Given there is still mileage to cover at Washington tomorrow based on this https://www.gonortheast.co.uk/short-noti...0Januaryen

It makes you think how bad it would have been without the Sunday times

(07 Jan 2022, 6:05 pm)DeltaMan wrote Given there is still mileage to cover at Washington tomorrow based on this https://www.gonortheast.co.uk/short-noti...0Januaryen

It makes you think how bad it would have been without the Sunday times

It also makes you wonder if public transport is as safe as its claimed to be, with little in place to protect the driver and customers.

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(07 Jan 2022, 6:27 pm)Adrian wrote It also makes you wonder if public transport is as safe as its claimed to be, with little in place to protect the driver and customers.

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At the start of the pandemic "patchy" is probably a fair statement

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.com...455845.amp

I have to say some of the travelling public do not help. I've witnessed first hand customers passing masks between themselves onboard

(07 Jan 2022, 5:22 pm)busmanT wrote Will the Sunday running times cope with Saturday passenger levels and Saturday road traffic?
or will there be lots of late running?

Given the levels of traffic around key retail sites recently, I'd hazard a guess there's going to be even more delays and missed runs tomorrow. In addition to the runs already cancelled. 

Can see people waiting an hour for a service which is normally every 12mins or so on a Saturday.
It's not going to do the operators long-term prospects any good.
People will see these services as unreliable (regardless of the pandemic) and I can't see too many being that understanding when that hour waiting is cold, wet and possibly snowy. Particularly with kids in tow.

I have some sympathy for the operators being put in to this situation, but I still think a lot of the issues are a legacy of poor management and those poor managers getting away with far too much, for far too long. Drivers aren't just a number to be easily replaced. The pandemic has shown that.

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(07 Jan 2022, 6:56 pm)DeltaMan wrote At the start of the pandemic "patchy" is probably a fair statement

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.com...455845.amp

I have to say some of the travelling public do not help. I've witnessed first hand customers passing masks between themselves onboard

I'd love to know what measures have been put in to place around driver handovers.
I've seen driver handovers, but I've not seen any drivers clean and sanitise the cockpit (either getting in or getting out) or the van they've used to get from Washington depot to the Galleries and vice versa.

(07 Jan 2022, 6:56 pm)DeltaMan wrote At the start of the pandemic "patchy" is probably a fair statement

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.com...455845.amp

I have to say some of the travelling public do not help. I've witnessed first hand customers passing masks between themselves onboard

Patchy to non-existent then, but sad to say that I don't find that report surprising at all. 

I notice that some operators still have the 2m marking and front seats blocked off for example, but others have nothing. I don't think any have measures in place for customers either, which is actually putting the driver at more risk due to having more people crowding into a confined space. A space that is poorly ventilated and left to the mercy of the customers to control. 

You may find this paper from Feb 2021 of interest; especially the table on Page 21. Quite clearly there's a lot more that operators (and other businesses) could do to keep staff safe, but the bare minimum approach and stripping back safety measures as soon as possible, shows a complete lack of regard to staff never mind the customer.

(07 Jan 2022, 7:39 pm)Andreos1 wrote Given the levels of traffic around key retail sites recently, I'd hazard a guess there's going to be even more delays and missed runs tomorrow. In addition to the runs already cancelled. 

Can see people waiting an hour for a service which is normally every 12mins or so on a Saturday.
It's not going to do the operators long-term prospects any good.
People will see these services as unreliable (regardless of the pandemic) and I can't see too many being that understanding when that hour waiting is cold, wet and possibly snowy. Particularly with kids in tow.

I have some sympathy for the operators being put in to this situation, but I still think a lot of the issues are a legacy of poor management and those poor managers getting away with far too much, for far too long. Drivers aren't just a number to be easily replaced. The pandemic has shown that.

---

I'd love to know what measures have been put in to place around driver handovers.
I've seen driver handovers, but I've not seen any drivers clean and sanitise the cockpit (either getting in or getting out) or the van they've used to get from Washington depot to the Galleries and vice versa.

People already see public transport as unreliable. This is, in addition to months of daily service disruptions, going to take that opinion to a nuclear low and perhaps do some irreparable damage. 

I've seen cab cleaning taking place at changeovers, but its few and far between. I believe the companies provide the equipment and substances to do this, but it's still up to whoever is taking the bus over to do it. It's a human factor and one within the worker's control, but this aside, there are so many environmental factors outside of the worker's control that is putting them at high risk. which that paper I shared in the post above illustrates.

The environmental factors may be outside of an individual worker's control, but they're certainly within the employer's control. 

I've never actually seen any risk assessments from the transport sector, but have reviewed and worked on them throughout COVID in other sectors. Happy for anyone to drop me an email with any (anonymously of course  )

Noticed these couple of tweets earlier in regards to the X1





Likely to be this journey, with people trying to get into Newcastle in time for the match. Most of whom likely only use buses on match days, and won't have seen the (less than 48 hours) notice in the app or website unless they to looking for it.



Opening the app itself only shows the disruption once you select an individual stop that the service serves. The general banner doesn't mention it at all.



If I was on that X1 today and I had another option available, I just wouldn't bother again in the future.

Clearly 'BETTER than ever' is alive and kicking, and that's before I get onto my 35 minute wait at Birtley for a 21...

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(08 Jan 2022, 3:46 pm)Adrian wrote Noticed these couple of tweets earlier in regards to the X1





Likely to be this journey, with people trying to get into Newcastle in time for the match. Most of whom likely only use buses on match days, and won't have seen the (less than 48 hours) notice in the app or website unless they to looking for it.



Opening the app itself only shows the disruption once you select an individual stop that the service serves. The general banner doesn't mention it at all.



If I was on that X1 today and I had another option available, I just wouldn't bother again in the future.

Clearly 'BETTER than ever' is alive and kicking, and that's before I get onto my 35 minute wait at Birtley for a 21...

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Sounds like another SAFE bus situation to me.

(08 Jan 2022, 3:46 pm)Adrian wrote Noticed these couple of tweets earlier in regards to the X1





Likely to be this journey, with people trying to get into Newcastle in time for the match. Most of whom likely only use buses on match days, and won't have seen the (less than 48 hours) notice in the app or website unless they to looking for it.



Opening the app itself only shows the disruption once you select an individual stop that the service serves. The general banner doesn't mention it at all.



If I was on that X1 today and I had another option available, I just wouldn't bother again in the future.

Clearly 'BETTER than ever' is alive and kicking, and that's before I get onto my 35 minute wait at Birtley for a 21...

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Regardless of the decision to reduce service level, it's beyond belief that the driver decided to risk their livelihood to get a few extra punters into town. They shouldn't have been put in that position by the company anyway, but you don't go and make it worse by allowing folk to stand upstairs and inevitably also breaking capacity limits. 

It was well publicised that today's cup game was going to be essentially sold out well in advance, which makes the decision to cut service to a Sunday level even worse.

(08 Jan 2022, 4:20 pm)mb134 wrote Regardless of the decision to reduce service level, it's beyond belief that the driver decided to risk their livelihood to get a few extra punters into town. They shouldn't have been put in that position by the company anyway, but you don't go and make it worse by allowing folk to stand upstairs and inevitably also breaking capacity limits. 

It was well publicised that today's cup game was going to be essentially sold out well in advance, which makes the decision to cut service to a Sunday level even worse.

Chances are it is full from Washington, where there are no other links and through Springwell. 

Where else are they going to go. Wait for the next one - then the one after that will be full.

(08 Jan 2022, 4:41 pm)Omega54 wrote Chances are it is full from Washington, where there are no other links and through Springwell. 

Where else are they going to go. Wait for the next one - then the one after that will be full.

And? As a driver that isn't their problem.

Put a "Bus Full" display on, as many ANE buses I saw today did, and direct any complaints to customer services.

(08 Jan 2022, 4:46 pm)mb134 wrote And? As a driver that isn't their problem.

Put a "Bus Full" display on, as many ANE buses I saw today did, and direct any complaints to customer services.

Which isn't open...

(08 Jan 2022, 5:28 pm)Omega54 wrote Which isn't open...

Which is still not the problem of the driver. If an accident was to occur on that vehicle and people were injured, it would be the driver who would be at fault if the vehicle was found to be overloaded. It really isn't worth potentially losing your licence, livelihood. and perhaps even your freedom just to squeeze a few more passengers on board, no matter how justified you feel in doing so.

https://twitter.com/Keef_B_1/status/1479...43690?s=20  idk what service this is on, however it is time to bring back limited social distancing e.g no standing, as Omicron is just hammering everywhere and the IHU variant god knows what that is going to bring.

(08 Jan 2022, 4:20 pm)mb134 wrote Regardless of the decision to reduce service level, it's beyond belief that the driver decided to risk their livelihood to get a few extra punters into town. They shouldn't have been put in that position by the company anyway, but you don't go and make it worse by allowing folk to stand upstairs and inevitably also breaking capacity limits. 

It was well publicised that today's cup game was going to be essentially sold out well in advance, which makes the decision to cut service to a Sunday level even worse.

Terrible thing is, it's situations like this that is swaying drivers into leaving, whatever drivers do it's a lose/lose situation and they're often the ones that get the grief from the passengers when things go wrong.

The idea of most services running a Sunday timetable on a Saturday effectively halving the capacity on busy runs like the 20 & X1 is certainly not an attractive concept to me and those that faced the issues from this today will most likely come to the same conclusion for as long as this goes on for and maybe even a permanent mindset for not using public transport to many.

(08 Jan 2022, 5:28 pm)Omega54 wrote Which isn't open...

But should be. 
Additional resource to answer issues, queries, questions may counter some of the loss of goodwill passengers have towards operators on days like today.

Maybe getting all hands on deck and ensuring those at the top are leading by example would be a start too.

(08 Jan 2022, 6:02 pm)Jimmi wrote Terrible thing is, it's situations like this that is swaying drivers into leaving, whatever drivers do it's a lose/lose situation and they're often the ones that get the grief from the passengers when things go wrong.

The idea of most services running a Sunday timetable on a Saturday effectively halving the capacity on busy runs like the 20 & X1 is certainly not an attractive concept to me and those that faced the issues from this today will most likely come to the same conclusion for as long as this goes on for and maybe even a permanent mindset for not using public transport to many.

Oh absolutely and, while ultimately the driver is at fault for carrying over the limit, the drivers are being put in these situations by people who don't have the first idea what dealing with the public can be like.

Mind, I can't get my head around how they didn't forsee this and plan in duplicates. You're cutting service level from Saturday to Sunday, which I'd imagine is a reasonably significant cut in drivers rostered to work - surely they can't be that short?

(08 Jan 2022, 6:20 pm)mb134 wrote Oh absolutely and, while ultimately the driver is at fault for carrying over the limit, the drivers are being put in these situations by people who don't have the first idea what dealing with the public can be like.

Mind, I can't get my head around how they didn't forsee this and plan in duplicates. You're cutting service level from Saturday to Sunday, which I'd imagine is a reasonably significant cut in drivers rostered to work - surely they can't be that short? 

Or larger vehicles in the case of some routes.

(08 Jan 2022, 4:20 pm)mb134 wrote Regardless of the decision to reduce service level, it's beyond belief that the driver decided to risk their livelihood to get a few extra punters into town. They shouldn't have been put in that position by the company anyway, but you don't go and make it worse by allowing folk to stand upstairs and inevitably also breaking capacity limits. 

It was well publicised that today's cup game was going to be essentially sold out well in advance, which makes the decision to cut service to a Sunday level even worse.

Absolutely. The sell-out at St James' should have rang alarm bells when the decision was made to revert to a Sunday timetable at extremely short notice, and it should have been a priority to ensure there was additional capacity available on the X1 before and after the match.

Having that many people in a confined space just isn't safe at the moment, even with the windows open, and that's before you get into the issue about passengers being allowed to stand upstairs. 

(08 Jan 2022, 6:02 pm)Jimmi wrote Terrible thing is, it's situations like this that is swaying drivers into leaving, whatever drivers do it's a lose/lose situation and they're often the ones that get the grief from the passengers when things go wrong.

The idea of most services running a Sunday timetable on a Saturday effectively halving the capacity on busy runs like the 20 & X1 is certainly not an attractive concept to me and those that faced the issues from this today will most likely come to the same conclusion for as long as this goes on for and maybe even a permanent mindset for not using public transport to many.

(08 Jan 2022, 6:15 pm)Andreos1 wrote But should be. 
Additional resource to answer issues, queries, questions may counter some of the loss of goodwill passengers have towards operators on days like today.

Maybe getting all hands on deck and ensuring those at the top are leading by example.

Drivers have been put in the firing line today by this decision. An unacceptable amount of notice, leaving most customers unaware, and then no one available at customer services to contact instead. 

Sadly I think it stems from an industry attitude of not being accountable to customers, and that people will continue using services out of necessity anyway.

The X1 was always going to be the flash point due to it only running every 30 mins on Sundays (56 is every 20 mins so not as bad) and there being no alternatives to get into Newcastle, no other routes, no Metro.

For this trip ahead of the match, and presumably one coming back they should really have planned in a duplicate, driven by office staff, management, a school bus driver who only works during the week, anyone even someone from another depot.

(08 Jan 2022, 6:45 pm)Adrian wrote Absolutely. The sell-out at St James' should have rang alarm bells when the decision was made to revert to a Sunday timetable at extremely short notice, and it should have been a priority to ensure there was additional capacity available on the X1 before and after the match.

Having that many people in a confined space just isn't safe at the moment, even with the windows open, and that's before you get into the issue about passengers being allowed to stand upstairs. 


Drivers have been put in the firing line today by this decision. An unacceptable amount of notice, leaving most customers unaware, and then no one available at customer services to contact instead. 

Sadly I think it stems from an industry attitude of not being accountable to customers, and that people will continue using services out of necessity anyway.

Utterly irresponsible from GNE.  The stupidity in allowing overcrowding, which is only going to lead to higher case rates and so higher absences and more problems…it beggars belief.

The general situation of reckless overcrowding won’t have been helped by the operation of smaller vehicles on unaffected decker routes as well.  In the space of 5 mins in Gateshead this afternoon I noted a corporate Streetlite on 27 and an Orbit on the 93.  Oddly there’s also been an Orbit on a 6/12 board too.  Still a good number of breakdowns reported on social media, further cutting service levels.

GNE fb page (presumably autoposting) reporting more unplanned cancellations tomorrow – though the page it is linking to hasn’t been updated since Friday so shows nothing about tomorrow…

I guess the situation is so bad that every option for GNE is a terrible one.

It will be intresting to see how many trips from Sunderland, Consett and Washington appear on the cancelled list during the week, as I assume those that were working Saturday will have rest days moved?

(08 Jan 2022, 6:45 pm)Adrian wrote Drivers have been put in the firing line today by this decision. An unacceptable amount of notice, leaving most customers unaware, and then no one available at customer services to contact instead. 

Sadly I think it stems from an industry attitude of not being accountable to customers, and that people will continue using services out of necessity anyway.

Whilst there's only so much that can be done to combat these problems right now, the constant excuses being dished out just makes things even more infuriating and many won't understand what's going on and only sees them being screwed over.

Less than 48 hours notice for such a significant drop in service is pretty dire and no doubt will not have been picked up by many, I only happened to find out via it being posted in an enthusiast Facebook group followed by this forum with limited posts on their own social media using the standard template that has been used so commonly now for multiple purposes that it's barely noticeable now, could be more service cuts, could be more about fares, easily missed whilst just scrolling through Facebook (had to unfollow on Twitter as the service updates posts whilst useful just made it more difficult to see any other posts on my timeline)

(07 Jan 2022, 6:27 pm)Adrian wrote It also makes you wonder if public transport is as safe as its claimed to be, with little in place to protect the driver and customers.

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Well I’m certainly avoiding it, right now!

I suspect not a lot of people will have got the message today. Husband made no mention of any notices on bus stops (where most people will start their journeys, rather than bus stations) when littl’un dragged him out on his daily bus hunt, today. And without knowing about this reduction, I was pitying people relying on the timetables in bus shelters, as according to the one near county hall, the X22 is still running.

(08 Jan 2022, 7:50 pm)BusLoverMum wrote Well I’m certainly avoiding it, right now!

I suspect not a lot of people will have got the message today. Husband made no mention of any notices on bus stops (where most people will start their journeys, rather than bus stations) when littl’un dragged him out on his daily bus hunt, today. And without knowing about this reduction, I was pitying people relying on the timetables in bus shelters, as according to the one near county hall, the X22 is still running.

That's another issue, many timetables away from the operators own website have not been updated, Google Maps for example is still show the pre "temporary" cut times for the X9/X10 as well as the suspended X22. Took DCC a while to update the timetables along the 7 route when it dropped from a 15 to a 20 minute frequency (at least I think they were updated)

(08 Jan 2022, 7:57 pm)Jimmi wrote That's another issue, many timetables away from the operators own website have not been updated, Google Maps for example is still show the pre "temporary" cut times for the X9/X10 as well as the suspended X22. Took DCC a while to update the timetables along the 7 route when it dropped from a 15 to a 20 minute frequency (at least I think they were updated)

When they are updated, the accuracy is suspect. I’ve mentioned before that the one in the new college stop had no mention of the 21 for the best part of a year.

One of the things, other than what has already been discussed, that I find particularly strange about this decision to cut Saturday service levels is that it goes against a hell of a lot of the marketing etc. of the past year.

There's been a huge push to increase leisure travel numbers through numerous methods, given the fall in commuter passenger numbers. Yet the first thing to get the cut when push comes to shove is the market apparently viewed as being key to recovery...

No doubt hundreds of people will have had more than disappointing experiences today, which will be passed on to friends and family.

I wonder if a more sensible approach would have been to drop non-peak hour M-F service levels?

(08 Jan 2022, 8:07 pm)mb134 wrote One of the things, other than what has already been discussed, that I find particularly strange about this decision to cut Saturday service levels is that it goes against a hell of a lot of the marketing etc. of the past year.

There's been a huge push to increase leisure travel numbers through numerous methods, given the fall in commuter passenger numbers. Yet the first thing to get the cut when push comes to shove is the market apparently viewed as being key to recovery...

No doubt hundreds of people will have had more than disappointing experiences today, which will be passed on to friends and family.

I wonder if a more sensible approach would have been to drop non-peak hour M-F service levels?

You don't save drivers doing that as somebody still needs to take the bus out first thing and take the bus back in the evening.

(08 Jan 2022, 8:07 pm)mb134 wrote One of the things, other than what has already been discussed, that I find particularly strange about this decision to cut Saturday service levels is that it goes against a hell of a lot of the marketing etc. of the past year.

There's been a huge push to increase leisure travel numbers through numerous methods, given the fall in commuter passenger numbers. Yet the first thing to get the cut when push comes to shove is the market apparently viewed as being key to recovery...

No doubt hundreds of people will have had more than disappointing experiences today, which will be passed on to friends and family.

I wonder if a more sensible approach would have been to drop non-peak hour M-F service levels?

Weekends are the worst to get drivers in to work especially when short staffed especially as I think there's little to no incentive to work these days?

Another thing that doesn't help covering services on weekends is sometimes other work being picked up, Rail Replacement's, Metro Replacement's, shuttle services for the likes of Kynryn and in the case of today, the St James' Park & Ride service from the Metrocentre which was promoted near enough on near the same level as the Sunday timetables were on their socials.

(08 Jan 2022, 6:33 pm)Andreos1 wrote Or larger vehicles in the case of some routes.

You could put the 56' plate Omnidekkas afaik they have over 20 extra seats and probs more standing. 

who thought it would be a good idea to put the X1 to every 30 mins on a Saturday. In some places there wasn't a 50 for over 2 hours. I saw something on twitter where a place i think it was Bridgehall or something like that, got cut from a bus every 15mins to 1 hour, and i believe it was only the 47 or 47A. 

78 had double decker throughout most of the days. It gets me back to thinking how many of these are 'temporary' will we see the X22 again. Will the X1 be moved back to every 12mins. Or 20. A lot of these have been happening for atleast 3 months, granted we aren't out of the situation yet, with Deptford being the worst hit atm after not getting any for months. 

Could be see a 20/20A - every 20 mins extened to South Sheilds, every 10 mins Sunderland - Durham. I saw many X45/X46's full today, and 47/47A full aswell, not to mention there was a coast & country on the X46 or X45 today aswell.

I caught the 21 today relatively unaffected by the disruption…you’d think.

Waited 20 in Birtley and the first bus turned up full, someone flagged the trailing bus to the clear annoyance of the driver who quite possibly was the single worst example,of customer service ever. I’d call him an utter areshole tbh. Loudly muttered under his breath, seemed put out he had to serve nufc fans, Missed stops, whinged at customers…utterly utterly appalling.


On the way back, no 21.06:from Newcastle, not on the cancellation list. 42 mins for the next bus. Appalling service. I got an Uber.

Today told me…never rely on buses ever