(18 Jul 2021, 9:14 pm)Adrian wrote No wonder I missed that! GCT special with that sheet of A4 in the window
I mean at least it was stopping at stand C for passengers, but far from ideal when they're expecting a big blue bus with a rainbow on the side.
Genuinely surprised to see the taxi though, regardless of passenger numbers. I thought the contract specification would have required a decent size bus.
Sent from my SM-G965F using Tapatalk
It’s a commercially operated service (as was the MetroShuttle until the changes mentioned in my last post) so there isn’t a contract specification. Don’t forget that this was originally effectively a roadworks shuttle bus while the 50 and 56 couldn’t serve Nissan. The SNS was the only one of the three which was contracted by Nexus.
In ordinary circumstances I’d have otherwise agreed that it wouldn’t be acceptable to run an 8-seat taxi or 16-seat minibus on frontline service (even if it was the norm pre-pandemic for our friends in grey and red!) but it’s tough times at the moment - not just for the bus industry but for everyone seemingly - and to minimise disruption, it’s best that resources are reviewed and adjustments made. It’d be mad to have a big diesel Scania OmniCity chugging away all day needing two drivers daily, when mileage is having to be stood due to short-notice failures as a result of track and trace.
Arriva will be reducing all their services from Blyth to be half-hourly, the X6 will be suspended, and it has been rumoured that the X12 between Durham and Newcastle will also be suspended (although yet to see confirmation of this on Arriva’s website) from this Sunday.
In Middlesbrough, Stagecoach have sub-contracted their vaccination shuttle bus out to JH Coaches. A far less political approach than cancelling services and reducing frequencies. Amazed to see them introducing new services (19 in Sunderland) when they’ve been successful in winning Nexus contracts (99 and 319) which will both require more driver resource, as they’re in the same boat as everyone else staffing-wise and won’t improve drastically over the summer as they don’t operate that many school buses.
Hopefully things improve next month once double-jabbed people no longer need to self-isolate!
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk