(24 Aug 2024, 10:47 pm)Storx wrote Personally I think bus stations anywhere are a waste of money, bar for regional buses. Our European friends can mostly do without and they take up a lot of space (in a country with limited space) with very little benefit.

Darlington, Cramlington and Stockton have some of the strongest bus usership in the North East, none of these have a bus station.

Others might disagree but I can't think of any examples where a new bus station has been part of a resurgence of a town because Stanley, Consett and Hexham have done absolutely nothing to improve the area around them which have had them in recent'ish times, if anything they've got worse and the first two bus usership has fell off a cliff aswell, in recent years aswell. Hexham has arguably got much worse since they moved it 5 minutes down the road in the middle of nowhere, fine for someone able to walk, not so fine for a pensioner who can't walk well - the people who use buses to shop. Didn't someone actually mention the X84/X85 died pretty partially because people couldn't be bothered to walk down there and got on the 685 instead.

Obviously warm waiting areas etc are a benefit, but surely there's other solutions ie. converting empty shop units with seating etc which could be a local hub for other services aswell. Frequent services are irrelevant as you won't be waiting long anyway.