(03 May 2015, 12:54 pm)northern156 wrote Without wanting to set the cat amongst the pigeons, why are vehicles branded?
To the extent that the bus operator would rather (when possible) place another branded vehicle on a run en-route (which used to happen in Carlisle with the Dart SLFs but has drastically improved) causing disruption and inconvenience, does the benefits of branding vehicles outweigh the farce it can cause?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not on about general route branding (GNE's Coast and Country to give an example) but individual vehicle branding which I find more common with ANE and SNE, such as ANE's Jesmond-ran 46 from Haymarket to Featherstone Grove - this is just standard Interurban livery with '46' branding on.
Even to Jesmond's Hybrid Streetlites and Volvo B5LHs - they both have 306/308 branding on (I'm pretty sure they do!), why not take this branding off so both can interwork with no real problems?
Branding will only have limited appeal.
A plateau will be reached (it may even have been reached already in some instances), whereby no matter what funky colours are painted on the outside, which little gadgets are installed on the inside - there will be no more organic growth.
If 30% of the population of a town/village/estate using a service prior to branding and it sees a growth of say 20%, through the approach we have seen over the last 10 years - there will be a reason why the remaining 50% don't use the bus.
Where do the operators go then?