(10 Sep 2015, 12:04 pm)Andreos1 wrote Appreciate we are getting way off topic like...
The whole getting the Metro to Sunderland and subsiding both post and pre-privatisation always puzzled me.
I get why the PTE may have wanted to fill the lack of Metro provision to Sunderland, but I don't understand why the lack of provision there, was covered by PTE funding, but West Gateshead (who also have a lack of a Metro), didn't get similar.
Obviously the original idea, was to reinvigorate the original suburban railway that existed and link them together, via the underground section - with buses feeding into the interchange points (the original NE hub and spoke?) and not crossing the river.
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Would it not have made more sense, to make Blaydon an Interchange, with trains running into Newcastle - just as they did and still do, from Wearside?
Huge swathes of both Newcastle and Gateshead are without access to the Metro. However the Metro does touch venture into both boroughs so, I'm guessing, it was less of an issue for each respective council to pursue as there was, at least, some benefit for taxpayers through limited provision whereas Sunderland received no provision yet was still footing the bill.