East Kent buses

I live in a town called Deal, on the Kent coast. It is served by 4 Stagecoach East Kent bus services, which go to Canterbury. Most meander slowly through the countryside, which is quite enjoyable, but incredibly slow.
None of these services connect with other bus services, whether provided by East Kent of another operator. I classify connections as services that are scheduled to arrive at a common point at about the same time and wait for each other.
This makes travelling very difficult, for example a trip to Ashford and back, 30 miles away, took 8 hours!
I've commented on this to Stagecoach and they replied that the routes I mentioned weren't their 'most popular routes'. I'm not surprised.
The most irritating thing about their timetables is that buses from Dover to Folkestone usually leave 1 minute before the bus from Deal is timetabled to arrive. It's a moot point, because the service between Deal and Dover is notoriously unpunctual. When I had to use it regularly I would leave an hour earlier than I needed to and even then sometimes I had to call and apologise for being late.
Another example is the trip to Westwood Cross shopping centre in Thanet. It's 13 miles away and takes less than 30 minutes by car, but 90 minutes by bus, if the Dover to Ramsgate bus reaches Sandwich on time.
Is it any wonder that most people use their car in preference to Public Transport?