(7 hours ago)col87 wrote i know you don’t seem to like Hartlepool for some reason but yes they is actually a demand for bus services to Sunderland and Newcastle. The train is no good if suffer from anxiety and is often packed a bus service would at least be another option. I mean from your point of view the 36 and 1 shouldn’t exist either but guess what both services get busy. They is also no service from Hartlepool to Dalton Park so your not thinking of the places in between. It’s usually having the train if you can’t get from Hartlepool to Easington Village anymore like you used to be able to.
The 1 and 36 are totally different though, the first one is the only bus service through the Clarences and the second one does multiple short journeys like Billingham to Norton aswell. They're also the only service between the bits. Not to mention the 1 links Seaton Carew seafront to Teesside for days out etc.
There's nothing inbetween other than Dalton Park either, and that alone won't stack it up. It's the Peterlee to Hartlepool bit that's the problem as the 23/24 is every 15 minutes and you're never going to compete against it.
GNE have attempted links to Sunderland before and they literally got withdrawn as no-one used it.
Once franchising comes in, there's definitely arguments for merging the X6/23 though imo.