(23 Nov 2013, 11:53 am)Dan wrote What would you allocate B9s if you had a choice?
While I do think that the "Pronto" X21 can fill up a double decker quite easily, this tends to be between Newcastle and Durham, and I doubt many of these passengers are fare paying customers. There are also times of day when I think all the X21 can justify is a single decker.
I admit that Go North East do need to consider the total number of passengers when deciding to 'upgrade' a service, but I think it was a pretty big push to give the X21 Citaros, nevermind being able to justify B9s.
I think Citaro's are a pretty good fit. Every service is busy at peak (especially the 9.30am rush Monday - Friday) but those with DD and those upgraded tend to stay busy all day throughout the route. From experience I've not seen that with the X21. Its similar to the X22 and you'd wonder why that has a DD operation (obviously interworking helps) but if you see that service early morning or weekend, its generally rammed especially at Christmas
You are never going to get the perfect vehicle allocation. Despite it being every 7 minutes, you go to Eldon Square at rush hour and you'll see huge queues for the Angel and deckers getting filled up run after run and people complaining. But there's little GNE can do about it