(Adds Arriva statement)
The average reliability of buses on the 70s route group has been improved to between 90 and 100 per cent from between 13 and 69 per cent, Transport Malta said this morning.
The authority said it has carried out extensive monitoring on a number of bus routes to ensure that the level of public transport was brought in line with contracted levels and users’ needs and expectations.
Following a specific monitoring exercise carried out this week, the authority said that punctuality in the 70s group also improved significantly from 50 to 94 per cent.
It said this improvement was due to the various measures that were put into place by Arriva, including the allocation of additional resources, and the adjustment of schedules and timetables to better reflect actual journey times.
While TM was aware of various problems across the network, it decided to prioritise the allocation of resources for monitoring on the main lines that connected to and from Valletta, to establish causes and address them effectively.
This would be followed with inter-locality and direct hospital services.
Since the exercise was effective, TM decided not to deploy any additional buses for the time being, but would continue to review the service levels regularly to ensure that the improvements made were sustained.
In a statement this afternoon, Arriva said that o the past weeks it reworked the journey times and schedules for “the 70’s”, taking into considerations the various factors that were affecting reliability and punctuality on these services, among them traffic problems and congestions.
Routes 71, 72 and 73, serve, among other localities, Zurrieq, Mqabba, Qrendi, Kirkop, Safi and Luqa.
The new schedule was launched last Sunday and the solutions implemented include the use of additional buses, the interworking of routes and the doubling of frequency on Route 73, which is now operating every 30 minutes.
Arriva managing director Richard Hall said:
“We embarked on a detailed timing and reliability exercise and have rescheduled these routes to better meet our customers demands, enhance the services we offer and lay down a very solid foundation over which we will continue building in the future.
“Both our customers and the regulator for transport have immediately noticed and commented on the improvements we have brought to the 70s. We know that what we have done and achieved on the 70s is real and works for our customers, and on these achievements we will look build long term sustainbiltiy and reliability.
“We are working on consolidating and improving services by focusing on groups of routes that compliment each other, and we will be looking to repeat the work we did on the 70s on other route groups in the coming weeks and months,” he said.