YOU might think otherwise, but York's beleaguered ftr super bus seems to be hitting all the right notes nationwide.

So the ticket machine has problems, and there may still be reliability issues, according to council leader Steve Galloway anyway, but that has still not stopped key transport people across the country fawning all over ftr as if it were a new puppy.

Yesterday, The Press revealed how an influential report, On The Move 2006, highlighted the ftr project and said it exemplified the partnership approach between City of York Council and ftr operator First - a partnership which has contributed to a 50 per cent increase in bus use since 2000.

Now we've got our hands on the report, produced by the Confederation of Passenger Transport, and can tell you more.

On ftr, it comments: "The result challenges traditional perceptions of public transport, while providing the ultimate in safety, comfort, reliability, speed and style. Cashless ticketing will help to reduce dwell times' at stops.

"From the very beginning, the local authority welcomed ftr as an innovation that is now part of the transport tapestry of York."

The Diary thinks a few city residents may have an issue with some of those sweeping statements.

Part of the transport tapestry? Only if that's the Bayeux Tapestry.

IT can be confusing when a political ward is given the same name as a street. There are several examples in York, including Micklegate, Hull Road and Fishergate.

But Green councillor Andy D'Agorne reckons the Lib Dem recycling chief Andrew Waller still deliberately misinterpreted his question when he asked at a recent council meeting about recycling facilities.

Coun D'Agorne wanted to know when cardboard recycling collections and paper tins and glass collections from terraced houses and flats would be extended "in Fishergate." But, he says, Coun Waller gave a response about services to houses in the street called Fishergate.

"I'm sure the residents won't find this childish behaviour funny," fumed Coun D'Agorne. "They want to know when they are going to get a decent service on a par with more suburban households in wards such as Dringhouses and Westfield."

Coun Waller said: "Coun D'Agorne seems to forget that large parts of his ward already have a service, either through the council or Friends of St Nicholas Fields. If he has further refined questions he wants to ask me he can email me at any time."

FOR more than a year now, Stuart and "A" Marr have been running a successful Thai restaurant at the Bay Horse pub in the village of Terrington, near Castle Howard. So successful, in fact, that locals are said to be considering campaigning Ryedale Council to change the signs at each end of the village to now read "THAI-rrington".