(11 Dec 2021, 5:29 pm)L469 YVK wrote How is the PVR now 9?
I thought it was just a 4 hour round trip?
To be honest, I'm not a huge fan of the Volvo B5TL.
The X21 has never really had the right vehicle allocated. A bit of a shame the newer StreetDecks part of the original plan before COVID never got the chance of redemption.
I still say the X45/X46 would be better suited to Volvo B5TLs due to the lack of evening & Sunday boards (evenings & Sundays covered by E400MMCs interworking with 47, X30, X72) with the newer StreetDecks going the other way.
A bit unfair to tar all StreetDecks with the same brush. The earlier classic E400s weren't great but the later ones before MMCs have been spot on.
From 30 October the timetable was revised to include around 25 minutes layover in Newcastle to improve reliability.
The Volvo B5s aren’t unsuited to the X21 at all. Realistically it’s only a very small percentage of the route where the bus is flat out. It’s the typical scenario where a few buses are off service and no spares are carried, so routine maintenance then being carried out looks and feels worse.
In a few weeks there will be StreetDecks spare and it will be less noticeable.
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