(29 Oct 2022, 12:30 pm)Dan I always look forward to your fortnightly Durham Road woes!


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(29 Oct 2022, 5:21 pm)Ambassador It reassures me that as management Dan that you and the rest of the management team have done and continue to do absolutely nothing about it 

Even your drivers were openly slagging off management today and apologising to customers

(29 Oct 2022, 6:11 pm)Ambassador The driver of the 21 from Durham which I waited 25 minutes today literally said


Hi I’m really sorry we’re 15 minutes late and I’ve been told I have to stop at gateshead and turn around. I’m sorry you have to get off, I know you waited a long time for me. I’ll wait and make sure you get on the next bus. It’s not my choice and it’s a joke.

And he did. He ignored the radio and got all the buggies and elderly on the following X72. I’d send a compliment but I worry he’d be criticised for ignoring the service delivery team

And it’s not the first time, I doubt Dan and co are remotely in touch with the realities.

(29 Oct 2022, 4:45 pm)Andreos1 Engagement with customers on social media seems to have gone from poor/abysmal to literally non-existent.

Not sure what the logic is there. But I can't see it doing them any favours.
Saying that, I'm sure am industry back patting award will still somehow come their way.

(29 Oct 2022, 4:50 pm)streetdeckfan I always just use the live chat and I've never had an issue with it.

(29 Oct 2022, 6:16 pm)Dan Ironically, I used the 21 today 1hr pre-match.

Didn’t have half as much bother as you seemed to have. None seemed to be parked up in Gateshead at the time (or if they were, they were buses of the wrong brand - which of course is possible!)

The bus was 10 minutes late - but it was OK because I knew there was a match on and allowed for a small delay. I still met my connection (with a few mins to spare).

I noticed one bus had broken down in Birtley outside of Morrisons.

Otherwise all buses in the opposite direction seemed evenly spaced - I didn’t check to see if they were all running late or were all roughly on time, but gaps certainly seemed even and all were well loaded but not all full and standing.

Not sure when you travelled pre-match, but it must have been much earlier than an hour before kick off, as we seem to have had completely different experiences today.


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(29 Oct 2022, 6:11 pm)Ambassador The driver of the 21 from Durham which I waited 25 minutes today literally said


Hi I’m really sorry we’re 15 minutes late and I’ve been told I have to stop at gateshead and turn around. I’m sorry you have to get off, I know you waited a long time for me. I’ll wait and make sure you get on the next bus. It’s not my choice and it’s a joke. 

And he did. He ignored the radio and got all the buggies and elderly on the following X72. I’d send a compliment but I worry he’d be criticised for ignoring the service delivery team

And it’s not the first time, I doubt Dan and co are remotely in touch with the realities.

(29 Oct 2022, 6:56 pm)Unber43 I've been on the X21 from Durham to Newcastle 4 times since its moved to Riverside, 3 times I've been told to get off and get on the bus behind. 

(29 Oct 2022, 7:24 pm)DeltaMan Surely it's time to put a step-back in at Eldon Square on the 21s between 10:00 and 17:00? It would only cost one driver a Saturday if somebody with half a brain schedules it. I'd argue that one extra driver is worth it to save the inevitable loss of passengers the continuous shambles Saturdays are becoming on Durham Road. I've been a victim of it myself recently!

The 21 is the flagship service. Maybe they should treat it that way.

(29 Oct 2022, 6:27 pm)Adrian It has, but then again I'm not sure how you can positively engage with customers, when the majority of your business decisions are going to be perceived as negative? There's only so many times you can respond to people telling you that you're shit or whatever.

I'd suggest it'd be a good investment to get someone to actually work with the team to improve the social media side of things. If there was some balance to what they're posting, then you'd hope that most of the response wouldn't be so negative.


Yeah, I've used this a couple times now and it works a treat. Even if I email, I generally get a response back in a week or so.

(29 Oct 2022, 7:34 pm)Unber43 Theres no space, with Arriva parking their buses there, Q3's parking there for upto 5 hours, X10's, numerous consett buses. 

Really you need to have a longer layover in Chester-Le-Street, Stanley, Consett, Peterlee, Easington Lane, even non-Newcastle services are struggling to keep up time, especially the 65, 20 & 60 too strugle to keep up time, its made every worse now that the 20 is every 15 mins and there is no X20, aswell as the 60 which has always struggled, as soon as you get 5 mins late you're just picking up the other passengers I remember looking on bus times and there were 7 out and 6 of them were bunched up into 2s.

Martjin mentioned something about something which will help them keep on time and name dropped the X1, 21, 60, X45/46 however if you send any of them dead from Newcastle/Consett/Sunderland the one behind just becomes late too, to get from Stanley to Newcastle the other saturday on X30 or X31 was a 3 hour wait due to buses running 1 hour late.

Also the GNE Social Media team, the people who say X service wont operate due to delays, whenever it involves the 21/16/20/60 go NIS they just don't seem to put it on their socials

(29 Oct 2022, 9:33 pm)Ambassador We’ve had going on a year of this.. lets politely call it operational issues and there’s zero sign of it getting better or even a token gesture of them trying, dans post said it before and his promotion speaks volumes of where the business is at.

Find a fleet and a load of absolutely awful agency drivers to cover a metro contract….easy

Serve your actual paying passengers…no interest.

They can’t even get a council to cut back a bush…

Still waiting for the chaos that arriva and Stagecoach will unleash with their cuts…the ed miliband chaos statement of the north east bus world and probably shows the sheer incompetence and arrogant attitude at the top of the massively woeful loss making enterprise that is GNE.

(29 Oct 2022, 9:44 pm)Andreos1 Come on. It's been longer than that. We wouldn't be on the forum complaining otherwise.
It's just reached its peak (I hope) over the last 12 months.

(29 Oct 2022, 9:28 pm)DeltaMan Space in Eldon Square is a terrible excuse not to do anything. A sensible operator would do a step back.

Send the buses round the block in the unlikely event of arriving on time during Saturday daytimes. What is more likely to happen is they'll arrive 15 mins late and depart Eldon Square on time. At least give the drivers a fighting chance

(29 Oct 2022, 9:50 pm)Ambassador I was trying to be positive haha, but yes it’s been awful for years, you can see the marked decline since Huntley. Carr was woeful and it’s managed decline since then. Gilbert was the last throw of the dice to try and he did alright if not a bit gimmicky and then ended up being the wrong leader for a crisis before he jumped before being pushed. 

it just feels inevitable they’ll be sold off. Investment funds have little patience

(29 Oct 2022, 6:54 pm)Ambassador dan…If you’re using a bus 1hr before kick off you aren’t seeing the problem. Nobody would dream of that risk.  The majority do not leave an hour before kick off. The issues are 12-1.30 which are peak travel time. 

If you think 2pm is a good measure. Says all you need to know about the incompetence of the commercial team and how out of touch you are

(29 Oct 2022, 9:33 pm)Ambassador dans post said it before and his promotion speaks volumes of where the business is at.