(01 Jun 2016, 2:33 pm)Dan wrote Buses may not necessarily be withdrawn immediately.

Go North East has been awarded a contract to operate Metro Replacement services between Four Lane Ends and Whitley Bay for 16 days, commencing Saturday 23rd July.

Whilst some vehicles will be made available due to scholars services not operating, I'm inclined to suggest that some cascades may be postponed until the Metro Replacement Blockade is out of the way.

Tridents 3873 and 3874 were withdrawn from service at Stanley without permanent replacement (though 4896 and 6024 are currently covering for them as float/reserve vehicles), and likewise 3859 at Percy Main was withdrawn without replacement. It's important that permanent replacements are sourced as soon as possible to restore the depot's normal engineering spare vehicle percentage.


It's one of the 'wait and see' situations!

There are 8x Volvo Olympians in the fleet (five at Stanley, three at Riverside), and 9x Dennis Tridents in the fleet (three at Stanley, four at Chester-le-Street and two at Percy Main).

I'd imagine that the priority will be to dispose of the five Olympians at Stanley and the nine Dennis Tridents at various locations. The three Volvo Olympians at Riverside are only allocated to the Jewish Scholars 850/851 contract, and as it's a private contract, I don't think the buses allocated to the services have to be DDA-compliant.

Not forgetting that Go North East may lose some double-deck misc works contracts from September - this could also allow the disposal of further double-decks without replacements being sourced.