(Yesterday, 8:05 pm)S830OFT wrote I had a trip round on the new 51 service around Hartlepool today.
From my observations I'd noted two passengers travelling from Hartlepool Town Centre to West Park, then we picked up a passenger from Dalton Piercy to take to Hartlepool Railway Station.
The next trip departed with no passengers, which is a little surprise given the service covers York Road Shops, a stop that always has passengers making short journeys into Hartlepool on the 6/7 & 36.
Hopefully the service will pick up in passenger numbers for the most part, although some of the trips are more or less guaranteed to be carrying fresh air, particularly on the West Park to Elwick & Dalton Piercy section...
It’s a new service and once people are aware of it and the weather gets nicer I can see more people using it to get to Summerhill and Ward Jackson Park. I don’t think having a Teesflex minibus doing the first day of service will have helped much though.