100 Metrocentre shuttle
100 Metrocentre shuttle
Hi, I'm just wondering if the 100 shuttle is still temporarily suspended or has it been canned completely?
(21 Feb 2023, 7:49 pm)NEbushopper Hi, I'm just wondering if the 100 shuttle is still temporarily suspended or has it been canned completely?It's not coming back despite what they put out on Twitter.
I can't imagine it being more economically viable to run a duplicate service than to just pay GNE for ticket acceptance
(23 Feb 2023, 12:00 pm)Aaron21 100 is a better service than gne service to Metrocentre. Straight to the point and can guarantee it'll run
100. 1 stop in Newcastle and Straight to Metrocentre
Gne about 7 different stops before Metrocentre
(23 Feb 2023, 12:00 pm)Aaron21 100 is a better service than gne service to Metrocentre. Straight to the point and can guarantee it'll run
100. 1 stop in Newcastle and Straight to Metrocentre
Gne about 7 different stops before Metrocentre
(23 Feb 2023, 12:02 pm)Dan Can guarantee it will run? I forgot Stagecoach never lost mileage.
It is practically the same as GNE’s offering.
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(23 Feb 2023, 12:11 pm)Thomas12 I remember the Stagecoach 100 being pretty unreliable - most of the time I seen it it ran in twos (or sometimes threes)
(23 Feb 2023, 12:00 pm)Aaron21 100 is a better service than gne service to Metrocentre. Straight to the point and can guarantee it'll run
100. 1 stop in Newcastle and Straight to Metrocentre
Gne about 7 different stops before Metrocentre
(23 Feb 2023, 12:00 pm)Aaron21 100 is a better service than gne service to Metrocentre. Straight to the point and can guarantee it'll run
100. 1 stop in Newcastle and Straight to Metrocentre
Gne about 7 different stops before Metrocentre
(23 Feb 2023, 3:40 pm)MVK500R Really? Because I've seen the 100 come in 3's before, and sometimes it hasn't turned up at all.
Stagecoach suspended the 100 as they couldn't gurantee it would turn up due to a shortage of drivers. The fact that other services took priority because thats where they actually make their money. Despite being a busy route, the 100 didn't take much in fares, mainly passengers with day/mega riders transferring to it from services arriving from other parts of Newcastle, particularly from the likes of the East end.
(01 Mar 2023, 8:00 pm)Rapidsnap Stagecoach suspended the 100 as they couldn't gurantee it would turn up due to a shortage of drivers. The fact that other services took priority because thats where they actually make their money. Despite being a busy route, the 100 didn't take much in fares, mainly passengers with day/mega riders transferring to it from services arriving from other parts of Newcastle, particularly from the likes of the East end.It must have made a profit at some point though otherwise it wouldn’t have had brand buses brought for it like it did at various points.
(01 Mar 2023, 8:00 pm)Rapidsnap Stagecoach suspended the 100 as they couldn't gurantee it would turn up due to a shortage of drivers. The fact that other services took priority because thats where they actually make their money. Despite being a busy route, the 100 didn't take much in fares, mainly passengers with day/mega riders transferring to it from services arriving from other parts of Newcastle, particularly from the likes of the East end.It must have made a profit at some point though otherwise it wouldn’t have had brand buses brought for it like it did at various points.
Strangely enough both the 100 and X66 were profitable in my view. People travelling there for a day out by bus are likely to buy day tickets (or transfers in the case of the X66) to either Newcastle or Gateshead then switch over to the 100 / X66 (depending on location).
Up until recently the X66 ran non stop aside a few journies late at night as the 66 or early in the morning as the 63. These days it now stops at certain locations to pick up extra passengers therefore grabbing those extra fares. But other then that the only two places that the X66 stopped was either interchange at Gateshead or Metrocentre, now we know there isn't housing at the Metrocentre end. And at the Gateshead end, the vast majority would have as previously mentioned gotten the bus or metro from surrounding areas with perhaps a small handful from with Gateshead Town Centre.
The 100 was the same, with 3 City Centre Bus Stops (Greys, Pilgrim and Central) and the Metrocentre Interchange, again maybe a handful of residents within the city centre used it, but again most passengers would have came from other bus routes or the metro.
Thinking about it, whenever new buses came they were heavily branded for the Shopping Centre, the last new buses for either service being the 4 Streetlites for the X66 in 2016. Last time the 100 had brand new buses was 2005. To start off with the services were probably sponsered by the shopping centre to get people there, however as they years went on the sponsership dwindled and the urge to buy new buses for the service is non-exsistant with Go North East and Stagecoach NE putting on well used vehicles that have being used on other routes, and now it's at the point where the service isn't branded.
I don't think the 100 will be returning anytime soon due to the building works around Pilgrim Street unless Stagecoach change the route so it goes anti-clockwise around the City Centre and exits via Gallowgate then down the Boulevard.
A sad reflection of the changing times.
The 100 was conceived, numbered, branded and routed all to appeal to new markets and make maximum use of a single operator's market dominance by making the bus an attractive alternative in terms of price, convenience and environment. As daft is it seems now, it was a literal blue riband affair.
Customers taking advantage of their Day Rider only needed to know their own bus route into town, which at the time for that customer was already likely to be an express or a fast and frequent Super Route, and just hop on the shuttle. No fuss or hassle. Certainly no need to pore over timetables and network diagrams.
Now, none of that matters. You're just a passenger, and it is assumed you will put up with whatever is most convenient for the private operators and their employees, who have no real incentive to grow their own businesses or compete with each other.
Just a zombie mess waiting for the inevitable subhumation into a publicly run monolith, with all the further horrors that entails.
I don't feel special now, I feel no more valued than the oiks using the bus to get to the MetroCentre to wander round for a day's work being a moody teen or a shop lifter. I consider the fact ticket acceptance is offered as the bare minimum, not something to be whooping about in celebratory fashion like I have won the lottery.
I am amazed that these days, once you have located the bus you need in the complexity of GNEs network, there seems to be no consequence to a GNE driver not even realizing there even is an acceptance agreement, as he stares at you with a baffled and slightly suspicious face as you present him with this mysterious ticket, paper or digital, that he has apparently never seen before (yet more proof that local bus drivers are already doing well enough they don't need to use buses in their leisure time). I could have complained, but what's the point?
I complained when my far more convenient local bus that took me directly from the end of my street to the MetroCentre in less time than it takes to me drive (when including the hassle of parking) was axed due to so called low demand. It came to nothing, I was offered scripted platitudes by some time served tosser waiting out the time he could draw his fat PTE pension. The bus companies (and useless local authorities) continued their journey of self harm, to the point traffic is now so bad now I can bike to the cente faster than the current bus options. And it is quite a pleasant run too, taking in the river and a bit of train spotting.
