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I have to agree terminating the 5 in the Town Centre seems a bit silly, often see it pick up a couple of passengers in the station and having buses terminate in the town means the driver is having to take his drop off either blocking off stops or parked illegally on the double yellows on Station Road, also if the 31 stop stays the same it already causes enough problems on a half hourly frequency, when there is a 37 also at the stop the 6/49/76 often has to offload in the middle of the road blocking traffic and is dangerous especially for the older folk, wheelchairs and buggies.

Also in the day the 1 seems to have a 17 minute drop back at Tesco, it kind of defeats the point of the red route if you have a bus pretty much blocking one lane most of the time not to mention this is also the 6 relief point and at times can get congested with drivers changing over and other buses having to squeeze past the parked bus, surely a more sensible solution would have been to terminate at the first stop on Haslucks Green Road which better serves the new shopping centre and return to Robin Hood via Haslucks Green Road, Newborough Road and Baldwins Lane.

Also anyone else see the logic of the having the last two 49's from Solihull on a weekday terminate at Cotteridge (as they do now) but oddly continue to Northfield on a Sunday?

50 branded Enviro on the 49 today

Its 4747 on the 49

Spotted a 49E yesterday in Cotteridge running to Shirley at about 5.40 pm.  Never seen this one before

There's a scheduled 49E from Cotteridge to Shirley Station should leave 17:57 from memory which may have been the one you saw , always seemed pointless as the Solihull bus is only 5 mins in front and then theres a gap of 15 mins till the next one, from Shirley Station it runs dead to the garage.

Also 58E - Hay Mills seen leaving Solihull around 16:15ish today.

99 branded 807 moonlighting on the 23 this afternoon.

Speaking of Enviro's on the 49 4799 is on there today. To my knowledge no stripey ones have so far ventured onto the 49, or the 76 for that matter either!

4725 + 26 both on the 35 today not sure about 4731, couldn't agree more livery looks far better, brighter and attractive than the other red and white Enviro's here.

Was on the peak running boards again today and is definitely at Yardley Wood (dunno if its permanent or if any more are coming down), should have been back in the garage for 10:30 though so you may have missed it, was also out in the afternoon on the running board (26?) which includes a run on the 18 from Cotteridge to Yardley Wood before going onto the 50.

Don't know how to put it right in terms of sentence but I'll try my best.

Basically it's about the dead mileage on 22/3, when they start running on evening timetables, buses terminates at Kitwell and Woodgate instead at City centre and they have to drive all the the way to BC garage as NIS. It's been going on like this long time and would like to see operate as final daytime journey to city.

I think I know what you're getting at and there are certainly a number of examples not just at BC of this, for instance there are quite a few 18's which run dead from YW to Bartley Green and visa versa which on the face of it could go back in service. However the main problem with doing this is the drivers duty, we are paid 7hrs 36 minutes (38 hours a week) a day regardless of how long the duty actually is, the idea being that on average the duties must come to 7hrs 36 mins or slightly below, if you decided to run those 22/23's back in service its inevitably going to result in a longer duty as its going to take more time to go back in service to Colmore Row and then dead to BC than it would to go straight to BC which would likely push the average over 7hrs 36 mins.

What you're suggesting does already happen to a certain extent if you look at the 22/3 timetable the night frequency of every 15 minutes doesn't really kick in going into town till after 8 o'clock so there already will be quite a few which will terminate in town then run back to the garage, compare that to the YW 6 where the night frequency of every 20 minutes kicks in going into town from Solihull just after half 6.

Hope this helps!

900 branded 4901 on the 23 seen in California around 17:50 I presume this is an afternoon peak if it was on the 24 this morning.

It just doesnt make sense for BC to run a 11E trip or for AG to loan a Trident ?  :-\

Probably came off from 9 instead of running dead back to City?

But I still dont see why BC would be on the 11E ? reading tonys above post it seems very unlikely

As illogical as it seems it definitely was on the 11 yesterday, confused the hell out me but I saw it at 10:00 in Kings Heath heading anticlockwise with '11E Harborne' on the blinds.

BC did a 49E from St Thomas Aquinas in Kings Norton to Northfield think it starts around 15:25 although it maybe earlier but I have a feeling this has now been renumbered 849.

Seems to be know one else from yw on here so here goes, the 76E to Camp Hill according to the running board is meant drop off at the 11/35 stop on Vicarage Road then run dead back to the garage (used to say via Colmore Road, Howard Road, Haunch Lane, Yardley Wood Road) it used to and I haven't done it for a while so this may have changed layover in the garage for around 20 mins then do a 2 from Warstock to Town then dead back to the garage. There is a specific '76E King Edwards Camp Hill' blind but a lot of drivers seem to just put '76E Kings Heath'.

The only completely seperate school service here is the 863 (Light Hall School - Yardley Wood) should be two buses in tandem in the morning and back in the afternoon.

Apart from that there are a couple of other school workings of other routes.

18A - For King Edwards Five Ways starts from the island at the junction of Field Lane/Scotland Road in Bartley Green just down from the school then runs as a normal 18.
27E - One afternoon working from Kings Heath Boys School on Hollybank Road to Kings Heath (terminates last stop on Addison Road) (comes off the 2/3 so the only opportunity to see a decker on part of the 27)

Two buses in the afternoon which start from Alderbrook School on Blossomfield Road, they actually pick up from the school forecourt:-
6E to Robin Hood Island
49E to Maypole

The 827 was withdrawn last year and basically did the 27 route from Dame Elizabeth to Kings Heath although when I was a kid at Bournville School I seemed to remember it started at Bournville in the past and there was an am working the other way.