(19 Sep 2016, 9:46 pm)L469 YVK wrote Could Arriva not disperse of them nationally as spares for other divisions?
Also, if 12x were being ordered, could this not be a possibility for Arriva (not that I want it by the way, more of a prediction / wild guess than anything):
- X21 rerouted via Hartlands and increased to every 15 minutes becoming the core Ashington / Bedlington / Newcastle service with a PVR of 12x Enviro 400 MMCs with increased recovery and running time for reliability.
- X22 rerouted via Glebe Road and Nedderton running every 30 minutes with a PVR of 5x VDL Pulsars with 1x spare available (transferred from Darlington / Belmont).
- 5x 14 plate Enviro 400s transferred from Ashington to Darlington / Belmont to convert the 7 to fully double deck.
- 1x 14 plate remains at Ashington as spare with the other transferred to Darlington as spare. 7518 goes to Belmont as spare for 6/22/24/7.
I think you're seriously underestimating the usage of the Guide Post/Choppington/Bedlington West portions of the current X21/22 routes with that suggestion. Your X22 suggestion could possibly cope, if it was either every 20 with Pulsars, or every 30 with E400s, but cutting frequency and capacity?
I think the current route and timetable of the X21/22 is pretty good, and apart from Bank Holidays, seems to cope majority of the time.