(26 Jul 2014, 8:30 pm)Andreos Constantopolous wrote I appreciate I may sound like a broken record, but with the 'let's make the 21 work at any cost' attitude and axing of the 21a, the service was doomed to be second or third rate at best.

You have said yourself how the passengers work, in the main - using the service either side of the county border.
Fares are ridiculous and buses have been cast offs since day 1.

People don't want to go to Chester or Houghton, hang around waiting for connections (connections need to work both ways, not just on the way out) and huddle around in poor 'interchange' facilities and pay a premium for the privilege.

You don't need to be a genius to know that either.

The service was squeezed out of the Sunderland - Houghton market and is being squeezed on local sections too.

Just wish the powers that be, listened to what passengers wanted and not forced the services onto the communities it serves.


Aye, especially on days like today.

Used vehicles already in the fleet, until they decided to purchase Solars for it.
Apparently it was amongst the fastest growing services around.

Not sure why they scrapped it if that was the case... :s

You've basically just said what I tried to say, Andreos - I'm terrible at explaining stuff!

I agree, I reckon the depot just throws out whatever they want on it, Lolynes, B10BLEs, Scanias, the list goes on!

The communities (cough cough FPF) that it serve would do a pretty good job of running it themselves, wouldn't you say

In regards to the X50, I recall, although once again, I was quite young when it was about, used to get the Nationals?