(04 Sep 2023, 6:58 pm)mb134 wrote In fairness, does Cramlington need a much better service to Newcastle? 

Excluding the X8 which has a different purpose, the express bus services only take 25-30 minutes from the centre to Haymarket. Incuding the X8, on Arriva services alone there are 12 buses per hour on the Cramlington (shops) to Haymarket corridor, increasing to 15 once you include the 37 and 352. The station is out of the way as you say, so for the majority of the town the bus is going to be more attractive regardless. 

I'm sure I've seen before that capacity on the ECML isn't really there to have half hourly stoppers between Morpeth and Newcastle either (at least if they are also stopping all stations from Edinburgh too), though admittedly I don't know enough to know if that's still accurate?

Guess it depends who you're going for. It's much easier to attract someone to use a train who currently uses a car vs a bus which goes the exact same way as you do and sits in the same traffic. Admit the X9/X10/X11 aren't the worst for reliability but when things go wrong they don't half go wrong.

Yeah do believe there is capacity problems, I believe SENRUG are trying to use the free paths to the alternative Lumo services to extend one of the TPE services through running Cramlington, Morpeth, Widdrington, Alnmouth, Berwick, Reston, Dunbar, Edinburgh. I believe there's interest from Scotrail for similar aswell since Reston is pretty much unserved atm with Berwick shorts filling the gaps.

I know they wanted to move the station South to where the bridge crossing the lines opposite Manor Walks aswell and build a bus station, don't get me started as it's the complete wrong place for a bus station, but moving the station would be a good move imo, it's a bit out in a limb atm. It would be a good place for some Intercity services to serve SE Northumberland, especially Blyth, Cramlington, Dudley etc. I know I'd use it if it was cheap enough heading North rather than doubling back via Newcastle.