(20 Apr 2014, 10:38 pm)Jimmi wrote The busiest I've seen the X26/X27 is all seats occupied.

In my experience with the 21 is busy between Darlington and Newton Aycliffe and does have standing passengers between Station Town and Peterlee quite often.

When I've seen the 21A its quite busy.

I think the 21/21A would be far more deserving of an upgrade than the X26/X27.

The Darlington X1 does really well, especially between Bishop Auckland and Shildon.

I can tell you the 21/21A are very peaky. Some days you can run around with 2 or 3 people yet on market day in Stockton you can arrive into there with around 60 people at the right time of day! Some of the afternoon departures from Peterlee can be fairly busy but they're generally empty beyond Trimdon all the way to Middlesbrough with only 2 or 3 people. The same applies going northbound on a morning, whereas it'll be busy gong south into Middlesbrough. Similarly, the afternoon departures from Middlesbrough can often leave empty and run with very few passengers all the way to Peterlee. I imagine the 21 is very similar. The X7 has taken all of the passengers from Wingate, though.

The X26/X27 do pick up quite a lot though, and they pick up even more at the rail station with heavy usage by forces people and families for Catterick. I still don't think cutting it from every 15 to every 20 mins was the smartest move but if its cut the cost down whilst maintaining (or increasing) revenue then I suppose it's for the best. A lot of Darlington's driver have a "town driver" mentality though and don't like taking big buses outside of the town... Even though full size vehicles used to operate the X26/X27 (and former guises...) and Ecocities now operate on the 21 on Sundays.