(22 Aug 2015, 6:52 pm)DaveyBowyer wrote Totally agree with you mate. I was also wrong about the X21 / X22. Nedderton is only a slight PITA and if you consider that you can get roughly 18 mile each way in less than an hour, then that actually aint too bad unless you include Newbiggin. I also think that the X20 should certainly be promoted more.
I must say that I've had a look at Arriva's fleet list and it seems very scrappy with any old bus (particaularly MAX branded vehicles) being thrown about anywhere. Arriva need to have a good clean up with some more investment and more standardisation in the fleet rather than just chucking buses around left, right and centre. GNE's fleet is mostly standardised and easy to allocate and Arriva need to do the following:
- Is the route a single or double deck route (excluding the 6 and 7 for occasional capacity boost).
- Is the vehicle type going to be the same or very similar.
It's no good having single deckers running around on the long X14, some X15 runs and some X12 runs and even old B7s tearing around on the X20. This is what it should look like:
All double deck MAX DB300 routes:
- X7, X8, X9, X10, X11, X12, X20 (if no E400savailable).
All double deck MAX E400 routes:
- X14, X15, X18, X20 (DB300s if none available).
A pool of spare modern MAX deckers that can be swapped around when needed (i.e summer X93 extras).
All single deck MAX routes running with ONE type of single deck vehicle.
i think the most modernist bus since 7519 7520 7521 have been absent have been LF02 PKV/LF02 PKX. also the 35/35a double decker side of things seem to be constant older ex london buses par from the odd 1 MPD that wonders onto the route and a sapphire pulsar.