Stagecoach North West Discussion

[pickles]

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[K768 DAO]

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[themaster985]

Not sure about the former PB fleet giving change yet, the vaults are still in place and unbagged on the buses Ive seen, but Ive not been in Preston much this week.

They are due to start giving change on the date of the major rescheduling from Sunday 22nd March. The vaults will no longer be used from then.
Olympian 14551 [formely 101] is now in Stagecoach livery and very smart it looks too. Also 13296/7 are now working schools out of Deepdale Road.

 

[K768 DAO]

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[mbonwick]

I guess it will be a long short term if you get me, I bet SCNW want rid of them!
AFAIAA, the schools were previously operated by the Lynxs which had seatbelts and CCTV fitted, so it could be a case of waiting for similar single decks (eg. B10Ms) to become available, or waiting for 2 DDs to become free...

 

[Dallamlad]

I don't think there's anything wrong with those Lynxs' as long as they are just used for schools.

 

[mbonwick]

Oh, there is. As we were saying a couple of posts ago, there is the issue of standardisation. Although other SC regions have Lynxs, there is no point in Preston retaining so few.
Plus there is the question of their age. I bet Stagecoach feel that in order to win over Preston Bus customers, they have to be seen to be actively investing in new vehicles.

 

[cainebj]

as usual, buses at Lillyhall not on the routes they were brought to lillyhall for lol. 33167 on Moorclose 51, 33168 was on its planned route!!! (seaton 47)!
40445 was running Northside 48, but had no working display and no destination boards!
P565PNE was sitting just outside Maryport this morning, not sure what route it was running (57 or 58 ).

in Carlisle:
20896 was running 600.
20727 running 104 to Center Parcs.
P109DCW on Layover from 685 while Arriva ran it (they alternate between Arriva and Stagecoach).
R948FOO was running 69.

I was on 16655 to Carlisle this morning, and 16652 coming back. the other buses running 300 today were 16653 and 16654. (was nice not to see 16358 run it!!!)

 

[pickles]

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[mbonwick]

20699 was always a rather sickly machine. I recall having it on a 556 one morning and it sounded terrible!
20702 had knackered suspension last time I travelled on it, the dampers had obviously perished and it sound really creaky when it went over a pothole.


List updated, pickles

 

[pickles]

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[mbonwick]

20699 would probably have come off the 'line sometime before or after 20702 as it's plate is different. I did find a site once explaining what the letters on number plates meant, but ATM I can't find it.

Attached are some pics of ex-PB vehicles now in swoops. NONE ARE MY OWN PICS. Copywrite rests with Paul Austin.

 

[pickles]

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[cainebj]

20699 would probably have come off the 'line sometime before or after 20702 as it's plate is different. I did find a site once explaining what the letters on number plates meant, but ATM I can't find it.

as far as i know, on the old style plates, the last 2 letters were location of registration. "HH" and "AO" are Cumbria i think. pretty sure "tn" is Newcastle area. thats about as much as i know

those buses look nice in stagecoach livery they just need a retrim to match lol.

forgot to mention this before, but theres something that really annoys me about some teenage bus passenges. when it comes to buying a ticket, 16 year olds are suddenly 14 years old, but when they're in a shop wanting alcohol or cigarettes, they're 18 lol. in my opinion, if a passenger claims to be under 16 when they look over, they should show ID, if they don't have any, then full price ticket it should be!!! it just wastes time!!!
another thing that annoys me is drivers not changing destination display!!! quite a few times now i've been coming home from Carlisle with "Carlisle 300" on display! with the displays on the buses being LED, they reflect easilly which is how i can see they havnt been changed lol. sometimes drivers wait until passengers are on before changing it, but the past few times, they havnt bothered!

 

[mbonwick]

AO is Carlisle, as is RM and HH. Hence K 699 ERM and K 702 DAO were both registered in Carlisle.


TN is indeed Newcastle

this site explains all

 

[Dallamlad]

Those pics are brilliant and they look great in the new livery!!! Want some Scans up here!!!

How long will it take for them to get them all done?

 

[mbonwick]

Not long I imagine, they're getting through them pretty quickly!

 

[Dallamlad]

end of March? April maybe? Are they going to do all of them even the really really old ones lol.

 

[themaster985]

Oh, there is. As we were saying a couple of posts ago, there is the issue of standardisation. Although other SC regions have Lynxs, there is no point in Preston retaining so few.
Plus there is the question of their age. I bet Stagecoach feel that in order to win over Preston Bus customers, they have to be seen to be actively investing in new vehicles.

In fact, Stagecoach do not have any operational Lynx's in any region. They still own three others that were driver trainers, but these are now withdrawn. The Preston Bus Lynx's are the only ones earning revenue for Stagecoach. Only one [215] is used on schools - for a specific LCC contract, the other three are still being used on all day service.

 

[mbonwick]

Oh right, thanks for clearing that up. Even mor reason to dispense with them. I feel sorry for the poor people who have to put up with those NC Darts though!


I wouldn't have thought they'd bother with the older vehicles which they've no intention of keeping, but who knows?

 

[K768 DAO]

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[pickles]

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[K768 DAO]

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[cainebj]

According to Granada Teletext, Stagecoach Manchester have ordered a further 80 vehicles, on top of the 100 new vehicles they got last year, OK for some! Lol

from what ive heard, most of them are Enviro 400's, which once recieved, will send double deckers around the country in April, but we'll see what happens lol.

Manchester doesnt have any enviro 200 /300's. they have loads of ALX300's though. their midi fleet is made up mostly of pointer bodied darts, with some marshall darts (longer wheelbase) and ALX200's joining them.

i still havnt heard anything about a 3rd 709d replacement for 46 / 46A / 47 routes at lillyhall! something needs to be sent quickly!!! its a shame none of the low floor minibuses will be route branded it means that stagecoach can annoy people like me, who prefer to see buses on the routes they were purchased / transferred for!!!

as far as i seen, everything was running normally here today.
47617 on its usual 30 sunday service.
52629 on layover from X5 sunday service.
709d on Workington sunday service.

 

[mbonwick]

Single decker wise, Manchester have a lot of the usual B10Ms and MAN 18.220 HOCLs with ALX300. They have 2 Omnicitys which came with the purchase of Maynes, as well as one DAF SB220 which came with Bullocks and a single Transbus E300.

Believe it or not, they still have a step-entrance Dart down there (32048) as well as several Dart SFD412 (whatever is different about them compared to an SLF, I don't know), 32351-2, 32354-5, 32358-62/5/6/8. They also have 709Ds and Varios in regular service as well!


I would have thought the 80 vehicles would be single deckers, in order to get rid of the step-Darts and Mercs.

 

[driver9000]

I think Stagecoach went to great lenghts to standardise its fleet to a few makes/models namely Leyland & Volvo Olympians with Alexander R bodies, Volvo B10Ms with Alexander PS bodies and it was close to a fully standardised fleet. Then it bought out some larger competitiors namely Traction & RoadCar which had totally different buying policies which has seen it left with a lot of 'non-standard' buses in its fleet - if they are kept in their originial operating areas with fitters who are already working on them then there should be no real problem with reliability. Most buses have interchangable universal parts anyway.

 

[cainebj]

33167 is out on Moorclose 50.
one of 51 reg solo's on Moorclose 51

driver trainer on Workington Bus station annexe, and its had a lot of its seats removed since i last saw it!!!
still got 709d's trundling around on Seaton / Harrington routes!

i've been told that 33164 is supposed to be coming to Lillyhall as the 3rd 709d replacement on Seaton / Harrington, but we'll see what happens! its currently at Carlisle getting a repaint (i think the repaint has already been mentioned on here lol).

Manchester have 1 709d in full time service (a bit odd really!) and they have 1 as promotions / staff shuttle or something, not really sure what the use is.

 

[Stonesourscotty]

I Thought the Manchester 709D was just used for Coronation street now?

 

[cainebj]

I Thought the Manchester 709D was just used for Coronation street now?

thats what the other one does :-P i forgot about that haha. theres one in full time service, and one for coronation street.
the coronation street one is 40660, N660VSS, and is kept at Charles Street depot.
the one in full time service is N884AAV (40434) at Ashton depot.

 

[Stonesourscotty]

Never knew about the Az One. Thanks for that. i'll have to hunt it down sometime. Noted a 125/6 Trident on the 663 Tonight.