(27 Dec 2021, 2:48 am)OrangeArrow49 wrote Apologies I didn't notice this reply.
Not further afield necessarily, just odd that only Westerhope has a bus service to Kingston Park Shops and Tesco Car Park in particular. The free Tesco shuttle ran from Wideopen, Newbiggin Hall and Kenton to Kingston Park Tesco Extra. Kingston Park Shops is served by the Metro, which is great, but in terms of buses only really has the X47 (the 6 and M71 don't run on evenings and the M71 doesn't run on Sundays) . Just remembered about the 6, which links Kingston Park with places further away, such as Four Lane Ends. 42A also links Wallsend, Four Lane Ends, Killingworth and Wideopen etc with Kingston Park. Anyway, my point was only Westerhope has a reliable, non-Stagecoach bus service to Kingston Park, and into the car park in particular. Fenham, Cowgate, Slatyford, Blakelaw and Kenton Bar should all have a decent service for Kingston Park, why should Westerhope and nowhere else locally have a service? GNE's 42A provides the link further afield. Maybe Gosforth and Great Park could have a new service to Kingston Park.
Would people in Fenham, Cowgate, Slatyford and Blakelaw not either head towards the big Morrisons (and the shopping centre) at Denton Park, or head into Newcastle itself if they wanted something that they can't get there? If they absolutely needed to go to Tesco, then there's a Tesco Metro and I think two Tesco locals in the town.
I don't really know Kenton Bar, but Google Maps shows it as half a mile walk from Tesco Extra. I've got about the same to a bus stop.
On the 42A, I don't think its a route designed with the intention of shoppers flocking from Wallsend to Kingston Park. You'd have to be insane to do a 3 hour round trip to a supermarket, especially when there's one a stone throw away next to the Silverlink.