(Yesterday, 7:49 pm)Kimlfixit wrote Pretty careless omission

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2k2x7vywjo

I appreciate doesn't sound as sexy as their headline, but it's £104 million indexed over 30 years, which is approx £2.3m per annum unindexed. 

What the article doesn't state, is that the accountants classed this as non-material for the purpose of the franchising scheme assessment for a number of reasons. The main being that "existence of an additional investment need was already acknowledged within the Assessment; the omission increased its scale but did not alter its nature or the conclusions drawn regarding the affordability of the Assessment"

The whole report is available to read here: https://www.northeast-ca.gov.uk/download...report.pdf

(Yesterday, 9:38 am)Busadvocate wrote I think the main problem is that the sort of service that you are envisaging just isn't viable as commercial services, otherwise they would be running now.

Tyresmoke:
You are assuming that the south end of the X10 would be a loss-maker. But unless GNE is being daft (which I doubt), the X10 must be generating revenue that makes it at least cover its costs plus a modest profit, on the basis of passenger fares and ENCTS reimbursement etc etc. All that revenue remains there in the future, and so this is a potential net fund-generating service for the franchised world.
We need to adjust from the sense of publicly secured services always being loss-makers; designing the franchised network will require a good sense of what is financially viable.

(And I'm pretty sure there are Peterlee people using X10 to travel to/from Teesside...)

I mean it’s interesting you say that because when was the last time a service like this was properly tried, I think you have to go back to 2002 when the X99 still ran, so nobody could say if it would be a success because nobody has tried doing new services for well over a decade.

(13 Jul 2026, 11:20 pm)tyresmoke wrote This is all great but like you say the X10 is only ~30% outside the NEMSA area … which means to continue running it would have to be an NEMSA franchised service - do they necessarily need an express to Teesside that mainly (not entirely but maybe 70% of the market) benefits Tees Valley residents travelling to Newcastle rather than the NEMSA residents that are paying towards it? They could truncate it at Peterlee, save a fair bit of cash and not worry 95% of the NEMSA users. 

This is one of the worries I have.

It's quoted in the franchising scheme assessment that there's approximately 30,000 people commuting between the North East and Tees Valley daily, across all transport modes. Whilst clearly that's different from 30,000 people travelling by bus or train, it does however indicate that there's still a commuter market between the Tees Valley CA and the North East CA.

It's worth noting that they've said in the scheme assessment that it's unlikely to be a one size fits all. So whilst something like the full X10 could be seen as worthwhile to be a franchised cross-boundary service under NEMSA, to use your example, they could also see fit to curtail it at Peterlee and seek a contribution from the Tees Valley CA to continue the service into Middlesbrough. 

Of course, another operator would also be welcome to pick up the gap and request a service permit to run into Peterlee bus station. This may be more appropriate for something like Arriva's 23.

(5 hours ago)Adrian wrote It's quoted in the franchising scheme assessment that there's approximately 30,000 people commuting between the North East and Tees Valley daily, across all transport modes. Whilst clearly that's different from 30,000 people travelling by bus or train, it does however indicate that there's still a commuter market between the Tees Valley CA and the North East CA.

It's worth noting that they've said in the scheme assessment that it's unlikely to be a one size fits all. So whilst something like the full X10 could be seen as worthwhile to be a franchised cross-boundary service under NEMSA, to use your example, they could also see fit to curtail it at Peterlee and seek a contribution from the Tees Valley CA to continue the service into Middlesbrough. 

Of course, another operator would also be welcome to pick up the gap and request a service permit to run into Peterlee bus station. This may be more appropriate for something like Arriva's 23.

If the south end of the X10 is loss-making, why does GNE run it? My assumption is that it makes money, so  therefore there is no net cost for TV to share. And why would NEMSA offer a share of the profit to TV...? 

Under the draft scheme, I think 23 can't run under a permit unless it is a service secured by TV - hard to see that happening! Google maps makes the present route 9.5miles overall, with 4.6 miles in TV.  That's 53% in NEMSA, so it would not be eligible for a permit. Otherwise, perhaps an operator could extend the route at the south end to take it over 50% in TV; but it does not seem obvious to me where an extension at the south would go.
Operationally, it is currently part of the 22/24 cycle, too.

Arriva X22, X75 and X76 are other cases of commercial services running in TV where the current routes are well over 50% in NEMSA. 

So under the draft scheme, it appears there is little scope for permit operation across the boundary with TV. I wonder if the proposed 50% rule will attract consultation responses wishing more opportunities for penetrating services? I think the TfGM scheme must be much more open to penetrating services, as I believe the Burnley - Manchester X43 is not franchised, and must be at least 65% in TfGM; I'm sure there will be other cases.

The very worst result for passengers would be an unwillingness to operate franchised service4s across the boundary and a restrictive permit scheme that leads to curtailed routes. I would prefer cross boundary franchised routes, and I suspect that is the intention. All this really only matters for residents living in west Northumberland (re 685) and south Co Durham, so a long way from Gateshead...