(07 Mar 2015, 10:30 pm)Dan wrote Shouldn't be having as big an affect as it seems to be having, and of course this diversion hasn't been in place for months (or years) on end. See aureolin's earlier post.
Go North East's services are running fine, as the diversion in Chester-le-Street only really adds about two minutes to the normal timetabled journey. Easily made up when you've got enough recovery time built into the timing points or layover time at each end, which, as already established, the X2/X12 has very little.
I would e-mail Arriva Customer Services to address my issues with regards to timekeeping and lack of layover, but quite frankly, it's not worth the 30-day wait for a response. Quite surprising Arriva isn't more proactive on a route which they face strong competition on...
I've done the X2 enough times to know there's no issues with the timings (last time I did one middle of the day and ran on time all the way there and back...) so it's either drivers who can't be bothered or something else is causing problems.