Apart from driving to Doncaster, and thus bear the wrath of the environmentalist – as well as that damn roundabout at the end of St George’s bridge, you can always go by bus or train.
Having recently travelled the entire distance from Burghwallis to the shops along Wheatley Hall with every light at green, can you believe it? 19 sets of lights in case you ask. Such a rare event thought it worth a mention. But apart from squirting all manner of noxious fumes we never knew existed from the exhaust the journey proved remarkably swift and trouble free. In comparison the alternative transport options hold a few issues.
Clearly the bus is the very best option. OK it won’t get you to Wheatley Hall in one go, but as a community facility it provides the best environmentalist option to the centre of Donny. With a bus pass it costs nowt, it only takes 30 mins and the nasty stuff squirting out of the exhaust is shared equally amongst all passengers. Thus the more passengers the less the pollution pro rata. The downside is on a wet day it can get a bit gruesome and if you watched the recent “Luther” series on TV you might never want to ride upstairs on a double decker again.
The third option, and worth remembering that only we guys living in the north of Donny have this facility, you can travel by train. Doncaster centre, Sheffield and Leeds all available from Adwick station. Not utopia granted, the service provided by German owned Northern Trains has its moments. Sheffield uses diesel Pacer trains. Generally the conversation would stop here. These ancient beasts still clatter along letting in rain and wind in the winter and hot air in the summer when the holes under the doors suddenly offer light relief. But they are old and frankly utterly knackered. But help is at hand. Chris Grayling the minister of moving things has promised replacement trains and more of them.
This could be a empty promise as he has in mind the refurbishment of the Pacers. Ouch. This is akin to fitting new seats into a split windscreen Morris Minor. All the new, new trains will be scheduled somewhere ‘important’. And as he recently flew to Leeds Bradford airport to discuss the train situation in the North, trains may not feature high up his flagpole.
We haven’t touched on the new ticket machine on Adwick, installed some months ago and facing into the sun, (dazzle completely overlooked) as the software doesn’t let you buy a ‘bus pass’ ticket. You need a ‘promise to pay’ ticket instead, which sounds a bit like the ‘She’s got a ticket to ride’ track from the Beatles. And the kids have found they can mischievously print dozens of these promise tickets whilst they are waiting for a train! Oh, and you can’t use the train on a Saturday, they are always on strike.
Thus the real option to get to Donny is the bus. Our route is under continual review and we need to remember the old maxim ‘use it or loose it’.