Some significant changes in Bluestar diagrams this week by the looks of it, following a few minor timetable tweaks. In fact, every return to school after holiday and half-term recently seemed to produce significant changes compared to before the holiday, though post-October half-term showed less changes.
Looking at Bustimes:
One notable change is that there seem to be less double-deckers between school/college duties finding their way onto regular services (notably the 10, 13, 14 and 20) during the school/college day. Have noticed more double deckers parked up in the city centre this week compared to the period before half-term, perhaps as a result.
The 10, 13 and 14 diagramming continues to be complex, as noted above, even though almost all daytime journeys are now single-deckers which ought to make the diagramming simpler. Perhaps to avoid drivers having to swap between vehicles? I have noticed one or two points of confusion though, with two buses seemingly turning up for the same 14 yesterday. One thing that doesn't help perhaps is that Southampton vehicles rarely display the working number nowadays which makes things perhaps harder for drivers changing vehicles; indeed a week or two ago I overheard a driver having to ring up control to find out which vehicle his was. Totton continues to display them without fail, though.
It's interesting just how often Bluestar (particularly the Southampton side) is seeing quite significant diagramming changes even with only minimal timetable changes.
I'm wondering whether this is because diagramming is done more by computer these days, so it's easier to optimise the diagrams when small tweaks happen compared to doing it on pen and paper.
Over on the Totton side I've noticed more Enviro200s on the 9 lately, perhaps related to the transfer of some Enviro400s to More?
Have also noted one of the Totton Enviro400s (sorry, didn't note the number) having an interesting multi-coloured "bird" design as its livery.
