(23 Feb 2023, 10:07 am)Storx wrote Personally can't see the 6/X21, the 6 is a much stronger route than the X21 between the two points so Arriva won't gain anything similar with the X12/X21 or 21.
It's some of the urban corridors especially in Sunderland that need it more.
Chester Road (2/8/16/35/39/78)
City Centre -> Seaham Grange / Dalton (22/23/60/61)
City Centre -> Pennywell (20/39)
Great North Road (Q3/43/44/45)
By far the worst corridors in the North East.
Similar with
Yellow Line Metro / 1
Yellow Line Metro / 26 / 27
They compliment each other but decent ticketing does not exist.
The issue with these corridors is that operators don’t take on any thing that could be a risk. I’ve long thought Arriva could have routed maybe their 23 service via Seaham Harbour, yes you’d add some journey time but you’d open up new connections and particularly when lots of other services were cut back or axed all together. Offering direct buses between Hartlepool, Easington Colliery, Horden, Blackhall, Seaham and Seaham Train Station maybe too, before Horden opened that could have been an interesting connection to the rail line northbound. For Arriva they would even still have the 22 operating the ‘quick’ route too, for Peterlee to Sunderland A to B travellers, so I don’t see many negatives. Then coordination of the 22/61 timings could give an every 15 mins service Sunderland to Dalton Park.
But instead as no one likes any element of risk, we’re stuck with up to 14 buses per hour* at one point duplicating the exact same route from New Seaham to Sunderland via Ryhope and Grangetown - which is complete overkill.
*currently 10 Mon-Fri