(10 hours ago)ReDemPTiion wrote They did almost lose it to Gateshead Central the last time it was up for tender but they couldn’t do it as they got the 35 at the same time they couldn’t guarantee they’d have enough drivers.
Would the E100EV not be too small for them routes? The 32/32A can be very busy around peak times, during the day and weekends they’re very quiet but Monday to Friday mornings and evenings they get quite busy. Unless they just scrap the Jesmond Vale part of the route. The amount of times they have to use Warwick Street because of badly parked vehicles but also the back roads around Montagu Estate only E200’s can get around them.
can't see them scrapping the jesmond vale section either as its a vital service for the elderly residents living in jesmond vale house which is over 50s only anyways. my nana lives there and i know for a fine fact they'll all be up in arms if they had another bus service scrapped like they did with the arriva 6.
if stagecoach did lose the 32s i doubt it'll be GCT cos of the 35s like you said (but then again, the 35s are also up for contract so GCT may decide they dont want to run that anymore). i highly doubt stagecoach will even lose the 32s myself but there is always the "what if" about it all. cos imagine they got new buses just for the 32 and it turns out the likes of GNE end up winning the contract. stagecoach then have new buses with zero use cos the 32s are the only stagecoach route that warrents the smaller buses.
and as for the E100s, they probably could get E200EV's if theres a smaller option to them but the only photos ive seen of 200EV's are the long based version but im also happy to be corrected on that.