(Yesterday, 10:55 am)Adrian wrote I think it's a misconception formed on the basis of us getting ex-Manchester and ex-London buses to replace some ageing vehicles in the North East fleet. 

Aside from the 13+ year old Citaros, I think the only other significant exit is the B5LHs to East Yorkshire. The ex-Manchester and ex-London stuff appears to have replaced a mixture of Omnicity, Omnidekka and Versas, with slightly newer buses. You could argue that the 3x Solos shouldn't have gone, but they're 14 year old at this point. I don't think it's had a material impact on fleet availability, and I think they'd very much be in the same position.

It'd be a better argument to argue the lack of fleet investment. We've not had any new buses ordered on a commercial basis for coming up to 5 years in September; the last being the Streetdecks and E400MMCs for the Xlines services. There's of course been the handful of Yutongs with significant Government funding, but this is a mere drop in the ocean. The longer you go on not investing, the worse the problem becomes at the point you need to invest.

If they put the Angel StreetDecks on either the 56 or 307/309 (in working order), that will sort quite a few problems out.

Could be shared out between 16/16A and X20 with current X20 B5TLs doing the X45. None of the B9TLs mentioned are exactly leggy and still have plenty of useful life in them....and much better than what's allocated.

Bit of a gamble putting B5TLs on the X45....but they'd likely be parked up on Sundays due to the interworking patterns, and the spare ratio (2x spare for PVR of 5x) would be generous enough. Not forgetting that StreetLites (Cummins) ran the 45/46/47 for 5 years with no major issues.