(01 Aug 2022, 11:11 am)Andreos1 wrote I thought I'd posted these. Maybe it wasn't in this thread. Or maybe I just didn't post it at all!
Anyway. To take in to account changing travel patterns, the need to get cars off the road and the fact that key employment sites don't have a decent level of public transport, a revision to key services at key times of the day.
Services will run with a suffix following on from their number.
X - Peak time variation of a route.
D - day time variation of a route.
N - evening variation of a route.
Example 1:
27X - South Shields to Newcastle via Tyne Dock, Jarrow, Hebburn, Monkton Business Park, Follingsby, Heworth, Felling Bypass, Gateshead, Newcastle.
27D - current route.
Example 2:
61X - Seaham, A19, Doxford Park, Sunderland.
61D - current route.
61N - Seaham, A19, Nissan, Follingsby, Heworth.
Example 3:
50X - Durham, Abbey Road/Arnison Centre, Chester, A1, Galleries, Waterview Park, Boldon Business Park, Boldon, Tyne Dock, South Shields
50D - current route.
50N - Chester le Street, Portobello, Rolls Royce/BAE, Crowther, Galleries, Biddick, Waterview Park (for Asda) , Nissan, Castletown.
The D services will run during the peaks, but at a lower frequency. This will allow driver and vehicle resource to be used effectively to meet the demands passengers actually have during peaks and on an evening/night.
These are just base ideas. I'm sure there are many more examples or suggestions of an operator looking to adapt a route to suit the flows or patterns across the course of a day and in to the night.
See personally I think they should make a workers network and interwork them with the local network to run peak services and actually advertise it rather than it being stupid numbers like 939.
Like for Team Valley
21 Every 15 Minutes All Day, 30 Mins to Durham
Morning Peak Only (Every 15 Minutes)
W91 - Newcastle - Team Valley Direct (First buses from Percy Main area maybe, possible 311 replacement?)
-- Run Empty --
21 - The Angel - Newcastle
(Repeat)
-- Do something else, maybe local services to Team Valley Retail World or add capacity to services like the 41/41A/311 etc --
Evening Peak Only (Every 15 Minutes)
21 - Newcastle - The Angel
-- Run Empty --
W91 - Team Valley - Newcastle Direct (Last runs returning to same place as above, possible 311 replacement?)
(Repeat)
It means there's a quick link to Team Valley and the core of the 21 get's a journey every 7.5 minutes when its needed rather than having buses running around empty all day.
Most the main employment sites are oddly quite close to core routes which are busy in one direction at peaks
Doxford Park (2/39/39A)
Cobalt (309/310/311)
Team Valley (21)
Follingsby (58)
or have local services around which don't really need that much morning capacity in particular away from the big city they serve which they could easily drop onto to give pensioners a better service.
Doxford Park (39B/82/84/85)
Cobalt (335/342/W1/W2)
Team Valley (25/28/29/67/69)
Follingsby (-)
Seems less confusing to me than variants.