(26 Oct 2023, 9:38 pm)Ambassador I had the misfortune of a pretty rough day on the 21 today and none of it was GNEs fault.

The rush hour 21s out of Newcastle were running 30-45 mins late out of Newcastle and it’s all down to the councils and the road network

Collingwood St and The Bigg Market are undergoing works to improve the flow of what is a pinch point of a junction but it took my 21 about 12 minutes to get from Wilko to High Level, not assisted by cars blocking Grainger St

The A184 was packed towards Gateshead interchange so the buses couldn’t access the bus lane, this added just under 8 minutes

We then got stuck on High St West as traffic from the A184 towards Gateshead Highway blocked the junction.

The above two are no doubt unintended consequences of Gatesheads utterly insane road network.

Low Fell was horrific, although I’d normally be off home at the cannon I was meeting friends in Chester. We crawled along to lyndhurst, at least 15 minutes.

Then we hit…Birtley. Wow. The new cycle lane and footpath improvements have 3 way lights at the moment, combined with the A1 roadworks, it’s a recipe for disaster, af5er 5 mins stuck at Eighton Lodge roundabout we sat in Newcastle Bank for 10 minutes before crawling through Birtley and then hitting yet more roadworks for the cycle lane after Komats. We arrived in Chester just under 40 mins late with a convoy of equally late 21s behind us.

I’m quick to criticise service delivery, but I genuinely don’t know what they can do aside stakeholder bollocking Gateshead Council for their ineptitude. Only going to get worse next year with the Tyne Bridge

(26 Oct 2023, 10:02 pm)Unber43 Turn High Level Bridge two ways and send the services going into Newcaslte via Central Station then have them come through Market Street then turn around New Bridge Street 

I am too however it just cannot be like this every day.

(26 Oct 2023, 10:20 pm)Ambassador High Level can’t support two ways anymore due to its age and condition

(26 Oct 2023, 10:26 pm)Unber43 What about with traffic lights?

(26 Oct 2023, 10:28 pm)Ambassador I don’t think that would work due to the road layouts in place. Modern buses are wider as well, the older buses struggled to get past. 

Network Rails long term plan is to close the bridge to vehicle traffic in the long term to prolong its life

(26 Oct 2023, 9:38 pm)Ambassador I had the misfortune of a pretty rough day on the 21 today and none of it was GNEs fault.

The rush hour 21s out of Newcastle were running 30-45 mins late out of Newcastle and it’s all down to the councils and the road network

Collingwood St and The Bigg Market are undergoing works to improve the flow of what is a pinch point of a junction but it took my 21 about 12 minutes to get from Wilko to High Level, not assisted by cars blocking Grainger St

The A184 was packed towards Gateshead interchange so the buses couldn’t access the bus lane, this added just under 8 minutes

We then got stuck on High St West as traffic from the A184 towards Gateshead Highway blocked the junction.

The above two are no doubt unintended consequences of Gatesheads utterly insane road network.

Low Fell was horrific, although I’d normally be off home at the cannon I was meeting friends in Chester. We crawled along to lyndhurst, at least 15 minutes.

Then we hit…Birtley. Wow. The new cycle lane and footpath improvements have 3 way lights at the moment, combined with the A1 roadworks, it’s a recipe for disaster, af5er 5 mins stuck at Eighton Lodge roundabout we sat in Newcastle Bank for 10 minutes before crawling through Birtley and then hitting yet more roadworks for the cycle lane after Komats. We arrived in Chester just under 40 mins late with a convoy of equally late 21s behind us.

I’m quick to criticise service delivery, but I genuinely don’t know what they can do aside stakeholder bollocking Gateshead Council for their ineptitude. Only going to get worse next year with the Tyne Bridge

(27 Oct 2023, 8:52 am)Rob44 I'll say this quietly but they could always terminate buses at Gateshead and save at least 20 minutes in delays and that no including how much time the 21 lost getting INTO Newcastle......  with lines and lines of empty buses sitting in "q"s on the Tyne bridge

(27 Oct 2023, 9:38 am)Ambassador But there's no alternative. Metro cannot cope and even with the new fleet probably can't manage the influx

(27 Oct 2023, 9:44 am)Unber43 Could they not just order say another 10?

(27 Oct 2023, 9:51 am)Ambassador They've need drivers, more infrastructure, more pathing - it just wouldn't work. 

And a lot of Metro's problems are not capacity - it's the whole wider piece

(27 Oct 2023, 9:38 am)Ambassador But there's no alternative. Metro cannot cope and even with the new fleet probably can't manage the influx

(27 Oct 2023, 7:42 am)Andreos1 Whilst there's not much forward planning (I'd argue there's stuff they could do to mitigate delays) they can do for roadworks and the inevitable delays, I do wonder how many of the cars on the road are there because the buses don't meet their needs?

Imagine the bus companies being proactive and trying to find out why the people in the cars aren't on the buses and then doing something about it?

(27 Oct 2023, 11:59 am)Adrian It's that they don't even attempt anything to mitigate roadworks. They know they've got buses getting stuck for around 20 minutes southbound, between Newgate Street and the foot of the Bigg Market, yet continue to send everything down that way. It's madness. 

Seeing as stuff is managing to get in over the Tyne Bridge OK, I don't understand why they wouldn't send stuff back that way instead? Especially when they've got a bus only lane on Swan House and then a bus lane down the slip road onto the bridge. It'd mean missing stops at St Nicholas cathedral and by Microbus, but at least you'd not have a queue of buses backed up.

(01 Nov 2023, 10:02 pm)Unber43 22/23 and cos of that the 24 are really suffering upto 40 mins late.

Ideally they could just where possibly be mostly all decker allocated and take some deckers off other routes.

They cannot just leave it for 12 weeks without any major changes

(01 Nov 2023, 10:19 pm)Adrian They should be looking at it as an opportunity, if its GNE's customers flocking to them.

Register a change to increase the frequency and in the meantime, offer promotional weekly/monthly tickets, cheaper than what they're paying now.

Sent from my SM-S916B using Tapatalk

(01 Nov 2023, 10:02 pm)Unber43 22/23 and cos of that the 24 are really suffering upto 40 mins late.

Ideally they could just where possibly be mostly all decker allocated and take some deckers off other routes.

They cannot just leave it for 12 weeks without any major changes

(01 Nov 2023, 11:51 pm)Jimmi Few bits of roadworks along the routes ain't helping matters, Durham yesterday was just completely gridlocked, believe Leazes Road was down to one lane and it was taking all the services that enter Durham that way considerably longer to reach North Road, roughly 30 mins from Durham Uni to North Road, whilst the 64 was taking as long as an hour to reach North Road from Sherburn.