(21 Apr 2026, 3:09 pm)logidoodah wrote With the 700/701 now needing to be transferred to GNE after City Transport dropped the contract. And having sneakily dropped the frequency to 20 mins sometime in 2026.

While they're at it why couldn't they just combine the 700/701 from being a combined PVR = 3, to a simple 700 PVR = 3. 

Simple loop of Park Lane - City Campus - Royal Hospital - City Campus - Wheatsheaf - Seaburn - St Peters - Park Lane. 

This would:

• get rid of the horrific 45 mins freq on the 700 currently, and keep the current 701
  
• make the service usable with decent layover spread across the route.
  
• introduce links lost from the 18 to Royal Hospital making it actually a connections service
  
• and provide the same PVR with easier to understand service. 
  
• With it being about an hour for the same bus to restart it's loop from Park Lane means easy for evenings/Saturdays when no uni for frequency to be dropped to 30/60mins when required without need to or route.
  

I know this would mean slightly longer journey times to each main destination i.e going around hospital before Seaburn and Seaburn before st peters but with an enhanced freq and better punctuality people won't mind. Also this service shouldn't compete with the commercial services anyways. Just simply the Sunderland Connect to get you to university, town, seaburn or the hospital.

imo the 700 should be just withdrawn, with some form of 18 restored again but as a full loop, not the mess of a horse shoe it ended up with. The point of the 701 is to link the two campus' though, you can't send people on a detour via Seaburn first. 

Like I'd say something like, ideally every 30 minutes:


With the 99 being withdrawn with it.

It's be a bit of a risk of tax payers money, but the links on that network is currently utterly dire without doubling back via Sunderland which no-one sane is doing. Seaburn has had a massive resurgence in recent years, there's a hospital on the route, there's tonnes of destinations etc (green dots) and the 18 is badly needed anyway. Be nice to try and create something which might actually work rather than the same old crap over and over again.

The 558 then curtailed at Seaburn, with the 568 extending to Monkton Business Park, all day (they interwork).