Hope the driver is well and makes a fast recovery. Bus services on the north banks of the Tyne have been plagued with worsening anti-social behaviour for years now.

Off the top of my head, I can recall three incidents against me when driving the 18 alone: someone who decided they didn't want the bus to run via BT on the way to FLE and started banging aggressively on the cab window and calling me every name under the sun; someone who walked in front of the bus on Shields Road and accused me of trying to run them over, who then proceeded to give me homophobic abuse for wearing a rainbow lanyard(!); and someone who decided they didn't like the way I looked at them.

On other routes out of Walkergate, I've had drinks thrown at me; glass bottles smashed off my assault screen; have been spat at; had death threats; been bodyshamed... the only group I haven't had abuse from in that area were infants and the deceased. It was clearly so bad that the management and the unions agreed that assault screens were to be bolted shut on every bus, and the unions themselves warned that disciplinary action could be taken for driving around with them open. During my time at Stagecoach, there were other reports of serious assaults against drivers, often in the Walker area.

As for the timetable, Stagecoach seemingly timed their services around Newcastle using their fastest buses and assuming that every driver is quick with the ticket machine. The only way you could keep to time on any service is if you had a fast bus and knew where every ticket was on the VIX ticket machine. Drivers were explicitly told to learn the ticket machines and get used to them, whilst in training. You also have to remember that most of the regulars used m-tickets and StagecoachSmart cards that sped up the boarding process as well - and these could be bought away from the 18.

Similar delays were experienced by another operator when they took over the 317 - resulting in timetable changes - where they presumably needed extra time due to the increased idle times using Ticketers. I've only used the Transmach machines for tracking and messaging, however can see that they're not going to be as fast to use as the VIX machines were - however that's a design fault on the manufacturers for making their machines UI painfully slow. As Stagecoach get rid of their VIX machines, you'll see delays on other routes too.

There's a few options that could be explored on the 18 to improve timekeeping: pulling out timing points (as Stagecoach did for many Newcastle routes in 2023); truncating the route at St Peters Basin and Nexus/GNE agreeing to accept Nexus Bus tickets on the funded section of the Q3, with the routes timed to meet at the Basin (except on evenings/Sundays where the 18 can run the full route without issues); or perhaps removing service from the BT Call Centre (Stoneleigh Avenue is ~5 min walk from the Call Centre) and Titan Road in Walker to assist with timekeeping - other options include not serving Shields Road Morrisons, however from experience that earns the 18 a lot of its cash, so should be a last resort. Another option could be to run the 18 via Albion Row and St Michaels Road instead of Byker Metro, to speed up journey times through Byker whilst keeping the link to Morrisons.