(26 Dec 2015, 9:13 pm)tyresmoke wrote [ -> ]I expect that if we are to start doing a limited Boxing Day service, it would work from one single depot just like Yorkshire operate their services.
Ashington depot - as they have the highest spec vehicles (Sapphire) which can be used on MAX routes.
35/X18 - PVR 5 - 3x MAX X20 B7s and 2x MAX E400 - interworks at Morpeth, providing short Alnwick-Morpeth service. As one X20 B7 will be at Alnwick, 2x MAX E400 will cover that vehicle.
X21/X22 - PVR 4 - 4x Sapphire X21/X22 E400 - interworks at Ashington with no service to Newbiggin
121 - PVR 1 - 1x Arriva MPD - providing shuttle bus between Ashington and Wansbeck Hospital
X10 - PVR 4 - 4x Sapphire X21/X22 E400 - X10 extended to Ashington via Bebside and 1 route, also runs via Wide Open.
X7 - PVR 2 - 2x Sapphire X21/X22 E400
X14 - PVR 3 - 3x Sapphire X21/X22 E400 - Every 30 minutes
2 - PVR 2 - 2x Arriva MPD
In total:-
13x Sapphire Enviro400s
2x MAX E400s
3x MAX X20 B7s
3x Arriva MPDs
Creating a draft timetable for the above
(26 Dec 2015, 9:44 pm)GX03 SVC wrote [ -> ]Ashington depot - as they have the highest spec vehicles (Sapphire) which can be used on MAX routes.
35/X18 - PVR 4 - 3x MAX X20 B7s and 1x Sapphire X21/X22 E400 - interworks at Morpeth, providing short Alnwick-Morpeth service. As one X20 B7 will be at Alnwick, a Sapphire E400 will cover that vehicle.
X21/X22 - PVR 4 - 4x Sapphire X21/X22 E400 - interworks at Ashington with no service to Newbiggin
121 - PVR 1 - 1x Arriva MPD - providing shuttle bus between Ashington and Wansbeck Hospital
X10 - PVR 4 - 4x Sapphire X21/X22 E400 - X10 extended to Ashington via Bebside and 1 route, also runs via Wide Open.
X7 - PVR 2 - 2x Sapphire X21/X22 E400
X14 - PVR 4 - 4x Sapphire X21/X22 E400 - Every 30 minutes
2 - PVR 2 - 2x Arriva MPD
In total:-
15x Sapphire Enviro400s
3x MAX X20 B7s
3x Arriva MPDs
Was thinking Ashington was far more logical than Blyth, as they also have a higher number of high capacity vehicles if needed.Far better location wise as well.
Here is Part 1 of the Northumberland Boxing Day timetable.
New service: X31 Blyth - Newcastle via Waterloo Road, Renwick Road, Albion Way, Brierley Road, Tynedale Drive, Cowpen Road, Bebside Front Street, Bebside Road, Horton Road, A189, A19, A1 then current X30 route into Newcastle.
This service would run at peak times and will provide a quick link into Newcastle for people living in Cowpen and Bebside.
(03 Jan 2016, 10:31 pm)Lm2606 wrote [ -> ]Operated by which depot?
Blyth in the morning and Jesmond for the evening run
I think its long overdue that there was some level of service on some routes on Boxing Day. On the one just gone, there was people waiting at bus stops in Saltburn and East Cleveland (they'd have had a long, cold wait!) and must've expected a Sunday service.
Just the main Sapphire or Max routes, even just to a limited timetable .. but surely well planned and publicised operating times ahead of the day itself would get quite a lot of bums on seats. Workers as well as shoppers, or people travelling to or from family.
It's 2016 and high time Arriva gave it a try.
I would still love to see Sapphire 7 be increased to half hourly operation on Sunday daytimes.
From what I've seen the Sunday service on the 8 seems to carry fairly low passengers numbers outside of the Darlington section of the route and the timekeeping at times is pretty poor, saw it running 20 minutes late this afternoon! Think it would be better to scrap the 8 on a Sunday and possibly either extended the 56 to run Durham - Bishop Auckland like the daytime service or have two separate 56's with one running as it does now (Durham - Stobb Cross) and also have a 56 run between Bishop Auckland and Ferryhill possibly interworking with service 5A at Bishop Auckland. Service 7 could possibly be diverted on Sundays to serve Ferryhill Station on Sunday daytimes in place of the 8.
Problem with these suggestions is they would likely to result in more resources being required, possibly only one bus but still it's an extra bus out.
Trying to look at how links between Guisborough and Saltburn can be improved - not the easiest.
The only thing I can think of, is an extension of the X3A, which involves re-routing the service in Skelton.
Rather than the current Saltburn - Skelton - Asda - Skelton -Saltburn; I would re-route it as Saltburn - Asda - Skelton - Guisborough. It would use the bypass to Asda, then High St, Coniston Road, Marske Lane, A173, Guisborough.
(17 Jan 2016, 9:08 pm)Andreos1 wrote [ -> ]Trying to look at how links between Guisborough and Saltburn can be improved - not the easiest.
The only thing I can think of, is an extension of the X3A, which involves re-routing the service in Skelton.
Rather than the current Saltburn - Skelton - Asda - Skelton -Saltburn; I would re-route it as Saltburn - Asda - Skelton - Guisborough. It would use the bypass to Asda, then High St, Coniston Road, Marske Lane, A173, Guisborough.
It depends on how successful at present the X3/X4 is doing on the 'core'. You could go every 10 on the Middlesbrough-Saltburn secition of the routes then have the X4 every 20 to Whitby (all the way as the X4), an hourly X3 to Lingdale, an hourly X3a as now to Skelton ASDA then the X3b could do the Guisborough-Saltburn service but you would have to find a way for it to run between the two without taking on the 5/5a between Skelton and Guisborough.
(17 Jan 2016, 9:11 pm)Kuyoyo wrote [ -> ]It depends on how successful at present the X3/X4 is doing on the 'core'. You could go every 10 on the Middlesbrough-Saltburn secition of the routes then have the X4 every 20 to Whitby (all the way as the X4), an hourly X3 to Lingdale, an hourly X3a as now to Skelton ASDA then the X3b could do the Guisborough-Saltburn service but you would have to find a way for it to run between the two without taking on the 5/5a between Skelton and Guisborough.
I have seen the buses full between Redcar and Marske. Standing room only.
The other sections seem to vary, but the peaks between Boro and Redcar will get busy.
The other option is extending a 5a from Brotton to Saltburn, but then you have the X4 to consider.
If the X3a was to be extended, I can't see it doing too much harm to the 5/5a.
Not really any use for arriva to extend any service through to Guisborough to give a direct link, 5/5A to Skelton, then a X3/X3A.
Means people are more likely to buy a day ticket to save money, sadly people paying extra money comes over actually helping passengers!
Stagecarriage ran the 271, but between Guisborough and Saltburn passengers numbers where diabolically bad! As where numbers when arriva ran the 28 To Saltburn
(17 Jan 2016, 9:08 pm)Andreos1 wrote [ -> ]Trying to look at how links between Guisborough and Saltburn can be improved - not the easiest.
The only thing I can think of, is an extension of the X3A, which involves re-routing the service in Skelton.
Rather than the current Saltburn - Skelton - Asda - Skelton -Saltburn; I would re-route it as Saltburn - Asda - Skelton - Guisborough. It would use the bypass to Asda, then High St, Coniston Road, Marske Lane, A173, Guisborough.
If I remember rightly, at one point Stagecarriage operated at 271 service from Guisborough to Saltburn, but it was withdrawn due to low passenger numbers.
(17 Jan 2016, 9:24 pm)peter wrote [ -> ]If I remember rightly, at one point Stagecarriage operated at 271 service from Guisborough to Saltburn, but it was withdrawn due to low passenger numbers.
Yeah, Stagecarriage did do the 271 between Saltburn and Guisborough and it terminated at Eston Tesco. The two times I used the service the loadings were pretty low which is probably the reason for its demise.
(17 Jan 2016, 9:19 pm)Andreos1 wrote [ -> ]I have seen the buses full between Redcar and Marske. Standing room only.
The other sections seem to vary, but the peaks between Boro and Redcar will get busy.
The other option is extending a 5a from Brotton to Saltburn, but then you have the X4 to consider.
If the X3a was to be extended, I can't see it doing too much harm to the 5/5a.
(17 Jan 2016, 9:22 pm)Smarty93 wrote [ -> ]Not really any use for arriva to extend any service through to Guisborough to give a direct link, 5/5A to Skelton, then a X3/X3A.
Means people are more likely to buy a day ticket to save money, sadly people paying extra money comes over actually helping passengers!
I would say a direct link from Skelton ASDA to Carlin How and Loftus is possible more important than a direct bus from Guisborough to Saltburn. Of course, they already have the 5/5a connection in Brotton (10 minute gap each way) but it only takes one to be late and you have 30 minutes to wait heading for ASDA and 20 minutes heading back to Loftus. Of course, issue going from Skelton ASDA to Loftus is it would have to carry on to Easington as there's not really anywhere to turn in Loftus after the Market Place (which is of course why the peak X4s go to Easington).
(17 Jan 2016, 9:32 pm)Kuyoyo wrote [ -> ]I would say a direct link from Skelton ASDA to Carlin How and Loftus is possible more important than a direct bus from Guisborough to Saltburn. Of course, they already have the 5/5a connection in Brotton (10 minute gap each way) but it only takes one to be late and you have 30 minutes to wait heading for ASDA and 20 minutes heading back to Loftus. Of course, issue going from Skelton ASDA to Loftus is it would have to carry on to Easington as there's not really anywhere to turn in Loftus after the Market Place (which is of course why the peak X4s go to Easington).
Unless of course they turned around in the estate bring some class to "Beirut"
(17 Jan 2016, 9:22 pm)Smarty93 wrote [ -> ]Not really any use for arriva to extend any service through to Guisborough to give a direct link, 5/5A to Skelton, then a X3/X3A.
Means people are more likely to buy a day ticket to save money, sadly people paying extra money comes over actually helping passengers!
Stagecarriage ran the 271, but between Guisborough and Saltburn passengers numbers where diabolically bad! As where numbers when arriva ran the 28 To Saltburn
(17 Jan 2016, 9:24 pm)peter wrote [ -> ]If I remember rightly, at one point Stagecarriage operated at 271 service from Guisborough to Saltburn, but it was withdrawn due to low passenger numbers.
I think that's where a bus that extends beyond Saltburn would be different to the Stagecarriage service.
Saltburn isn't the biggest place in the world but add passengers from Marske (who don't want to go via Redcar) in to the mix on top of any passengers using the bus locally and I think it could work.
If I was shopping in Guisbrough, the last thing I would want to do, was gamble on a connection in Skelton or Brotton when carrying bags. Day ticket or not.
I'd love to see the 28 doubled between Guisborough and Lingdale, maybe something we could look to work in with the 81 if NYCC remove the subsidy for the Stokesley extension. This could then potentially work in (or connect) with the X3 in Lingdale via Saltburn to Redcar, giving one huge loop.
(17 Jan 2016, 10:14 pm)tyresmoke wrote [ -> ]I'd love to see the 28 doubled between Guisborough and Lingdale, maybe something we could look to work in with the 81 if NYCC remove the subsidy for the Stokesley extension. This could then potentially work in (or connect) with the X3 in Lingdale via Saltburn to Redcar, giving one huge loop.
And how then do you work the Middlesbrough-Stokesley service in then if the 28 goes half hourly?
(17 Jan 2016, 10:16 pm)Kuyoyo wrote [ -> ]And how then do you work the Middlesbrough-Stokesley service in then if the 28 goes half hourly?
The times would all have to be changed anyway so that wouldn't be a massive issue.
A better way to do it would probably be to have the 5 run every 10 mins to Guisborough with the two extra services running to Lingdale. That would bolster the 5 from Guisborough in towards Middlesbrough whilst providing a better quality, and faster, service from Lingdale and Boosbeck into Middlesbrough. They could then run directly down to Skelton, down to Asda via North Skelton then back via Hollybush (as per today's 5A) before running off to Saltburn, Redcar and Middlesbrough as per the X3 now.
The Lingdale 28 would be cut back to finish at Nunthorpe, although I would prefer the 29 to Stokesley to run every half hour via Longlands as an express (limited stop) up Marton Road, with a 15 or 20 min 28B (as current) to serve all the estates as a stopping service to Nunthorpe. That would need the new shortened 81 to do the estates in Guisborough, which would probably provide a better town service than they do between the 28 and 81 now.
I'd probably take the opportunity to run the 5A via North Skelton and send the long 5 via Asda, giving an Asda bus to people in Loftus - which seems to be a popular connection off the current 5A, and I wonder how much more popular it would be with a direct link.
Obviously, I don't know what the resource cost of all this would be, compared to today's network. This could be a problem without looking further into it.