Public Services
Today is Tuesday, an exciting day for us because in general the buses don’t run on Sundays or bank holidays (Monday was one). We’ve had to take taxis the last couple of days in order to get to our trailheads. The cost of yesterday’s 20 minute taxi ride was comparable with the fuel cost for Eileen’s and my week-long van rental, but was the only way to get anywhere. It’s no wonder that all the locals drive cars.
In general, I've been impressed with Welsh buses. All the buses have free wifi and accept credit card tap-to-pay for fare — no special card needed. But there are major gaps in rural areas, even high-tourist areas like Pembrokeshire. The buses are all privately operated; as profit-seeking enterprises, they have no obligation to assure equitable or affordable access.
As someone highly involved in local politics at home, it's very interesting to see what the UK prioritizes with public funding, and what gets left out.
Obviously, as an American (and as a universal healthcare advocate with Whole Washington) I notice the difference in healthcare services.
Watching the woman get rescued from her waterfall accident, we saw two ambulances, ten or more aid workers including a helicopter dropoff, and a helicopter lift out to the Bangor hospital and an ambulance ride for her husband and many children to meet her.
"God," I asked a fellow bystander, "what is this all going to cost them?"
Aghast, they responded, "nothing, of course."
I knew this, of course, in theory. But it's a reflex to think about the cost; at home, smaller incidents regularly bankrupt people and families who thought they were doing fine. Helicopter fuel isn't cheap, and neither is emergency spinal care. But if you make healthcare a human right and a value of society, cost ceases to be the primary concern in a health emergency.
There's a lot more theory I will refrain from getting into. Imagine spending more as a country on healthcare than on killing machines.
My point isn't that government spending is more or less efficient here (I don't know). The federally funded Llanberis Slate Museum made absolutely no economic sense, but it's clearly considered a national treasure. There was a free museum of Welsh modern art in Machynlleth. We've seen towns with gorgeous modern libraries and towns where the library has been permanently closed.
In Haverfordwest, the library had a full staffed art gallery, and the children's program was in full swing with timeless classics: "The Grand Old Duke of York/He had ten thousand men...". While I was sitting there in the wifi tapping at my phone, I was offered free menstrual products. We took a free map of the coast.
Here in the UK, footpaths are also a baked-in value. Much of the Wales Coast Path is on public right of way through private land. There are also miles and miles of other public footpaths that make it possible to walk from just about anywhere to anywhere else if you have the time. Yesterday, we cut through a yard where a pair of neighbors were chatting across the rock wall.
"The public footpath is through here, right?" I confirmed in a fit of politeness, though I could see the wooden marking sign.
We have walked through pastures of sheep and cows and on the edges of growing crop fields. Sometimes a path winds close to a home. Sometimes there's a wooden sign and sometimes I'm reliant on my map. But there are all these paths, and they're public — not like home, where a path is a place you drive to get to outside of a city, where there is no public space between parcels of land. Without the footpaths, it's hard to have a culture of practical walking. Perambulation becomes a hobby rather than a transit mode — unless in a city, where cars will still dominate your walking route.
Pembrokeshire, we've heard it joked, is a little England. This part of Wales is where the English go to the beach. There aren't a lot of places to eat along the path, but enterprising food trucks have set up beachside. Public drinking water taps are often available, but toilets cost 40p.
Post boxes are everywhere, and anything from a postcard to a letter costs £2.20 to send overseas. There's council-provided free wifi at White Sands, but nobody knows the password. There is a tidal turbine in the ripping tidal currents between St Justinian's and Ramsey Island, but it's not running. Apparently, the sensor that detects marine life and pauses the blades broke in the first 15 minutes, and they haven't fixed it in the intervening seven years.
The Welsh folks I overheard discussing it blamed Brexit. They went on to talk about pushback on the new local seaweed farms, which draw down CO2 and produce cattle fodder, as well as growing mussels to eat.
"I think people just don't like change," the Welsh woman observes.
But change happens, even here where most of the houses are hundreds of years old and the footpaths often older.
There used to be more buses in this area, but the one we really need canceled service in April. We try to ask locals about the change, but since they always drive, they're learning about it from us. "Couldn't find a driver?" They speculate. "COVID?"
The stops still show up on the Wales transit app, Traveline Cymru, but if you ask for timetables, "no service found."
There's no regular bus for where we're going today, but there's an app called Fflecsi that coordinates a sort of buspool service (but again, not on Sundays or holidays). We pick a pickup and dropoff time, and then they tell us times within an hour of our preferred pickup. Nine and ten AM aren't available, but there's a bus around eleven, and it's £3.50 a person — we'll take it. All this research is only good for today; we'll move out of Fflecsi's service zone tomorrow.
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