Last month I travelled on XC between Newcastle and Alnmouth. In both directions they were full enough for some to choose to.stand. I've travelled from Alnmouth to Edinburgh on similarly full trains. Obviously every service isn't full but they aren't as empty as some may image.
I'm not saying it's "fresh air", but the hourly XC services carry a small percentage of the total number of passengers on the ECML between Edinburgh and Newcastle.
Some services are busier than others, some are quieter, I'm not saying that there's *no* demand, but when there are so many well documented problems on the XC "core" then it seems daft to keep ten Voyagers north of York at a time when it'd be pretty easy to order additional 800/801/802s (full units or carriages) for TPE/LNER to cope with demand on the ECML.
It's the kind of change that I think would be made under BR (in those days, the only Cross Country services on the ECML north of Newcastle were effectively positioning journeys for HSTs, rather than an all day service) - but now that it's tied into various contracts with various franchises, it's probably more hassle to change.
Why does XC need to serve Doncaster which has ECML services to York/Newcastle/Edinburgh and a TPE fast service to Sheffield for connections South? Leeds and Wakefield are a bigger market that IMHO needs to be 2tph fast via Westgate
Doncaster isn't as attractive as Leeds (in passenger terms), which is why Arriva have tried to get a second path through West Yorkshire - it's more lucrative for them - but this needs to be balanced against the significant speed difference via Donny for longer distance passengers.
For example, looking at this afternoon, the 15:36 from York gets into Sheffield at 16:22... but the 15:44 from York doesn't get into Sheffield until over half an hour later (16:54) - so the diversion via Leeds can add at least twenty minutes to the journey time - XC is already uncompetitive for long distance journeys (hence Birmingham - Glasgow/Edinburgh being a lot faster up the WCML) - so running the Edinburgh trains via Doncaster would provide a faster service from Birmingham/ Derby/ Sheffield (etc) to Edinburgh.
For example, replace XC's current service north east of Birmingham with:
- Birmingham - Sheffield - Leeds (hourly)
- Birmingham - Sheffield - Doncaster - York - Newcastle (hourly - bi-hourly extension to Glasgow via Edinburgh)
That would free up a number of Voyagers to double up some other services as far as Bristol/ Reading.
But, at the moment, we have a TOC (XC) operating the shortest trains on the ECML (ignoring minor things like the Northern shuttles to Morpeth) whilst that same TOC is crying out for additional capacity elsewhere on its network - it seems such a waste of resources - especially when LNER/TPE could order additional IET capacity from Newton Aycliffe.