(19 Feb 2020, 12:45 am)L469 YVK wrote Yeah, for the southern half of the region Stagecoach getting everything bar Stockton would make sense. Stockton would work perfect for GNE too if they got that as they'd be able to enhance the X9 / X10 by reducing dead mileage as well as offering later journeys back from Newcastle.

For Northumbria however, I think Jesmond would most likely need to go to GNE as although GNE would end up with a monopoly in parts of North Tyneside, Stagecoach would end up with a monopoly too (i.e Killingworth to Newcastle).

Ashington would be better under GNE too and I could see them running it as a 'hub and spoke' model similar to their Stanley and Washington services.

Personally I'd say Killingworth is less than the whole of North Tyneside though plus they'd be able to simplify the 52 / 54 into other bus routes which they run anyway. I'm not sure the locals would mind as their much cheaper than both GNE and Arriva anyway.

Weirdly I think Stagecoach would be a better fit for Ashington as they have more experience in long distance bus routes and might actually run the Berwick buses with appropiate buses (coaches like in their Scottish work) rather than Enviro's which aren't really fit for the distance of the journeys. The routes ideally would be better to be like Citylink in Scotland which they have a 35% share of the ownership with a possibly a extension to Edinburgh creating a new link between the two cities and the towns inbetween. Whereas GNE excluding the X9 / X10 don't really have any long distance routes which are mostly non-stop.