So, has anyone figured out how to change back to the old forum theme yet?
This new one is bloody awful, even worse than the last one!

There used to be a setting to change back to the old, old theme, but that doesn't seem to be present anymore, unless I've been looking in the wrong place

As we all know Go North East and other operators have hit hard by the pandemic along with other business with many resulting to cutting costs where things are no longer commercially viable in the long term, but what if operators were to take more risks for a bigger pay off such as the success of the summer X11 from Newcastle to Whitby & Scarborough which will no doubt return in 2022.

So what else could operators such Go North East do, well I think whilst justified in some respects and I understand the above reasoning for such cut backs I think Go North East should be looking at options of expansion to their network to provide more benefits to the local communities they serve whilst offering new services to other areas that they don't serve, yes this may mean treading on some toes along the way.

My first idea come off the back of the reduction in service of Hexham X-Lines X84/X85 which in a few weeks will be a bog standard 684 and backwards step for passengers who will have a service operated by vehicles of a lower specification, far from ideal given the recent investment in new buses just 12 months ago. 

So from Hexham where could Go North East expand to given the options are limited, well you head west to "The Lake District" however not via Carlisle as you have competition their with the Arriva/Stagecoach 685 and then Stagecoach Services 554 to Keswick and iirc 104 to Penrith. Therefore any service would go via Alston where Go North East already operate Services 681/X81 to Haltwhistle & Hexham which a small number of journey's per day, a base to start an expansion coupled to that with more regular 684 thus merging the two together.

Having done a bit of research I think it would be a good idea to operate a Clockwise/Anti-Clockwise Loop of The Lake District giving passengers a frequent service to the area so we would have the following routes both operating on an hourly basis. 

X84 - Newcastle - Denton Burn - Heddon-On-The-Wall - Wylam - Ovington - Corebridge - Hexham - Haydon Bridge - Bardon Mill - Haltwhistle - Lambley - Slaggyford - Alston - Melmery - Penrith non stop to Kendal - Windermere - Ambleside - Grasmere - Keswick

X85 - Newcastle - Denton Burn - Heddon-On-The-Wall - Wylam - Ovington - Corebridge - Hexham - Haydon Bridge - Bardon Mill - Haltwhistle - Lambley - Slaggyford - Alston - Melmery - Penrith non stop to Keswick - Grasmere - Ambleside - Windermere - Kendal

The services would in turn also be maintained to X-Lines Standard so customers experience does fall below current standard whilst also opening up the Leisure industry from the North to the West which in turn would provide some competition to the train with a change at Carlisle if you are going to Kendal takes 3 Hours, taking into account layover times etc the Bus would be slower at just over 4 Hours

A breakdown of the timings across the route
65 Minutes via X84 route from Newcastle to Hexham - Would be quicker via X85 route at 41 Minutes so would likely go the latter to bring journey time under 4 hours.
97 Minutes via Alston to Penrith from Hexham
36 Minutes from Penrith to Kendal via M6/A6
49 Minutes from Kendal to Keswick via A591
22 Minutes from Penrith to Keswick via A66

So we have a minimum journey time of 3 hours 43 minutes and maximum journey time of 4 hours and 7 minutes depending on route taken, only 38 minutes longer than the X11 is from Newcastle to Scarborough.  

Anyone else have any suggestions?

well 7156 will be off the road for a long time now due to it Ramming an Arriva Pulsar into Middlesbrough Bus Station

Anyone know when Ticket machines are getting upgraded, GNE upgraded them in 2017, Arriva in 2019/20 so when will Stagecoach?

I know there's already a Wrestling Thread, but that thread is now nearly 9 years old...

I'm posting this because I'm part of a Wrestling Company based out of East Durham, my best mate is the Promoter and I manage the Tag Team Champions...

We're called Colliery Championship Wrestling and upto now have ran shows out Easington Colliery, Seaham and Murton, we sold the first 3 out (130, 160 and 260)...

Check us out on Facebook at:-

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Although we are a local promotion, we bring a lot of our workers in from around the Country, from Scotland, Wales, Manchester, Derbyshire, Bristol, West Midlands, though we do have a few local guys who double up as trainers as we try and create our own Wrestlers...

If anyone is Interested, check us out on Facebook

Sent from my SM-A526B using Tapatalk

I've been holding on to these suggestions for a while but i think these might gain a few passengers. 
Also, I originally designed these timetables for a fictional independent I was going create.
https://asxterranova.home.blog/2021/12/2...imetables/

So as discussed in the thread regarding fleet allocation changes to the X9/X10, it looks like 6352-55 are going to be allocated on the X9/X10. Furthermore, it's still unknown whether or not the frequency will change meaning that the X9 gets dropped and only the X10 runs covering both routes. If the latter does happen, a suggested re-shuffle (although requiring repaints) would no doubt bring some stability to the network and actually deliver reliability improvements as well as still providing spares too for Euro 6. The suggestion would depend whether or not the Consett Evening & Sunday interworking patterns could be altered and by the looks of it unless I've missed anything out, it appears they could.

Evening X45/47 - not including earlier X46 and 47A journeys
Newcastle (X45): 00:35
Consett (X45): 01:30
Consett (47): 01:45
Newcastle (47): 02:55
Newcastle (47): 03:05
Consett (47): 04:17
Consett (X45): 04:32
Newcastle (X45): 05:25

Evening & Sunday X30/X72 (Diagram 1) - Similar to the old 6/X30 evening interworking pattern
Newcastle (X30): 00:25
Stanley (X30): 01:01 (Sunday 01:02)
Stanley (X72): 01:15 (Sunday 01:12)
Newcastle (X72): 02:08

Evening & Sunday X30/X72 (Diagram 2) - Similar to the old 6/X30 evening interworking pattern
Newcastle (X72): 00:55
Stanley (X72): 01:48
Stanley (X30): 02:02 (Sunday 02:00)
Newcastle (X30): 02:38

Sunday X45/X46/47/47A (Diagram 1)
Newcastle (47): 00:15
Consett (47): 01:28
Consett (X46): 01:35
Newcastle (X46): 02:36
Newcastle (47A): 02:45
Consett (47A) 03:59
Consett (X45): 04:05
Newcastle (X45): 05:06

Sunday X45/X46/47/47A (Diagram 2)
Newcastle (X45): 00:00
Consett (X45): 00:57
Consett (47): 01:09
Newcastle (47): 02:21
Newcastle (X46): 02:30
Consett (X46): 03:28
Consett (47A): 03:37
Newcastle (47A): 04:51

---

Service changes
X30/X31 (PVR 5)- Revised to operate standalone from X70/X71/X72 during at least Monday to Saturday daytimes. Revised timetable with more recovery and layover time at both ends of the route.

X70/X71/X72 (PVR 7)- Revised to operate standalone from X30/X31 during at least Monday to Saturday daytimes. Revised timetable with more recovery and layover time.

ADL E400MMC
6336-37 - Consett - Spare
6338-42 - Consett - X30/X31
6343-51 - Chester Le Street - X21
6352-55 - Riverside - X10 (X9 is dropped and PVR reduces to 4x)

Volvo B5TL
6308-14 - Consett - X70/X71/X72
6334-35 - Consett - Spare

Wright StreetDeck
6331 - Consett - X45/X46 (stays at Consett)
6332 - Consett - Spare (stays at Consett)
6333 - Chester Le Street - Spare
6377 - Riverside - Spare

Since we're being silly.

Here's the official thread for all future upcoming service changes that may or may not happen in the next 300 years or so.

A thread for every upcoming service changes.

Apparently 2 400MMC's are in the base livery for the X9 and X10 due to the Coaches not being a reliable recovery to the services.
May not be true but this is being rumoured