THANK GOD! I thought I'd get some photos of the services today before they are withdrawn and that turned out well, got some photos of the 17/116 on Burn Lane then I went onto Westmorland Way got get another photo of the 17 as no buses will be going down there after tomorrow, I waited until about 1025 for it to come back and then gave up (was due back at the Town Centre at 1015!).
These services are a (word I can't say in this thread) joke, its totally pathetic, could the reason why the new 17 won't be serving Westmorland Way because of low passenger numbers and could those low passenger numbers be because they were stood there 15 minutes waiting for the bus and it hasn't turned up. I even spotted the bus parked in the Tesco Extra car park before so it seems their shopping is more important than their passengers,.
It often seems to be running late too, I know the 116 timetable is impossible to keep to, but how the hell can you rack up a delay of over 15 minutes on the 17/18.
Also there is the issue of missing parts of the route out and even dropping whole journeys, this often happened on the 116 as they'd often stop on Greenwell Road and not do the journey via Pease Way, Williamfield Way and Stephenson Way and would often just sit there until it was time to go back to Heighington.
I have seen a driver driving around town with the doors open and what would happen if a passenger was stood at the front of the bus and the driver had to brake suddenly and the passengers lose grip on the handrail and ends up falling out through the open doors into the road (I know this is a long shot but it could happen).
Also how can we tell which bus is which when you set the destination to JSB Travel and where its going.
I'm glad JSB Travel will no longer be a cancer on Newton Aycliffe and I hope the new Town Service operated by The Eden will be better than the shambolic operation of these services in days of late.
Now to quote a Steam / Bananarama song:
Na na na na
Na na na na
Hey hey hey
Goodbye