240 and 246 Changes

EYMS revised their two main Hornsea to Hull services on Sunday 6th May. The 240 is the direct service via Skirlaugh, whilst the 246 takes the longer route via Beverley.

For service 240 the main change is that all services now include Brandesburton, which the 240 previously just served on the journeys that included Hymers College, and in the evening. Otherwise the service remains hourly Monday to Saturday daytimes, along with a limited evening service into Hull and a reduced Sunday service of three return journeys, down from four previously. A previous two hour gap from Hornsea to Hull on Saturday afternoons between 1510 and 1710 is filled.

Service 246 has been increased from hourly to half hourly between Beverley and Hull Monday to Saturday daytimes. There is an extra service from Hornsea to Beverley in the evening peak Monday to Saturday, with previous 1630 and 1915 departures replaced by 1700 (1655 Sat), 1755 and 1855 services. A limited evening service from Hull to Hornsea remains Monday to Saturday, as does the 2300 Hull to Beverley on Sunday.

However service 246 has lost it's Sunday and Bank Holiday service between Hornsea and Beverley. Four return journeys were provided, three of which received financial support from East Riding of Yorkshire Council (ERYC) until the end of March. Interestingly EYMS pulled the interworked Sunday 220 service immediately, but these 246 journeys 'hung on' for a further five Sundays, plus Easter Monday. The combined Sunday and Bank Holiday 220/246 carried an average 7 passengers per journey, 4313 passengers a year, at a subsidy of £1.84 per passenger journey, according to ERYC's 2016  'Review of Bus Services in the East Riding'. With the Sunday 240 continuing and now serving Brandesburton, only Routh and Tickton have lost their Sunday services entirely.

Both services have a revised route in Brandesburton, now using New Road rather than Main Street due to 'badly parked cars'. It is also worth noting that almost all journeys on both services have new times.

So apart from Brandesburton, between Beverley and Hull, and on Sundays, not much change, which in the context of Hornsea depot closing is surprising. On weekdays there are seven pre 9am departures from Hornsea, but only one arrival. On Saturdays there are five pre 9am departures but no arrivals. In the evening Monday to Saturday Hornsea has six arrivals but only three departures. The residual Sunday 240 service starts and finishes in Hornsea. When EYMS's Hornsea depot was open this made sense, but there seems to be six 'out of service' buses running from Beverley and/or Hull to Hornsea on a weekday morning, and five on a Saturday. Likewise there appears to be a number of evening 'dead runs', and one each way on a Sunday.

This amount of dead running, to an outsider like me, seems to be very costly. Could some or all of it be run 'in service' - if necessary these journeys could runs direct between Sigglesthorne and Skirlaugh on the 240 and omitting Brandesburton and Leven on the 246? Even if only one or two passengers were carried it would be better than none.