going around asking everyone present where they were from.
Our point in this article is – obviously – principally that the route was an attractive asset that has been wilfully discarded by SPT.
newsroom also commented
- SPT cannot excuse themselves on this.
They knew well before anyone else that Seabus was going and the route was to change.
Clydelink have had new brochures available from day one.
This shows SPT’s absolute disengagement from the nature of the services they run – which explains the unthinking ease with which they failed to market the Seabus service and disconnected Helensburgh in the new contract.
Recent comments by newsroom
- SNP meeting on Monday may be testing time for mega-coalition proposal
We’re not going to do a ’20 questions’ routine but, to let local politicians off the hook, it’s not any of them.
And we’re now taking a vow of silence. - First Minister’s choice not to condemn mob behaviour proves Farage point
Criticising behaviour – like Nimbyism [a worthy target], should not necessarily require tying it to a party or a group, although if there is good evidence why it belongs there, there is every reason to relate the two.
When you say: ‘Only in a very small number of occasions would I condone taking protest to the point of physical intimidation and I reserve that to some of the most significant ‘upheavals’ in modern times (examples being the fight against apartheid and the civil rights movement in the US) – even then there would be a line I, personally, couldn’t step over.’ – this is wholly understandable but using violence to protest against it is contradictory. I can never get playwright John Arden’s line out my head on this one: ‘You can’t cure the pox by further whoring.’
Civil disobedience is a very attractive and effective expression of disaffection but people are quite resistant to considering it.
Lynda - Arctic Convoy navies celebrated at Loch Ewe as surviving veterans receive Arctic Star medal
Email Jacky Brookes of the Russian Arctic Convoy Museum in Wester Ross: info@russianarcticconvoymuseum.co.uk (Russian Arctic Convoy Museum)
She will be glad to hear from you and of your father.
If you go to this webpage: http://www.veterans-uk.info/arctic_star_index.htm
- you will find an Application Form for the Arctic Star on it.
Alternatively, you can phone: 08457 800 900 and take it from there.
You will be able to get a posthumous medal for your father for his Arctic Convoy service – and although, painfully, he will never have known of it or seen it, he earned it and the medal will be very important to your family. - First Minister’s choice not to condemn mob behaviour proves Farage point
We have people in Community Councils in Argyll who are on the record as not wanting ‘people of low incomes’ in their area. And those will be people of a variety of political persuasions. The socialist NIMBY is not a rare bird.
It is unsafe to give representational status to the fringe adherents of any cause – and that is why the cause itself – any cause – must be clear about what it finds acceptable and what it does not.
The need for the formal, official representative of a country to be clear on matters like this is even greater – and it sets the bar.
How would Mr Salmond react to the same treatment the mob offered Mr Farage in Edinburgh?
It was sudden and unexpected.
It began with an invasion of the pub he was in.
It was intimidating – the mob crowded tight in, creating a real pressure.
The shouting and the abuse was literally ‘in his face’.
There was no way through nor any offered.
It would be surprising if the First Minister were not to feel equally shaken by such an experience – and very surprising if he had effectively condoned it as gleefully afterwards.
Personally, I’m not afraid of much – but the pressure of shouting bodies, the level of unreason, the aggression – with no signals that this might not turn to physical aggression… I wouldn’t have run but I would have been worried for my safety and I would have had no certainty as to the outcome.
The police clearly had reason to take a quite extraordinary series of measures to protect Mr Farage.
One of these was locking him in a pub for his own safety.
That meant that they were uncertain of their ability to protect him against a violence they, who were present – clearly felt was a potential development.
I feel – on good evidence – that Tony Blair did more damage than anyone to the political life of this country, to its expectation of honesty in those who govern, to its essential democracy and to its security – and that he has blood on his hands: of untold thousands of innocent Iraqis, of Dr David Kelly, of those who died in London in the bombings of 7th July 2005. I feel the most profound contempt for him.[And Nigel Farage has nothing of this level of gravity on his record.]
But I would act to protect Blair were he to be the butt of anything like this – because I do not wish to be implicated either in what he has done or in any primitive lynch mob response to it.
The best punishment for the attention-seeking and egotistical Blair is to pay him no attention. He is not an homme serieux.
The best response to UKIP and MR Farage, if you are opposed to their politics, is not to vote for them.
Lynda - Walsh to lead all but Lib Dems, Conservatives and George Freeman
No – not speculation – otherwise we would have said so.
But this is not a done deal.
It has to go for approval to an SNP meeting tomorrow [Monday].
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I picked up a ferry and bus timetable last week in Gourock and the Helensburgh ferry is still on it!! How many screwed up tourists will there be this summer!
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SPT cannot excuse themselves on this.
They knew well before anyone else that Seabus was going and the route was to change.
Clydelink have had new brochures available from day one.
This shows SPT’s absolute disengagement from the nature of the services they run – which explains the unthinking ease with which they failed to market the Seabus service and disconnected Helensburgh in the new contract.
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It’s as if SPT’s concept of an integrated public transport system doesn’t extend beyond buses and trains, and it beggars belief; they should be sent on a study tour (of the genuine – rather than junket – variety) of Scandinavia at their own expense, to find out how to do it.
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Gosh, spotted only 48 hours after it appeared! Those in glass houses… cast your mind back to a headline on this site: “400 Rosneath residents protest in person on Kilcreggan Pier on SPT ferry plans”. Not the case at all, quite apart from the issue of whether it is possible to protest ‘on’ something. Some of the people protesting were from Rosneath, but most were not. A classic case of what happens if you take a headline off the shelf without knowing the area or bothering to check.
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Sorry – spotted on the day but, with the electoral convulsion in Argyll and Bute there were priorities.
This was information we were given from local sources and are unaware of anyone else going around asking everyone present where they were from.
Our point in this article is – obviously – principally that the route was an attractive asset that has been wilfully discarded by SPT.
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So what – you think those people had no right to protest? you think that the ferry service is fine? are you rooting for SPT? – is it a case of ‘don’t rock the boat boys, remember where your money comes from? just what sort of blinkers are you wearing, and who put them there? Compared with the misinformation in the timetables, and the misinformed piece in the Herald, this is nothing.
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Helensburgh & Lomond Real Ale Festival organised by the Round Table is advertising on its leaflets that to get there, you can go “by Ferry: Passenger ferry from Gourock via Kilcreggan”
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Dear dear… just because I point out an error, Mr Wakeham, I must be a member of the forces of evil. I’m not. I’m one of the people who use this ferry service, are furious with SPT and baffled by some of the apparent support for Clydelink which has appeared on this site. And I was on the pier that day.
Rather than picking holes in other people’s stories, perhaps the ‘newsrooom’ could do something such as work out the percentage of scheduled journeys since April 1 which have not taken place under the terms of the contract – a 60-seater vessel. So the current 12-seat joke should be ignored, as should the buses, the journeys cancelled because of weather (in April), breakdowns/boat reliability (two separate occasions, including the current one) and the MCA’s instruction that it should not sail for safety reasons. Try working out that little sum, and the facts will tell the story.
The headline, by the way, was in error because ‘Rosneath residents’ means people who live in that village, not the peninsula of the same name.
Oh, and try searching on Youtube for Island Princess and Gourock.
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So it’s a wonder to me why I haven’t seen you raise these major issues already, rather than saving your comments for what’s really nothing more than a bit of nitpicking – accuracy is important, but getting to the stage of distinguishing between residents of Rosneath and residents of the Rosneath peninsula, in this context, is surely getting a bit anal? Don’t you need to concentrate your energies on the real point, the way in which what should be several passenger ferry links on this part of the Clyde have been comprehensively mismanaged by SPT?
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I don’t live on the peninsular and used it occasionally to go from Gourock to Dumbarton via Helensburgh. What is being reported is the ferry crossing and time tabling are now just a shambles – an infrequent and unreliable service. There is no good to be done by bitching between us. There needs to be a concerted effort to assist those who can make a difference and have the ability to persuade those in power to improve this ferry service for the good of us all, and particularly for the core users. I have written to the Transport Minister – reporting on the number of missed timetables and substitute buses. It will take more than just one voice to make a difference. so if everyone could just email the Minister then at least we get it on his agenda.
Ps the bus leaves from Gourock at 0645hrs tomorrow, Wednesday 9 May the ferry leaves at 0700hrs http://www.kilcregganferry.com – talk about the cart before the horse
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Could it be that SPT has been corrupted by a hostile alien force to cause maximum damage to the economic and social well being of the communities around the shores of the Clyde, under the nose of a supine national government?
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Nobody seems to be bothered about The Herald running a story that must be at least six months old without taking the time to check that it is still valid, it is by no means a case of ‘hard luck’ on the part of the paper. The ‘fun fair’ could only ever be in ‘full belt’ during the summer (although I can’t recall when I last observed it coming close to fitting that description) and disappears completely for the winter period. They, like some others, have simply assumed the link still remains, the current Cal Mac online timetables still list the old service with a ‘subject to change’ stamp on them. It only takes a quick visit to travelinescotland.com to confirm what the current arrangements are, which would be prudent advice for anyone planning such a journey.
There are a couple of other points overlooked here, one is there is still a very effective public transport link between Kilcreggan and Helensburgh which operates for moat of the day with only a small proportion receiving any subsidy and the second is the lack of support for the day tripper ticket in some areas, i.e. although you can get to Gourock by train your only option from there is the Kilcreggan Ferry as it’s not valid on the local buses.
On the subject of marketing try searching SPT minutes, there is a little more there than conjecture.
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having to get the train to gourock from alexandria does make a change that I see dumbarton rock from the other side of the water.their has to be a triangle of service me thinks and should be brought back.please…
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