Arriva Leicester

[markcf83]

4510, 4511, 4514, 4516, 4524 and 4527 are still in Leicester. They're either clinging on just while 4529-4535 are being repainted, or covering for fleet shortages due to withdrawals. The latest confirmations for those are 4100 and 4761.

4100's engine failed beyond repair, while 4761 has been withdrawn due to turbo problems.

I see. Thanks for that.

[Coventrybususer95]

With the x6 being increased to every hour will it still be the same 2 coaches or will there be more chances of seeing service buses doing it

[SSmith09]

With the x6 being increased to every hour will it still be the same 2 coaches or will there be more chances of seeing service buses doing it

they have three coaches so I'd guess they'd be used alongside another bus unless another coach gets drafted in

The 158 changes should free up two additional buses too

[leicesterbusadventurer]

Does anyone know what's happened to 2950 and 3119? Both are sat at the depot in a bad way.

[Fin W]

Does anyone know what's happened to 2950 and 3119? Both are sat at the depot in a bad way.

3119 looks like it might have been in a RTC

[xmj-signal]

....

4100's engine failed beyond repair, while 4761 has been withdrawn due to turbo problems.

News of the demise of 4761 (FJ06 ZSG) appears to have been premature.

I noticed that 4761 was tracking again last Friday (17th March), having not tracked since 23rd February. Of course, with Thurmaston depot's track record of putting ticket machines into different buses without reprogramming the vehicle number that didn't really prove anything.

Being in town this morning, with 4761 tracking on route 127, I though I would investigate - and 4761 duly turned up to work the 0919 From Leicester to Loughborough. I took a trip on it to Loughborough and can report that it is in fine fettle, with a good turn of speed so we were waiting time at each timing point. It appears that it has received some TLC (Thurmaston Loving Care).

In other news, the bus tracking as Thurmaston Spare is 3766.

[xmj-signal]

Does anyone know what's happened to 2950 and 3119? Both are sat at the depot in a bad way.

I can confirm that 2950 was viewed working on route 6 to Thurmaston this morning (as shown on the tracker), so whatever was wrong with it must have been attended to.

[AlexS]

It appears 3 more of the 16 plate MMCs have travelled south. As a consequence Thurmaston was unable to source sufficient vehicles to run a full service this morning.
The fact that anybody who had bothered to look at fleet availability statistics would have been able to predict this would occur apparently wasn't enough to prevent the move happening (and this is on a Monday for which fleet availability is usually slightly higher due to fewer buses being in service on weekends).

[andyallen4014]

Following an RTC yesterday morning, 3808 will be getting repainted into the new livery, and the other Pulsars at Hinckley will subsequently follow.

3300 is also currently being repainted.

More duff information - 3808 has returned, currently sat in Leicester depot and still in Sapphire livery. 

[AlexS]

And yet again Thurmaston is short of serviceable vehicles leading to cancellations mostly in the AM peak but continuing throughout the day. If an independent were this shocking at being able to provide sufficient buses to run the advertised service they would have been up in front of a traffic commissioner long ago. In a piece of spectacularly intelligent allocation they also decided to run a service directly behind two consecutive cancellations with a versa vice the booked decker on a route that also left people behind yesterday evening using a streetlight.

[Fin W]

Perhaps Leicester will get some buses from Oswestry (once it closes) to help with the shortage

[Tony]

And yet again Thurmaston is short of serviceable vehicles leading to cancellations mostly in the AM peak but continuing throughout the day. If an independent were this shocking at being able to provide sufficient buses to run the advertised service they would have been up in front of a traffic commissioner long ago. In a piece of spectacularly intelligent allocation they also decided to run a service directly behind two consecutive cancellations with a versa vice the booked decker on a route that also left people behind yesterday evening using a streetlight.

Thurmaston currently has just under 13% spares against PVR which is probably above the national average.

[AlexS]

Thurmaston currently has just under 13% spares against PVR which is probably above the national average.

Which would either suggest they are absolutely awful at maintaining vehicles (either directly or indirectly by consistently allocating buses to routes they are unsuited to) or there is a non unsubstantial number of vehicles that are in need of urgent withdrawal.

[Tony]

Which would either suggest they are absolutely awful at maintaining vehicles (either directly or indirectly by consistently allocating buses to routes they are unsuited to) or there is a non unsubstantial number of vehicles that are in need of urgent withdrawal.

Or they are just having a bad time at the moment like all garages at all companies do occasionally

[AlexS]

The major differences in this case are the length of time the issues have been going on and the fact that the depot has taken delivery of 36 new vehicles since the issues started and the arrival of the new vehicles has failed to lead to any real improvements in the situation despite the reliability of the new vehicles being as good if not better than could have been expected. 
The combination of the above points moves this particular situation away from short term reliability issues that could have struck anywhere towards structural and ongoing failures by the management team both on a local and a national level to provide a reliable service due to a failure to understand the realities of the situation on the ground.