North East Buses

Passed a few DM deckers on the A1 as I made my escape (holiday)

DM Motor Services, A&A Travel, Jh Coaches, Stanley Travel & a random Silver Scania Bendy bus are on today. Shaws Of Durham & HC Travel have two ALX400 earlier but they haven't came back. M&D & Coatham Coaches are in as well but unsure what they are doing unless there helping the shuttles

Apparently they didn’t have enough buses for the shuttles from Park Lane earlier. 15 buses missing from the contract and expect more issues tomorrow

(22 May 2026, 6:30 pm)Ian1254 wrote [ -> ]Apparently they didn’t have enough buses for the shuttles from Park Lane earlier. 15 buses missing from the contract and expect more issues tomorrow

Wonder which Operator failed to show.......

(22 May 2026, 6:32 pm)citaro5284 wrote [ -> ]Wonder which Operator failed to show.......

Can't be them. They can do no wrong.

(22 May 2026, 6:30 pm)Ian1254 wrote [ -> ]Apparently they didn’t have enough buses for the shuttles from Park Lane earlier. 15 buses missing from the contract and expect more issues tomorrow

Seemed woefully under resourced, appeared as if the vast majority of the stuff on was having to be pretty flat out as kept seeing the same bits around every 40 minutes, so was likely load and go then drop and go and repeat - were still having to send buses out after 6pm as people were still waiting at Park Lane, queues at Heworth were supposedly bad too.

Operators I observed this afternoon:
A&A Coach Travel
Coatham Coaches (3 coaches)
City Transport (ALX400)
Delta Coaches (one coach)
DM Motor Services
JH Coaches (3 Omnis and an E400MMC)
M&D Travel (2 coaches)
Shaws of Durham (ALX400 and double deck coach)
SMT Travel (1 OmniCity DD:  https://flic.kr/p/2sesvwk)
Stanley Travel (2 B9TLs)

Unsure how many deckers A&A and DM provided, hard to tell who's was who's especially as it was mostly ex London tat and an ex Brighton/GNE bendy Merc from DM:  https://flic.kr/p/2sexecv

There was a silver preserved Solar Fusion bendy pottering around too (working for City Transport) but unsure as to exactly what that was doing as was appearing very frequently with full loads on.

Also saw an ALX400 with HC Travel but think this may have only done trip on one of the longer distance runs rather than the Park & Ride services, same with a few TNS Travel coaches, one of which did the trip from Billingham & Hartlepool with at least one from Coatham Coaches doing pick ups in Skelton, Marske, Redcar and Middlesbrough before dropping onto a P&R service

(22 May 2026, 9:16 pm)Jimmi wrote [ -> ]Seemed woefully under resourced, appeared as if the vast majority of the stuff on was having to be pretty flat out as kept seeing the same bits around every 40 minutes, so was likely load and go then drop and go and repeat - were still having to send buses out after 6pm as people were still waiting at Park Lane, queues at Heworth were supposedly bad too.

Operators I observed this afternoon:
A&A Coach Travel
Coatham Coaches (3 coaches)
City Transport (ALX400)
Delta Coaches (one coach)
DM Motor Services
JH Coaches (3 Omnis and an E400MMC)
M&D Travel (2 coaches)
Shaws of Durham (ALX400 and double deck coach)
SMT Travel (1 OmniCity DD:  https://flic.kr/p/2sesvwk)
Stanley Travel (2 B9TLs)

Unsure how many deckers A&A and DM provided, hard to tell who's was who's especially as it was mostly ex London tat and an ex Brighton/GNE bendy Merc from DM:  https://flic.kr/p/2sexecv

There was a silver preserved Solar Fusion bendy pottering around too (working for City Transport) but unsure as to exactly what that was doing as was appearing very frequently with full loads on.

Also saw an ALX400 with HC Travel but think this may have only done trip on one of the longer distance runs rather than the Park & Ride services, same with a few TNS Travel coaches, one of which did the trip from Billingham & Hartlepool with at least one from Coatham Coaches doing pick ups in Skelton, Marske, Redcar and Middlesbrough before dropping onto a P&R service

Sounds like a complete shambles - loads of complaints online about 2 hour plus queues at Park Lane and people commenting how poorly organised it all seems compared to other Big Weekend ops.  Closing the main access road and having the regular services operating non stop to force people onto the Park & Ride is all well and good if you can be sure you have a competent P&R operation.  Embarrasing really.  And £13 return for the privilege of enduring the P&Rs!

I'm told that he who shan't be named pulled his buses and drivers after a few hours?

I was on regional coaches yesterday so can't confirm, however will see later when I am back at Herrington...

(22 May 2026, 6:30 pm)Ian1254 wrote [ -> ]Apparently they didn’t have enough buses for the shuttles from Park Lane earlier. 15 buses missing from the contract and expect more issues tomorrow

Northstar provided three buses at short-notice yesterday (421, 422, 435) due to other operators failing to provide the vehicles they said they would.

Shaws of Durham also provided two additional vehicles at short-notice (coaches, not double-deck buses).

Northstar was planned to provide three vehicles today, and has been increased by a further two vehicles (to five) at short notice for the same reason as above today.

I am told the breakdown for today/tomorrow is:
- 30x Go North East
- 25x JH Coaches
- 15x DM Motor Services
- 5x Northstar
- 5x City Transport / A&A Coach Travel
- 2x Stanley Travel
- 2x Shaws of Durham

(23 May 2026, 5:02 am)Dan wrote [ -> ]Northstar provided three buses at short-notice yesterday (421, 422, 435) due to other operators failing to provide the vehicles they said they would.

Shaws of Durham also provided two additional vehicles at short-notice (coaches, not double-deck buses).

Northstar was planned to provide three vehicles today, and has been increased by a further two vehicles (to five) at short notice for the same reason as above today.

I am told the breakdown for today/tomorrow is:
- 30x Go North East
- 25x JH Coaches
- 15x DM Motor Services
- 5x Northstar
- 5x City Transport / A&A Coach Travel
- 2x Stanley Travel
- 2x Shaws of Durham

This was a whole different thing today 

Go North East didn't see 30
Jh didn't see 25
Dm did see 15
Northstar saw 4 including the beauty 425 (stunning job)
City with 2 & A&A with 3 it seems
Stanley with 1 & Shaws with 3 (2 deckers 1 coach)

A surprise was Garnetts who turned up with 9

Some of my photos of the Shuttle Buses from today, only uploaded Independents thus far. - https://www.flickr.com/photos/adammalark...0333835864

A lot of the vehicles used by Garnetts, DM Motor Services and A&A Coaches were Ex Arriva London DAF DB300 Wright Gemini 2's.

SMT Bus & Coach had x2 Buses in the form of Ex Metrobus Scania Omnicity DD's YP58 UGA/UGG.

---

(23 May 2026, 6:04 pm)Nerd4321 wrote [ -> ]This was a whole different thing today 

Go North East didn't see 30
Jh didn't see 25
Dm did see 15
Northstar saw 4 including the beauty 425 (stunning job)
City with 2 & A&A with 3 it seems
Stanley with 1 & Shaws with 3 (2 deckers 1 coach)

A surprise was Garnetts who turned up with 9

From checking through my photos I caught 17 from Go North East and I caught 10 of JH in a 2 hour period, definitely was no where near 25-30 Vehicles for both operators as Dan mentioned this morning.

Whatever the breakdown is, at least it seemed to be running much more smoothly today although I only saw a few bits within about an hour at Belmont this afternoon, whereas yesterday was a non stop flogging for the few bits which did actually turn up.

(23 May 2026, 8:54 pm)Jimmi wrote [ -> ]Whatever the breakdown is, at least it seemed to be running much more smoothly today although I only saw a few bits within about an hour at Belmont this afternoon, whereas yesterday was a non stop flogging for the few bits which did actually turn up.

There was a post on the council facebook around lunchtime confirming improved arrangements had been put in place.  Credit for pretty quick response to the learning from fiasco yesterday though you'd have thought Big Green would know how to operate without having to see the first day turn into a s**tshow to figure it out.

https://www.facebook.com/SunderlandUKOff...do9JQN1mxl

Maybe they should have let a major operator organise it instead of a company who don't actually have any resources themselves.
Back in 2019 when it was held in Middlesbrough, Arriva organised the transport and it worked fairly well from what I saw at the time.

(24 May 2026, 11:42 am)Superman wrote [ -> ]Maybe they should have let a major operator organise it instead of a company who don't actually have any resources themselves.
Back in 2019 when it was held in Middlesbrough, Arriva organised the transport and it worked fairly well from what I saw at the time.

This. 100%.

Still don't know why they didn't unless the big 3 said no...

(24 May 2026, 12:23 pm)idiot wrote [ -> ]This. 100%.

Still don't know why they didn't unless the big 3 said no...

To be fair it was always going to have issues. 

It's a bank holiday so loads of people want the time off, but more importantly Sunderland are at home and it's an either/or.

Companies like L&G Coaches aren't going to throw their football specials away for a one in a blue moon event.

(24 May 2026, 12:23 pm)idiot wrote [ -> ]This. 100%.

Still don't know why they didn't unless the big 3 said no...

First Travel Solutions were the ones who had the initial transport contract, Big Green Coach got the contract off them.

(24 May 2026, 2:06 pm)Storx wrote [ -> ]To be fair it was always going to have issues. 

It's a bank holiday so loads of people want the time off, but more importantly Sunderland are at home and it's an either/or.

Companies like L&G Coaches aren't going to throw their football specials away for a one in a blue moon event.

Think that was something that contributed to the issues, a mix of all sorts of various other things happening, Friday various companies had their usual scholars contracts to operate, Saturday had the last minute trip to Wembley for Boro although that looked to be difficult to resource too given the circumstances, JH Coaches also had a festival shuttle to run in North Shields on Saturday but unsure how many buses that required, Rail Replacements between Darlington/Redcar & York Saturday to Monday, Shaws provided 2 coaches and 1 from Stanley Travel for 'Big Green Coach' services to Slam Dunk Festival in Leeds today and of course Sunderland home fixture.

Friday was certainly a poor show due to the limited resourcing and whilst scholars services obviously have to run, still can't help but feel if it could've been better organised, all seemed very last minute from what I've gathered at least.

(24 May 2026, 9:15 pm)Jimmi wrote [ -> ]Think that was something that contributed to the issues, a mix of all sorts of various other things happening, Friday various companies had their usual scholars contracts to operate, Saturday had the last minute trip to Wembley for Boro although that looked to be difficult to resource too given the circumstances, JH Coaches also had a festival shuttle to run in North Shields on Saturday but unsure how many buses that required, Rail Replacements between Darlington/Redcar & York Saturday to Monday, Shaws provided 2 coaches and 1 from Stanley Travel for 'Big Green Coach' services to Slam Dunk Festival in Leeds today and of course Sunderland home fixture.

Friday was certainly a poor show due to the limited resourcing and whilst scholars services obviously have to run, still can't help but feel if it could've been better organised, all seemed very last minute from what I've gathered at least.

Yeah agreed, the location didn't help either mind since it's not really walkable to anywhere so everyone needed transport and the buses to Durham didn't get there - who signed off terminating at a P&R with zero buses after 11pm is a mystery to me. 

Not sure where else you could do it but surely there has be somewhere more central.

Very much surprised the Silas Blissit of the bus industry had any volunteers sorry drivers to provide work during the weekend. One would hope everything was done correctly & above board.

I'm sure he's not the kind of man you would want to run into in a dark ally, that's for sure!

https://youtu.be/HFS6YBe2P6o?si=hgAnItiXhi8vsVY2

Where are DM motors based?
Anyone know

(24 May 2026, 11:41 pm)Retro Nero wrote [ -> ]Where are DM motors based?
Anyone know

York…well Tockwith

http://www.dmmotorservices.com/index.html

(24 May 2026, 11:42 am)Superman wrote [ -> ]Maybe they should have let a major operator organise it instead of a company who don't actually have any resources themselves.
Back in 2019 when it was held in Middlesbrough, Arriva organised the transport and it worked fairly well from what I saw at the time.

I'm sure its often cheapest bidder wins for things like this.

(24 May 2026, 11:49 pm)Ambassador wrote [ -> ]York…well Tockwith

http://www.dmmotorservices.com/index.html

Ok , thanks, interesting!