(24 Nov 2013, 10:18 pm)aureolin wrote If I lived on the 2A or 2C route in Washington, I'd be pretty annoyed about losing the frequency to provide an express service between Sunderland and Newcastle. Baring in mind that Nexus would have already screwed me over with the absence of the Metro. People in either Newcastle or Sunderland wanting to go to each other can use the Metro. There's no need for them to get a bus that takes twice as long.
I agree.
Go North East are already fighting a very hard battle, competing with the Metro. The journey times of the Metro are a hell of a lot more appealing, and the only way customers are going to be attracted to an express bus service is if they are connecting to other Go North East buses during that day (from either Newcastle or Sunderland). I guess that's why these express services have seen so many changes, because they're just so hard to generate profit from. I find myself repeating this phrase a lot lately, but as Go North East are a business, they need to take whichever route is of best commercial interest to them - as do all bus operators.
(24 Nov 2013, 10:20 pm)CatsFast101 wrote Why would, the X2 need to be limited stop? The X1 isn't after Shiney Row, so the X2 could serve all bus stops down Chester Road.
It wouldn't have to be, but the X3 has very few stops at present. The X36 has a lot more and the increased distance as well as stops are reflected in the increased journey time. As I said above, a direct service between Sunderland and Newcastle is hard enough to run as it is, nevermind adding more stops to the mix and making the journey time even longer, thereby making the service seem even less appealing to use as opposed to the Metro.
As aureolin said, there is also a great potential that the service will suffer with reliability issues. The 'express' side on the Sunderland half could possibly reduce the likelihood of those issues.
(24 Nov 2013, 10:23 pm)CatsFast101 wrote But unfortunately, bus services aren't run to provide passenger with high frequencies.
Bus services are operated to make money. If a service makes money, it has a tendency to receive a vehicle upgrade and/or see an increase in frequency. The "Silver Arrows" 2A/2C currently have the best 'single decker' within the fleet, and are at a combined frequency of 10 minutes... You can't get much better than that - they clearly make a fair amount of money.
(24 Nov 2013, 10:27 pm)Adam Malarkey wrote X2 would use the B9's, Citaros could go on the Laser to free up More Solars to replace older Vehicles and then the Northern Mixture could be used on anything as they are Currently and the 36/36A would operate as a Stand Alone Service with no Interworking with the X36 as it would be Axed as a Result of the Above.
Looking at photographs on Flickr, the service appears to have previously been allocated a mixture of single deckers (pink OmniCitys, unbranded "MetroLINK" Solars, "Red Arrows" Mercs...) but also coaches. There was only one example of a double decker being used, which to me suggests that the service did not justify double decker usage back then. Why do you think it would justify the usage of Go North East's best double decker in the fleet now?