Michael Cotter talks about the introduction of the Super Bus and the importance of the provision of transport in Stevenage

Transcript:

Interviewer: Well there we are, it’s a sort of town that was built with lots of two storey, mainly two storey buildings which meant it was so spread out that you had to have a good transport system

Michael:  Yes that was the introduction of the Super Bus. That was marvellous. But yes that was a marvellous experiment it worked, it did reduce the number of car journeys, it gave people a door-to-door fast and speedy service, you know. A fare that they knew what their weekly commitments in advance was they knew for a fair time. It wasn’t unreasonable, it worked that’s the criteria, that’s test it worked. It was frequent I think it is less frequent now. But in those days it was very frequent and we had a method of scaling our buses, which looked different because they were painted yellow then to attract a lot of attention. Very good. And again they were in Stevenage first there have been so many Stevenage firsts, it is difficult to recall them all but we have done a hell of a lot of things that other people have copied.

Interviewer: That was extremely useful if you are going to have to get people off the road

Michael: Oh yes

Interviewer: Reduce accidents, save money and all the rest of it you have got to help and provide transport.

Michael: That’s right

Interviewer: It’s a social service virtually

Michael: That’s right

Cotter 1986