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Doors on scanias are too slow. Interlock system will not real ease until doors are completely shut. 1889 being the slowest 15 seconds

I doubt it takes 15 seconds to close think how much time this bus would add on to a journey

Debatable, not sure if it's specific buses or just the drivers being a bit retarded and hitting the wrong pedal but I used to dread having to catch an Omnilink (still not a fan but learning to deal with them) because the doors would close slowly (as they all do), then open and close again just as slowly... and on some journeys that was at every stop, ergo 10 minutes late

Pretty sure a similar thread already exists?

Hope they don't go back to the original route of the 178 (or 177 or whichever one it was), would be better if it was a sort of "to Redditch then to Woodrow / Hospital / wherever", because if I'm honest I thought that's what the problem with the original route was, it didn't go direct enough for anyone going to Redditch, instead going on a magical mystery tour of the suburbs

Not sure, the 99 for me is already long and complicated enough.
But I have to say the 002 is always a route that surprises me, Diamond do so well on it that I have to wonder why NX or any previous versions of them never ran along part of it.

Furthermore, if the timetable could fit it, you could make the 205 a circular to Wall Heath going from Merry Hill via the 255 Route replacing the 255E. As a user of the 255 between Wall Heath and Merry Hill, I would value this too.

Bad idea, any sort of circular service that involves Merry Hill AND Dudley town centre is guaranteed to fail

I've just come through Kings Heath on a class 172, that was something I didn't realise you could do until today

Random extra services on saturday from Bromsgrove to New St (or maybe from worcester?), booked as 172s and booked to run via Camp Hill.

If you ever need to use that route on a sunday, there's usually a 172 operating it and gives the chance to travel on one of them via Selly Oak as well

Ok, perhaps a good point to re-ignite the debate......

Watching the recent "Routmasters" program about road transport in London, and in particular the one about the night buses, I always assumed London always had such a network of night buses, but apparently not. They started with a handful of routes and it has steadily grown to the insane level it is now, with some routes even running to similar insane frequencies as daytime services, presumably because they never imagined the demand to be there. Now the demand has been met, with services from central London out towards the suburbs, from Heathrow out to various nearby places and, perhaps more importantly, routes that go nowhere near either of them. People can use the excuse "London is a 24hour city and Birmingham isn't" to justify us not having nightbuses here, but for example, looking at a recent bus route map of South East London, Croydon has 24hour bus routes going to various nearby places.... How is Croydon worthy of that and Birmingham isn't?

Hopefully, the hourly 97 will prove a success and they'll see sense to gradually up the frequency and add other worthy routes. But I suppose that makes too much sense....

Saw this T-shirt online last week, thought about it for a nanosecond and had to buy it there and then.......

One I'd completely forgotten about until I randomly started browsing their pictures on the main site....
North Birmingham Busways! Always looked smart, hell they even made Darts look smart. I miss them...

As much a cynic as everyone else sometimes, but.... Perhaps, just perhaps, the 300 new buses would be specific to do with this investment, and maybe NXs usual orders are on top of that? I know it's a bit far fetched but if we think of these "Gold" routes or any sort of "Sprint" network then surely buses required for them would require significantly more investment than usual orders for E400s or B7RLEs, which although are new, they are still just run-of-the-mill buses for ordinary routes

The 33 and Pershore Road have both had competition, but both times it was Thandi!

Knew I remembered something else on the 33, couldn't quite picture it though

Yesterday, 99% sure 824 was on the 297. Also 3602 was on the 49.

Today, 5512 spent all day on the 126, again! Also, by the evening, 1-branded E400H 5415 had joined it. 4802 was on the 120, and 554 on the 297.

Beat you to 5415 by hours ;D Only joking Matt :)

Wonder if NE would consider a fleet of Hybrids for the 126 if funding was available?

Yes, when I rode 5510 on the 126 the battery mode came in quite alot

Strange that, I would have thought the 126 was actually quite a quick route and didn't really stop all that much (maybe just because it's been a while since I've travelled on it and I forgot what its like)

Therefore, it would go nowhere near the bus station.

Probably for the best, I imagine if it did it would be chaos

There was a company New Testament travel? who ran very briefly from West Bromwich ringroad (layby infront of the current Metro stop before the new Bus Station) down Soho Road and up the 11 route to One Stop.

GAH WHY DOES NO-ONE ELSE THINK OF THIS ROUTE IT WOULD BE SO USEFUL

....sorry, I just really want someone somewhere to run buses between Perry Barr and West Brom, seems such an obvious route and yet nothing

Anyone know what's happening about the new deckers PB should be getting, it's odd that they've lost deckers to WA and had nothing in return, are they getting a share of the new E400s?

I have to say I'm a little confused by E400s going to WA. Genuinely would have thought it makes more sense for, say, the 997 to move to PB in return, as most of the journeys are 997E's that don't even go near Walsall