There is a key reason why the 37 is half hourly. If the service was hourly, to make the timetable balance, the bus would have to park up for around 30 minutes before returning to Newcastle, and Stagecoach don't like wasting resources especially on regular lenghtly layovers (hence why the 685 timetables were constantly chopped, changed and split up to get the driving time down, then split to bring it under normal driving rules to remove the 30 minute layover at Newcastle and the hour long one at Carlisle.)

To be honest Stagecoach missed a trick by having it hourly and in that 30 minutes at Cramlington, extend the route to either Northumbria hospital or up to East Hartford. (They could do that on a 30 minute frequency too at a cost of another bus).

Where as when the 352 arrives at Cramlington, instead of twiddling its thumbs for however long it is until a suitable departure time, it just jumps onto the 353 and toodles off to North Shields, and it happens going the other way. If the 352 doesn't work, then GNE can always reallocate their resources elsewhere or extend the 353 to serve the Northumbria hospital.