(15 Jan 2017, 1:01 pm)Jamie M wrote They weren't exactly going to trial those modifications on 15 year old buses at Stanley or Crook, though. The B9/B5LHs were the only vaguely new buses then - and at the time the 56/309/310 were the newest deckers (63 reg). I feel it was down to this, more than anything.
Logically, the company would be looking to upgrade the route which costs the most to run by fuel (crawling through town and challenging hill work or travelling flat out along national speed limit). This gives a shortlist of everything BUT the 309/310: X9/X10 (A19), 10/A/B/X (Town -> Station -> Metro -> Stocksfield), 21 (Past Chester to Durham or Bishop), X1 (Wrekenton) and 56 (Donwell -> Wrekenton).
I could be wrong in ruling out the 309/310, but the others seem to have a more challenging route than just coasting at 30, which I'd guess at being the most economical speed for a bus.
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I don't mean that but on a route where a bus isn't being stretched to it's capabilities, surely it would make more sense to utilise the fuel savings there rather than on a more challenging route. Having a B9TL running around the estates around Shields, West Chirton, Battle Hill, High Farm, Cobalt, Whitley Bay Town Centre would surely prove to be costly in comparision to what the operational cost of a Streetdeck would offer.
On top of this, 6101 would also allow a grace period for new 'suitable' buses to be sourced for the X9/X10 as this alongside 6084 could be used to give 6043-48 more downtime to conserve them for one more year as well as allow more maintenance to be carried out on them.