(16 Sep 2020, 1:11 pm)tcts24 wrote I kinda get the point about the 10A going off the beaten track a tiny bit. But it is a 10A, i.e. not a 10 or 10B. It goes vaguely the same direction and has a slightly different service number, which differnentiates it enough to figure out that like the 10B, it wont go anywhere near Hexam!
The same goes for the X10. It's different, as in it's not a 10 and it's pretty simply to comprehend that may not go to Coulby Newham from Middlesbrough Bus Station - like the 10 does! Expecting anything with a X prefix to take the same route as a similarly numbered non prefixed service is bodering distictly on the anal side.
The 55 and Stagecoach North East service 1's (both of them) present a bigger issue. Does it go to Buddle Road or Slatyford? Seaton Carew or Middlesbrough? Peterlee or Wingate? Where it goes, nobody knows! I have known instances of customers stopping the bus and asking the driver where it's going because they've established it's a 1, but haven't (or couldn't) read the actual destination. If these type of routes were split into a 1 and 2 or 1 and 1A or 55 and 155 or whatever.
I disagree with this personally I don't think any bus company in their own company shouldn't have duplicate numbers with an express and a non express service. It's not a bad assumption to assume an X1 is an express version of their 1, or the X10 is an express version of their 10 (ignoring common sense). Between other operators then fair enough but there's 99 numbers GNE could use (if you want to keep it 2 digits) without having an X1 and 1 and X10 and 10 running from the same bus stations (or nearby).
In terms of the 10, I quite like the way Trent Barton have done it for their 'nines' routes where it's 9.1 and 9.3 (used to be a 9.2 which got scrapped - don't have the gap). Could work well for the 10's 10.1 to Hexham, 10.2 for the 10A and 10.3 for the 10B
In terms of GNE, Arriva and Stagecoach is there any services which have the same number running from the same bus stop / station in Tyne and Wear, can't think of any tbh.