04 Mar 2022, 5:29 pm
#191
(04 Mar 2022, 4:37 pm)Storx GNE are by far the worst of the big 3 North of the Tyne and as much as Arriva is hated on here because they don't paint buses pink. I'm not sure there'd be many passengers crying if they disappeared overnight with constant cuts, downgrades and reducing of services. The 309 being the latest now having a last bus at 8pm to Blyth and the 1 being hourly which is useless. Good thing the Metro/22 and 308 run in parallel for most of the route to give those people an actual useful service. Obviously it's Covid's fault though for everything.
To be honest with adjustments to running times, the 310 departures ex Newcastle could be xx:22 with the 309 at xx:52, both running standalone. That would give a reasonably even gap on the Coast Road as well as working with the 308 and even open up the potential of joint operator initatives such as ticketing.
But cutting the later evening journeys won't win over the 'casual' users who will just end up using Arriva. Even the 51 could potentially take some passengers around parts of High Farm given the more sensibly timed evening departures at xx:10 rather than xx:55 / xx:00.
