GleadlessLad

Maybe, or maybe not; I see though that Supertram posted on their "X" feed about an hour ago "Tram only products will remain valid even if they cross the changeover date. The changes referred to in the link relate to Stagecoach tickets that currently include Stagecoach buses and tram."

Thanks - but what about the"Tram Only" tickets e.g. "Tram Only Monthly Mega rider", "Tram Only Flexi 5" (5 Dayriders to be used within one month) etc? If I bought a Tram Only Flexi 5 on e.g. 12th March, normally I'd have until 11th April to use those 5 Dayrider Tram Only tickets. But would I find instead, on 22nd March, that I was unable to use any of the 5 tram tickets that I had remaining?

Trams have run just between Townend (where there's a crossover) & Halfway & back - for weeks - during previous rail replacement work e.g. when they did City Rd, we had a rail replacement bus between town & Townend with folk then able to board a tram again Townend to continue their journeys towards Halfway. A number of trams were between those two stops when the break was discovered, but for some unfathomable reason they were all just immediately sent back to the depot (the break's on the outbound track). So I don't see why they couldn't have at least run the service between Townend & Halfway as they've successfully done in the past - on this occasion, they decided straight away not to bother.

If the weld's between the gaps, then the weld appears to be intact? That does look like the affected piece of rail, when I spotted it last week white marks had been painted further along the rail from the two breaks - possibly to indicate where to cut when the damaged rail's removed?

The Star's photo is - on this occasion - accurate - I know because I've seen the rail break myself. If anyone wants to check, it's on Ridgeway Rd, just as traffic turns left onto there from the one way westbound section of Hurlfield Rd after the entrance to Asda's car park. The break's in the outside rail, adjacent to the gap in the railings where there's a non-light-controlled pedestrian crossing point.

The unions pushed Sheffield Council into conducting a Job Evaluation exercise for all employees about 14 years ago. Pay for some posts was then reduced, while pay was increased for other posts. Obviously this caused a lot of upset & stress for those folk who'd been appointed to a particular grade, only to be told - often many years later - that the grade for their job was now being arbitrarily reduced & therefore their pay would be cut - often significantly - when they had mortgages to pay etc. A number of departments then suffered a loss of experienced staff as people left to work for other employers who were paying something like the original rates, while SCC subsequently struggled to fill the resulting vacancies with the right calibre of person because the remuneration wasn't judged as being competitive by potential applicants. Throughout that job evaluation process (circa 2009), SCC repeatedly said that it was necessary in order to protect the authority from any liability in future for large expenses resulting from equal pay claims. After the process had ended, all new posts ever since were run through the same Job Evaluation criteria to ensure "fair grading". Hence I find it difficult to understand why GMB seem to be trying to re-visit the process?

Ah yes, the man who SCC appointed as Chief Exec during the late 1990s. The first thing he did was to announce a wholesale privatisation / sell off of Council services "to reduce costs & improve the service to the public". The first batch was sold off to CSL (who later changed their name to Liberata because CSL had become extremely unpopular with the public due to a multitude of service delivery issues). Then, when re-tendered at point of contract expiry, Capita got their hands on that tranche of work... The vast majority of the services he flogged off to the private sector have since been taken back in-house by SCC - hence a failed experiment.

Yes, the doors on the trams are operated by compressed air - certainly on the "old" Siemens fleet, anyway. Yes, things do seem to be going downhill service-wise again recently, with regular tram failures yet again.

I too live very close to a tram route & agree that some trams are definitely much noisier than others. I don't think it's necessarily due to passenger loadings because there seems to be no difference, day or night. I suspect that it's to do with the condition of the tram itself - if wheels are a bit worn but not yet at the stage where they need reprofiling (or require new metal tyres if, like locomotives, they have those shrink fitted on to the wheels?) then that will probably cause a vibration making the bogies / chassis rattle? Also, worn track is likely to exacerbate this situation?

Supertram's Twitter feed on Friday & Saturday evenings indicated a number of issues at the end of the day's festivities, the main ones as follows:- 1) Some of the stops aren't being used (trams just going straight past) for reasons of safety. List of stops seems to vary by tweet but the gist of it appears to be avoid Malin Bridge & all stops after Leppings Lane & before Shalesmoor. 2) All trams being held for some time & not going anywhere when people are coming out of the park, causing a very large gap in service frequency & severe disruption right across the network.

Ha ha there'd no doubt still be cancellations & disruption, with a new excuse of a lack of horses!

No trams running at the moment between Cricket Inn Rd & Meadowhall / Parkgate. Yet more problems with the overhead cables, apparently!

There seems to be nothing at all on Supertram's website, at the moment, with regard to the service suspension between Birley Lane & Halfway. Just a message about the forecast for hot weather on Monday & Tuesday, suggesting that customers should think carefully before using their service on those two days. Supertram did post about the service suspension on their Twitter feed at 07:16 this morning, just stating that this is until further notice; it's now 9 hours later & they've posted nothing else on there since 07:16.

From 1994 until late 2019, the Herdings Park frequency (Mon to Sat) was 2 per hour in the daytime & 3 per hour in the evening. The evening frequency was then reduced at the start of Dec 2019 (hence nothing to do with Covid) to 2 per hour. Following the removal in early summer 2021 of the Covid restrictions on socialising, the "late 2019" frequency of 2 trams per hour (Mon to Sat during all hours of service) was reinstated. That lasted until the end of November 2021 when Supertram introduced a "Temporary Emergency Timetable", due to a shortage of drivers, cutting the Herdings Mon to Sat service down to one tram per hour during all hours of operation; other changes included an evening service reduction on Blue & Yellow Routes from 3 per hour to 2 per hour. 6 months later now & these "Temporary Emergency" arrangements - which we were assured would be implemented for a short period only to give time for Supertram to recruit & train sufficient staff to provide the normal level of service - remain in place. A few minor tweaks were made to the timetables at the end of May 2022 but the "temporary" reduced frequencies were not changed. I haven't commented about Sunday frequencies because I don't use the trams on Sundays. The Purple Route, while admittedly the least used part of the network, is a lifeline for many Herdings residents. Additionally, for those tram users who live between the city centre & Gleadless Townend, it serves to alleviate some of the overcrowding on the Blue Route at busy times by providing an additional service into & out of the city. Perhaps more people would use the Purple Route if it ran more frequently e.g. twice per hour, as it did between early December 2019 & the start of the pandemic - & again between early summer 2021 & the end of November 2021?

I live just down the road from Gleadless Mount - it's a nice area.