I do think Arriva need to take of attention to detail and tidy up a bit!

But I don't think branding as such given their nature of business and work suits Arriva and sticking with one livery (and even perhaps a generic non-route specific 'X' livery) would work better.

Arriva did initially have good intentions with the original Sapphire / MAX but looks like DB don't want to continue with it and just want to provide a bus service. If a new MD of GAG or GNE/EY rocked up tomorrow morning, they could easily decide "ahhh forget XLines, lets chuck a Ride Kite Ranger on the X45/X46 and a brand spanking new StreetDeck on the X5/X15"

Originally Sapphire worked when it only a selection of a few routes. But because they made so many routes Sapphire, and introducing the MAX brand, it kind of waters it all down.

So, when Sapphire was introduced we were promised new vehicles, quality seats, dedicated drivers, next stop screen and announcements, charging points.. and what have we now?

The buses are now middle aged, the dedicated drivers lasted about five minutes, the NSA rarely work for both audio and visual, the charging points almost never work. I was never a fan of the seating anyway but fair enough. The windows are often dirty and you cant see through them properly, the external marketing is usually missing lettering and needing redoing.
The internal marketing is years out of date on the X3/X4 buses (it's a minor point, but the 4 section between Loftus and Whitby has long gone, so why not keep the posters accurate and upto date?)

Yes, a bus turning up and on time is everyone's priority. But it isn't asking a lot , either in cost terms or effort, for presentation to be a lot better than it is at the moment. And don't forget that it was Arriva who decided a high spec brand (introduced with great fanfare at the time) was the way forward, and would encourage new customers to use the services. So I think it's more than fair for us to be critical of what they've done or not done since then.

(06 Feb 2022, 2:03 pm)Jimmi wrote Arriva seemingly want to be rid of the old 'Eco Green' livery the most right now, Yorkshire & North West are currently in the process of treating their B5LH's so chances are the StreetLite's at Jesmond and 1579/80 at Belmont will likely follow next. The seats in the gas buses also needed some attention as many had come away although with the exception of the ex demos only selected seats on each example have been replaced rather than all of them.

I'm hoping the North East pretty much just abandons the Sapphire livery as much of the buses to that standard just seem to end up everywhere now, Darlington for example now have a booked decker turn on weekdays on both the X27 & 1/5/5A/X1 with 7 branding whilst the 7 gets left with other stuff such as StreetLite's, gas buses and Solo's.

How many of the Gas Caetanos have been repainted?

(10 Feb 2022, 6:49 pm)NewcastleOne wrote How many of the Gas Caetanos have been repainted?

9 going off BusTimes. 4801/03/05/08/09 still to do, 03 & 05 haven't been out for over a week so these may currently be away getting refreshed.