(08 Mar 2020, 7:58 pm)scanialover wrote You are quite right. Look at what I said about 1410. You'd think it difficult to re-furbish the fleet into standard livery but they got the Temsa Avenues; 4721-6 not done as yet for some unexplained reason, without too much fuss.
It's the mechanical side of things that needs addressing. Getting rid of all the niggling issues that seem to blight our fleets. Problem is that the vehicles are hard worked and aren't off the road long enough. It's a bit catch 22.
Reason why 4721-4726 likely haven't been done as they were refurbished and repainted only a few years ago as they weren't originally part of the North East fleet. There's always going to be mechanical problems, it's just the way things have always been, it just seems more noticeable now with having more access to seeing when a bus is off the road or involved in an incident plus route branding and specs being different makes things look worse than previously, people barely battered an eyelid if a different bus type appeared, about the only time was when a double decker would turn up on a primarily single deck operated route.
(08 Mar 2020, 9:55 pm)GNE6312 wrote Had lovely ride on 1610 yesterday on the 5 from Shildon to BA. Abseloutley love those 67 plate Streetlites. I didn't think it would let me down as I am.a keen Streetlite fan and have had and enjoyed several rides on the 64 & 15 reg ones at Ashington, Jesmond & Belmont and 1610 completely amazed me hopefully arriva can get some more streetlites like 1602-14 in the near future as I would be happy with that.
As a regular passenger of the routes those are allocated to, can't say I share the same enthusiasm for them, sorry for sounding like a broken record but they're not particularly comfortable to travel on IMO with how much they rattle and clatter along and I found them intolerable during the summer months due to lack of ventilation mostly due to having all the windows at the front of the bus.
Before we get comments suggesting it's just enthusiasts that hate them, that is not the case... heard rumours suggesting the Darlington Moorsbus service will be going back to Pulsar operation again for this year as passengers were less than impressed with having them on that route, I had much the same issues with them on Dalesbus, felt like you were going to have a broken spine with how badly they took the road surfaces in places yet Solos didn't seem to be anywhere near as bad which is probs partly why none of the drivers want to do these routes anymore.
Some are better than others but overall not a massive fan of them myself.