Disruptions and driver shortages

[Dan]

No. Badly-painted Line run it I think.

I hope their customers pay close attention to the painted lines so that they end up at Longbenton DSS and not Waterview Park.


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[Ambassador]

The X12 and the arriva max rip off X66 livery pulled into Gateshead at the same time today. I hadn’t realised how similar they are after catching them in person.

Did GNE pay for that or did the work experience lad just google bus colours and send it to Saltmeadows?

[BusLoverMum]

The X12 and the arriva max rip off X66 livery pulled into Gateshead at the same time today. I hadn’t realised how similar they are after catching them in person.

Did GNE pay for that or did the work experience lad just google bus colours and send it to Saltmeadows?

Work experience lad probably realised that his colours were worth a punt because it's rare that the now only hourly X12 to Newcastle runs in max livery.

[Omega54]

GNE did an amazing job yesterday with the A19 shut, although there were delays of 90 mins, nearly every X20/55 ran from Park Lane on time. 
I have never seen the A690 in such bad state, it also effected the X1's and X10's some being longer than 1 hour late.

At once there was 2 X10's, 4-5 X1's (To Gateshead), 5 20's (to Durham) 3 (south sheilds) 3 X20's, 3 55's. 3

[col87]

Think they be some disruption tomorrow but thankfully most of us seem to escape the worse of it. But I would think quite a few services will be cancelled tomorrow though.

[MurdnunoC]

I think the most important question concerning the weather and the disruption it might cause is this:

Will there be deckers on the 78 today?

[streetdeckfan]

Surely the bigger question is whether deckers will even be out today!
We don't want the operators to put everyone's lives at risk in case they blow over!

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[MurdnunoC]

Surely the bigger question is whether deckers will even be out today!
We don't want the operators to put everyone's lives at risk in case they blow over!

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They are.


I've seen quite a few today whilst driving about.

[Omega54]

Surely the bigger question is whether deckers will even be out today!
We don't want the operators to put everyone's lives at risk in case they blow over!

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They are out, I saw a comment on Facebook that a X31 drive was driving in the middle of two lanes on Redhaugh Bridge trying not to go over. This was a few days ago. 

Surely they should be diverting via Swing Bridge

[Storx]

Surely the bigger question is whether deckers will even be out today!
We don't want the operators to put everyone's lives at risk in case they blow over!

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Why wouldn't they be..? It's barely windy here and isn't forecast neither today. Half the region doesn't have a weather warning at all now.

Snow is going to be the bigger problem today especially over Consett way.

[Omega54]

Why wouldn't they be..? It's barely windy here and isn't forecast neither today. Half the region doesn't have a weather warning at all now.

Snow is going to be the bigger problem today especially over Consett way.

There is literally a yellow weather warning for the entirety of the GNE network, bar Q3 route upto Great Park, and Services to Whitley Bay etc east of newcastle.

[Storx]

There is literally a yellow weather warning for the entirety of the GNE network, bar Q3 route upto Great Park, and Services to Whitley Bay etc east of newcastle.

I never said GNE, I said the region which stretches upto Berwick. A yellow weather warning is nothing. Amber and more importantly red like during Arwen is when you need to take note.

There's no reason to take deckers off today and cancel half the services. Consett would have to cancel the majority of their services if they pulled all deckers off.

Wednesday was worse and there was little issue.

[streetdeckfan]

Why wouldn't they be..? It's barely windy here and isn't forecast neither today. Half the region doesn't have a weather warning at all now.

Snow is going to be the bigger problem today especially over Consett way.

I mean, I was just taking the P after all the comments last time it got a bit breezy here 

[MurdnunoC]

The snow wasn't that bad in Stanley or Consett either. Estates had a dusting but it was soft and has more or less melted/turned to slush now. Main roads were fine.

[col87]

Arriva still had deckers on the 23/24 routes. That must be a bit nervous going around certain parts of 24 route round country Durham especially with the wind.

[Adrian]

Was hit with an extended stay at Heworth the other night, after opting for Metro/Bus instead of the X1. Whilst waiting for one of the xx.53 short runs on the 4, I had noticed it wasn't tracking nor listed on the website as a cancellation. Someone else who was waiting had mentioned these short runs are cancelled 'almost every night' recently.

Looking at bustimes.org journey history, it certainly backs up what he said. Since the start of last week, the 19.53, 20.53, 21.53 and 22.53 runs (they're all done by the same bus) failed to run on 07/03, 08/03, 12/03, 14/03, 15/03, 16/03. They're also listed as cancelled this evening.

Just waiting for those shorts to be cancelled in the next round of cuts due to low use now...!

[Dan]

Was hit with an extended stay at Heworth the other night, after opting for Metro/Bus instead of the X1. Whilst waiting for one of the xx.53 short runs on the 4, I had noticed it wasn't tracking nor listed on the website as a cancellation. Someone else who was waiting had mentioned these short runs are cancelled 'almost every night' recently.

Looking at bustimes.org journey history, it certainly backs up what he said. Since the start of last week, the 19.53, 20.53, 21.53 and 22.53 runs (they're all done by the same bus) failed to run on 07/03, 08/03, 12/03, 14/03, 15/03, 16/03. They're also listed as cancelled this evening.

Just waiting for those shorts to be cancelled in the next round of cuts due to low use now...!

They’re the journeys which have only just recently been reinstated (having been cancelled so that customers would be able to plan to avoid buses at this time, rather than hope they run and find out the night before that they aren’t going to run).

Of all the work at Washington to cancel on an evening, these journeys are the least disruptive to customers. It involves no secured mileage, isn’t the last bus of the evening, and there are other buses available (with a bit of a wait), which can’t be said for other low frequency services.

The loss of work in North Tyneside paired with recruitment efforts should minimise any lost mileage at Washington by the end of this month - but I’d still imagine if any late work has to be cancelled, these journeys will be affected.


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[streetdeckfan]

They’re the journeys which have only just recently been reinstated (having been cancelled so that customers would be able to plan to avoid buses at this time, rather than hope they run and find out the night before that they aren’t going to run).

Of all the work at Washington to cancel on an evening, these journeys are the least disruptive to customers. It involves no secured mileage, isn’t the last bus of the evening, and there are other buses available (with a bit of a wait), which can’t be said for other low frequency services.

The loss of work in North Tyneside paired with recruitment efforts should minimise any lost mileage at Washington by the end of this month - but I’d still imagine if any late work has to be cancelled, these journeys will be affected.


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And what if you're wanting to connect to another service?

[Dan]

And what if you're wanting to connect to another service?

You could say that about any journey on any service… Not wishing to sound completely defeatist, but bus operators are still not in any kind of position to completely avoid lost mileage and have to make decisions on what will minimise disruption (and in the main that’s cancelling journeys in the middle of the day, but this isn’t always possible).

I notice Arriva North East have started publishing their planned cancellations for Jesmond on their website (other depots in Durham County don’t, and I understand other Northumbria depots are back up to full strength in terms of staff now), and Stagecoach still report regular cancellations but don’t give specific details.


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[Adrian]

They’re the journeys which have only just recently been reinstated (having been cancelled so that customers would be able to plan to avoid buses at this time, rather than hope they run and find out the night before that they aren’t going to run).

Of all the work at Washington to cancel on an evening, these journeys are the least disruptive to customers. It involves no secured mileage, isn’t the last bus of the evening, and there are other buses available (with a bit of a wait), which can’t be said for other low frequency services.

The loss of work in North Tyneside paired with recruitment efforts should minimise any lost mileage at Washington by the end of this month - but I’d still imagine if any late work has to be cancelled, these journeys will be affected.

Hopefully the issues with lost mileage are sorted by the end of the month, but I am not convinced that persistently targeting the same services for cancellation is the least disruptive method. I accept that it almost sets an expectation if it's set journeys that are cancelled, but on the other hand, it likely just pisses the customers of that service off more than the others. 

And what if you're wanting to connect to another service?

I'd planned my route knowing I'd be able to connect on to the 84 at the Galleries. Of course an additional 20 minutes wait at Heworth meant that I'd have had to wait around 25 minutes for the short 2A or 45 minutes for the next 84, so I ended up putting another private car on the road and got a lift.