Since yesterday, Arriva has set in place quite a reorganisation of bus services around Darlington. This was an operation acquired from Stagecoach and I was travelling some of the buses transferred during the transaction on a visit to Teesdale during the Mayday Bank Holiday weekend of 2008. The seats still retained the covering patterns or moquette favoured by their former owner while many if not all had gained Arriva corporate paintwork by that time.
1, 1B Darlington - Bishop Auckland - Crook - Tow Law
All of these will depart now from Stand I on Tubwell Row in Darlington. The X1 sees an extra service from West Auckland at 07:44 that follows the route of service 6 as far as Tindale Crescent before continuing along the usual X1 route to Darlington with an arrival time of 08:25.
2 Darlington - Branksome
Also departs from Stand I on Tubwell Row in Darlington.
3 Darlington - Mowden
Also departs from Stand I on Tubwell Row in Darlington.
4 Darlington - Minors Crescent - Darlington
Now departs from Stand J on Tubwell Row in Darlington.
5, 5A Bishop Auckland - Shildon - Newton Aycliffe - Aycliffe Industrial Estate - Darlington
This now departs from Stand H on Tubwell Row in Darlington with no change in timetable. However, evening and Sunday services no longer interwork with those on service 7 and the Sunday service interwork with the X66 instead.
7 Darlington - Newton Aycliffe - Woodham - Chilton - Ferryhill - Durham
It is the addition of Thinford’s DurhamGate development to the route that has meant the breaking of any interworking with service 5A. The required additional running time between Ferryhill and Durham is the cause of both of this and changes in timings. There is one journey that has been removed from the service and added to another: an early morning one commencing from Coxhoe to Durham. Buses now depart from Stand H on Darlington’s Tubwell Row.
8 Darlington - Aycliffe - Ferryhill - Spennymoor8A Ferryhill - Spennymoor
Service 8 remains unaltered apart from a change to departure stand (now H) on Darlington’s Tubwell Row that also affects the 8A. It is the latter that sees route changes to take in the southern section of Thinford’s DurhamGate development while an opportunity to standardise route timings also gets taken.
9 Darlington - Haughton Road - Springfield
10 Darlington - Haughton Road - Whinfield
An extra vehicle is added to the roster for this service to improve timekeeping and it now uses Stand F on Prebend Row in Darlington as its departure point.
11 Red Hall - Darlington
No change.
12, 12A Hurworth - Darlington Town Centre - Trees Park Village
No change.
13A, 13B Darlington - Firth Moor - Darlington
Now departs from Stand G on Prebend Row in Darlington.
14 Darlington - Skerne Park
14A Harrowgate Hill - Darlington - Skerne Park
14B Springfield - Darlington - Skerne Park
Because of the withdrawal of services 6 and 6A, this route gets quite an overhaul with even different stands being used for each service. All do use Stand J on Tubwell Row for services to Skerne Park. Services 14 and 14A see revised timetables with former long journeys on the 14 as far as Morrison’s supermarket being extended as far as Whinbush to serve former customers of the 6 and 6A using the number 14B. On the way to Whinbush, the 14B uses Stand K on Tubwell Row. The 14A will depart from Stand H on Tubwell Row for Harrogate Farm.
19 Darlington - Faverdale - West Park
No change.
21 Darlington - Sedgefield - Trimdon Village - Peterlee
21A Middlesbrough - Sedgefield - Trimdon Village - Peterlee
Service 21 now departs from Stand H on Tubwell Row in Darlington.
59 Askrigg - Hawes - Leyburn
X59 Askrigg - Hawes - Leyburn - Darlington
No change.
75 Darlington - Staindrop - Barnard Castle
76 Darlington - Winston - Barnard Castle
No change.
X26, 26A Darlington - Richmond -
Colburn - Catterick Garrison
X27 Darlington - Richmond - Marne
No change.
X66/X67 Darlington - Harrowgate Hill - Stockton - Middlesbrough
The only change is to the Sunday timetable when journeys run thirty minutes later to interwork with services 5 and 5A. Otherwise, the Darlington departure point or the rest of the timetable is untouched.
With the environment within which bus services are being provided at the moment, success can feel very far away with local councils like North Yorkshire and Cornwall pondering cuts to their funding. Also, Arriva is not a company that you would associated very closely to the term either and that probably follows from the retrenchment that I have seen in Cheshire over the last decade.
Nevertheless, they are claiming that changes implemented to their services in Northumberland during September 2012 have seen good results. Also, there would seem to be conversations going on between them and passengers too and there never is a bad thing. The result is a set of changes that came into place within the last few weeks and today.
Of particular interest to me is the X15 between Newcastle, Alnwick and Berwick-upon-Tweed since it follows part of the Northumberland coastline that I have enjoyed exploring. There is only change to its timetable and it is a positive one: the 19:43 Monday to Friday departure from Newcastle is getting extended as far as Alnwick, bucking a certain trend that sees the decline of evening bus services in rural areas.
Service 35 between Morpeth, North Seaton and Newbiggin has enjoyed success and is seeing accompaniment by the 35A that terminates in Woodhorn instead of Newbiggin. Between the two of these, the Monday to Saturday daytime service frequency will become four buses per hour (one every fifteen minutes) between Morpeth and North Seaton; it is hourly at other times, including all day on Sundays. Also, double decker buses are set to be introduced too and that’s a sure sign of good patronage even if they are refurbished and not new acquisitions.
Related services 30/30A (North Seaton to Ashington to Linton) and 34 (Ashington to Bedlington) see changes too. The former is now an hourly off-peak Monday to Saturday service with its last service in the early afternoon making it more of a shopping service for those needing to such trips by bus. The latter gets enhanced to give four journeys each way a day on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday to Saturday with Wednesday seeing three each way. Again, like the 30/30A, the 34 has all the appearance of a service for shopping trips with its early afternoon stopping point. Extensions to Blyth have been withdrawn though so careful use of onward connections from Bedlington.
Travelsure’s Amble town service 471 is set to be complemented by Arriva journeys early and late in the day from Monday to Friday. This means two journeys before 09:00 and one after 18:10, giving coverage for a larger part of the day.
The last set of routes face relatively minor changes and these are the X20 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne to Ashington to Amble), X21 (Newcastle to Newbiggin) and X22 (Newcastle to Ashington). With the X20, the first journey of the day from Newcastle is set to run 15 minutes earlier for better timekeeping. The 20 now sees four journeys each going around by Hadston Square that it didn’t before. These were added at the request of residents on a six month trial basis and I hope it goes well for them. Service X21 is seeing minor changes such as a change of terminus in Newbiggin for evening and Sunday journeys. One journey is withdrawn for the X22 and another retimed. The Monday to Friday 07;13 from Bedlington to Ashington is the casualty because of low usage and the Monday to Friday 07:53 from Newcastle becomes the 07:48 instead.
Thankfully, there are not many service reductions in all of this and that is good news in itself. That there are enhancements is even better and is the sort of development of which more is needed these days. Hopefully, Arriva can build on its recent good fortune and make bus usage better for everyone.
Update 2014-08-11: Service 30 is operated by Phoenix Taxi, Bus and Coach now and is hourly from mid morning to early afternoon and those extra service 471 journeys around Amble appear to have been withdrawn too.
Within the last few days, a number of changes to bus services serving Crewe have been announced. These are coming in three waves, one for each of three bus companies. D&G is first and largely sticks to tweaking times and routes as does First. Arriva sadly are doing a spot of pruning though this is no near as drastic as what was facing us this time last year.
The 22nd of September is when the first batch of changes will come to pass and they are being introduced by D&G. Service 85 from Crewe to Hanley (Stoke-on-Trent) will have two morning journeys starting later: 08:15 at 08:35 and 09:30 at 09:35. The 45/45A service between Nantwich and Crewe will see the 08:22 journey from Marshfield to Crewe start at the earlier time of 08:12. Crewe town services 8, 8A and 9 are seeing some swapping around with 8A replacing the 8 and 9 on some Monday to Friday afternoon journeys. All of these are tweaks compared to what was going on this time last year and any later or earlier starts affect later stopping points on those journeys by the same amount of time.
Next up for adjustment is the 20 service from Crewe to Hanley that is operated by First Potteries from 6th October. Again, these are timing changes apart from withdrawal of the extension to Haslington. Otherwise, it’s a matter of journeys such as the Sunday morning 09:08 arrival at Leighton Hospital seeing tweaks. Some other journeys from Leighton Hospital start three minutes early and more again will see timing changes between Crewe train station and Radway Green. All of this is for the sake of ensuring greater reliability so things most have changed on roads around there recently to necessitate the changes.
On 27th October, Arriva are adjusting services 31/31A between Crewe and Northwich and 6 between Crewe and Shavington. The latter is losing the first Monday to Saturday journey of the day in each direction. Late afternoon journeys on the 31/31A are being thinned out with Monday to Friday post 16:00 journeys from Northwich to two at 16:35 and 17:40. Their equivalents on Saturdays are to become hourly (16:15, 17:15, 18:15). Post 17:00 Northwich journeys from Crewe go down to two from Monday to Friday (17:20 & 17:55) and three on Saturday (17:01, 17:31, 18:31). In all of this, the last journey of the day from Crewe to Winsford escapes unscathed.
Within the last few days, it has come to my notice that BakerBus are sharply cutting the number of services they operate in and through Congleton. The 99 from Biddulph will largely remain, albeit with only very few journeys extending as far as Macclesfield. Thankfully, both D&G and High Peak appear to be stepping in with replacements for the services that are facing withdrawal.
The latter is set to offer a new service between Macclesfield, Buglawton and Congleton. While this has yet to gain traffic commissioner approval, it has gained the number 39, and it will be of interest to see how the timetable looks. When High Peak did operate service 27 on a council contract, a number of those journeys started from or terminated in Congleton so they may know the route anyway from those less austere days.
As for the Beartown Buses brand, this may be set to disappear now that D&G are running their replacements and I cannot see route branding like that applied to Crewe service 1 appearing here. The current 77 route between Congleton and Kidsgrove is being redirected to go along Padgbury Lane, Ullswater Road and Sandbach Road to leave a new 76 to serve Banky Fields and The Westlands. The current service 42 too is seeing changes to include West Heath on its route. Otherwise, D&G will take over services 90 and 91 with both keeping their half-hourly service frequencies.
Services are being lost with the 95 and the X38 ceasing to exist. However, D&G have registered a Monday to Friday service 36 between Crewe and Sandbach that is to be a partial replacement for the X38 while the 38 from Macclesfield to Crewe remains anyway.
The shape of all these new services has yet to become clear, but there is cause for optimism given that other operators are stepping in instead of BakerBus. The service news from D&G should be worth watching just like that from High Peak, especially since I have learned of forthcoming timing changes to service 392 (morning and evening peak services) between Macclesfield and Stockport (also from September). There has been little alteration to bus services in Cheshire East for a while now with only the summer school holiday 378 service between Wilmslow and Stockport being the only newsworthy change until this week.
Update 2013-07-30
Links to new D&G service timetables have been added now so it does look as if the Traffic Commissioner is giving these the go-ahead. Others should follow as soon as I get them; Traveline has yet to provide September travel information on its timetable lookup facility.
Update 2013-07-31
Details of High Peak service 39 have appeared today. It’s an hourly Monday to Saturday service that doesn’t operate on bank holidays and has extra peak-time journeys from Monday to Friday. All this seemingly is being offered on a commercial basis and the registration is under consideration by the traffic commissioner.
There also are details of the revised 99 and 99B service (again a non-bank holiday Monday to Saturday affair as has been the case until now so no change there) available with Biddulph, Congleton and Buglawton being the main extent of the route and enjoying an essentially hourly frequency. The only journeys to Macclesfield are one in the morning that acts as a positioning journey for service 11 between Macclesfield and Kerridge and one in the evening that does likewise for the Monday to Saturday evening Macclesfield to Crewe Cheshire East Council contract (service 38). There is one evening journey from Macclesfield and that’s all for the day; it facilitates the return of the service 11 bus from Macclesfield to the BakerBus depot.
When doing a refresh of the Rural Services: NI page, it came to my attention that Ulsterbus have several seasonal services on offer in addition to their Rambler ones for visitors to and residents of Northern Ireland. The first of these is Goldline Express 221 which operates one journey each way between Belfast and Giant’s Causeway, giving you a next to next to 3-hour stay at the World Heritage Site (with a reduction on entry fees to the National Trust Visitor Centre too if the weather isn’t being kind) if you opt for a return day trip. Along the way, there are stops in Ballymena and Bushmills but it otherwise appears to be very much an express service and it continues until the start of September.
For those who fancy a longer stay at the Giant’s Causeway than three hours, there’s a later evening departure offered by Goldline 252, also known as the Antrim Coaster since it calls at so many places along the said county’s coastline between Belfast and Coleraine. There is one return journey over the whole route each way and another one between Coleraine and Larne to compliment it. The latter meets with service 256 for those wishing to travel onward to Belfast or go the other way. The 252 continues until the end of September and operates Monday to Saturday until the end of this month when Sunday services start for it and the 256 connecting journeys.
Since it was those rambler services that were the cause alerting me to the above, I suppose that I’d better mention these too. There are four in total that I have found with two being seasonal and others being year-round. The first of the latter is Monday to Friday (no bank holidays) service 407 from Kilkeel to Attcal and Cranfield and the second is Monday to Saturday service 403 (three journeys each way) from Magherafelt to Omagh. The 407 is known also as the Kilkeel Rambler and the 403 gets the Sperrin Rambler name. The Mourne Rambler is a seasonal offering that starts from Newcastle and embarks on a good circuit through the Mourne Mountains. It gets the service number of 405 and operates five journeys from Tuesday to Sunday and bank holiday Mondays until the start of September. There also is a Causeway Rambler for those spending longer along the north Antrim coast and it runs daily with an hourly frequency until the end of September as service 402.
Usefully, there is a Bus Rambler ticket for travelling across Northern Ireland on Ulsterbus services that is available during the main summer school holidays after 09:15. It costs £9 for adults and £4.50 for children. Also, there’s a Family and Friends ticket for £20 that is available during weekends all year round and every day during the summer holiday months of July and August. The latter allows two adults and four children to go together as a group (and it’s an extra £4 per extra child) so it looks like a tempting offer for families in times when money is a scarer commodity.
With all the above, there should be more scope for looking around Northern Ireland’s more scenic spots without needing to use a car. It would be better if more of these services were year-round and not seasonal but there always is the matter of demand to be considered. As it happens, an Easter or May to September span of the year isn’t so bad anyway. Maybe I might be tempted to pop over there myself.