I have just logged into the site today & have read all of the comments regarding Arriva in Ashington.

I live in the area & regularly use the 35 & X21. I have few complaints about the service sure buses run late but generally speaking the service is OK. I am quite in favour of the "Sapphire" branding on the X21 & find the seats perfectly comfortable, my only gripe is the lack of leg room in certain parts of the buses especially the 57 reg. batch.

As all services which run into Newcastle suffer from the congestion there I understand why they can run late but generally I find that the X21 arrives around on time into Ashington. Another point which has not been covered is the ridiculous road layout around the bus station in Ashington. This causes problems for all services calling there & was the reason for stopping the 35 calling at the bus station on it's run to Morpeth. It used to have to negotiate 4 sets of traffic lights to get in & 3 of them again to leave now "only" has to contend with the first 4.

With regard to Good Friday I had to catch the 35 at 14:02 off Newbiggin into Ashington but as the bus on X21 which forms it was 15-20 minutes late arriving it was obviously late. The driver was determined to make up time as best he could & recovered about 5 mins into Ashington. I returned on the 15:04 which is formed of the same bus & this was only about 6 mins late into Ashington so the driver had made a good effort to recover time. I noticed that the next X21 at 14:42 off Ashington to Newbiggin was similarly running about 10-15 mins late but this is a regular event in the afternoon on Sundays/Bank Holidays due to congestion in & around Newcastle. I agree with Tyresmoke that these schedules need looking at.

Maybe you need to stand back & think before making comments in this Forum as a lot of the more derogatory comments appear to me to be down to the impetuousness of youth.