With the loss of the 56.....

[RW]

from North Birmingham and beyond Diamond is rapidly becoming an extinct species in that area. Does anyone else feel that slowly but surely Diamond are being forced to look for pastures new to run its services?  It doesn't seem able to stand up to competition in Birmingam and it's outer environs.

[woody38]

Dianond do quite well on the 4 4M service but on others they do very poorly like the Walsall local sevices
Even when they have the services to themselves like Reddith they seem to mess it up. The 56 service goes back a long way but NXWM coming onto the 936 affected it, it alas suffered terrible with timekeeping & reliability issues which seem to effect a lot of Diamond services The 56 did have a lot of loyal customers who liked them for many reasons including quicker journeys diamond seem to stop at less stops than NXWM & there passes are cheaper.

[MrBevan2000]

from North Birmingham and beyond Diamond is rapidly becoming an extinct species in that area. Does anyone else feel that slowly but surely Diamond are being forced to look for pastures new to run its services?  It doesn't seem able to stand up to competition in Birmingam and it's outer environs.

I honestly feel it's the beginning of the end of Diamond in Birmingham. With Long Acre closing and the loss of the 56, it does seem they are running out of options. They will probably expand in the North West though.

[arrifirststage]

I honestly feel it's the beginning of the end of Diamond in Birmingham. With Long Acre closing and the loss of the 56, it does seem they are running out of options. They will probably expand in the North West though.

Diamond are presently giving the usual impression of a small operator eventually over-reaching themselves.........been coming for some time.
Whilst I would not even  presume to criticise or offer advice to the Company,I. can say that personally I would pull out of the Birmingham market altogether,including the multitude of tenders,and concentrate on Dudley,Stourbridge,Kidderminster and Redditch (the latter particularly needs a hell of a lot of work) and possibly do a lot less dabbling in the tendered market in Wolverhampton as well.
But hey...what do I know,but I certainly wish the Company well........pity no operator can presently get near to NX.......How about another try Uncle Brian?

[winston]

Diamond are presently giving the usual impression of a small operator eventually over-reaching themselves.........been coming for some time.
Whilst I would not even  presume to criticise or offer advice to the Company,I. can say that personally I would pull out of the Birmingham market altogether,including the multitude of tenders,and concentrate on Dudley,Stourbridge,Kidderminster and Redditch (the latter particularly needs a hell of a lot of work) and possibly do a lot less dabbling in the tendered market in Wolverhampton as well.
But hey...what do I know,but I certainly wish the Company well........pity no operator can presently get near to NX.......How about another try Uncle Brian?

Uncle Brian's only interested in buying the established operator i.e. NXWM, he's tried & failed twice time, third time lucky maybe (hopefully not!). If he was interested in competing with TWM/NX he would of no doubt purchased Diamond Bus Company (comprising of the merged BCC & Pete's Travel operations) when Go-Ahead were selling up. I'm surprised Go-Ahead never tried harder in the WM bus market, I was expecting much bigger things from them, instead of the half-arsed attempt where they couldn't even devote a full time MD to run the Op.

[Steveminor]

Go ahead were never interested in the west midlands bus market other than a tool to gain rail franchises.
Uncle bri, well let's be honest if he so wished he could remove nx from the west midlands in under 12 months attack knock the value down then purchase.  For whatever reason he hasn't & doesn't seem that interest in it at the moment, probably as monopoly & mergers commission would intervene.
Diamond have all the ingredients to succeed & in a big way but in my opinion the management team below simon & those below them lack the drive determination and commercial know how to make it happen.  A company is only as good as those running it no offence to simon at all.

[winston]

Go ahead were never interested in the west midlands bus market other than a tool to gain rail franchises.
Uncle bri, well let's be honest if he so wished he could remove nx from the west midlands in under 12 months attack knock the value down then purchase.  For whatever reason he hasn't & doesn't seem that interest in it at the moment, probably as monopoly & mergers commission would intervene.
Diamond have all the ingredients to succeed & in a big way but in my opinion the management team below simon & those below them lack the drive determination and commercial know how to make it happen.  A company is only as good as those running it no offence to simon at all.

I thought Go-Ahead used the Diamond Bus acquisition & Central Trains franchise (at that time) to give them greater coverage of the West Midlands & potentially a stronger product to compete against TWM/NX with?

Yeah okay! Uncle Bri couldn't pull off the deal agreed with CVC capital/The Cosmen's to acquire NXWM / NXC, NXD, UK Coach & various Rail Franchises (at the time) via the side door as that takeover deal collapsed when CVC pulled out, then Uncle Bri failed to merge/takeover the entire NX group when it was teetering on the edge whilst strangled by massive debts. Of course if Uncle Bri set-up shop in the WM, NX would just sit back & let him.... they wouldn't set-up where he frequently tops up his coffers in South Manchester, Newcastle, spread deeper in to Warwickshire etc  ;). NX UK bus & coach turnover & profits only account for approx 33% of NX group earnings, the other 2 thirds are derived from Spain & US/Canada. Once the German Rail franchises come on stream, that will change again & likely become an even smaller proportion. Uncle Bri wants NXWM or nothing!

That's true of any company, they're only as good as the people they employ & values they instil.

[Kevin]

The 56 is something that could have been salvaged as just a peak service, and then attempt to develop a different sort of daytime shopper service to/from Aldridge, say from Great Barr and/or Streetley, or similarly Aldridge and Streetley to Sutton.
Like the communities around Walmley have. They've got the 108 in the peaks and the 167/168 daytimes.

If they persevere with the services they have in the Black Country (4, 4H, 002, 42) and maybe build on them where opportunities arise (eg a short extention to the 002 to Selly Oak to pick up on the fact that now the X64 has been re-routed there is no link there from Weoley Castle) they should be ok. But yeah I think in Brum theyve lost it now

[Westy]

Dont see many people on the Bloxwich services.

[sonic84]

The 56 is something that could have been salvaged as just a peak service, and then attempt to develop a different sort of daytime shopper service to/from Aldridge, say from Great Barr and/or Streetley, or similarly Aldridge and Streetley to Sutton.
Like the communities around Walmley have. They've got the 108 in the peaks and the 167/168 daytimes.

If they persevere with the services they have in the Black Country (4, 4H, 002, 42) and maybe build on them where opportunities arise (eg a short extention to the 002 to Selly Oak to pick up on the fact that now the X64 has been re-routed there is no link there from Weoley Castle) they should be ok. But yeah I think in Brum theyve lost it now

An extension of the 002 to Selly Oak is actually a fantastic idea! It would be a lot more successful in my opinion than extending the 142 to Worlds End.

In fact I have often thought that extending the 002 to Northfield could provide some useful links.

[winston]

An extension of the 002 to Selly Oak is actually a fantastic idea! It would be a lot more successful in my opinion than extending the 142 to Worlds End.

In fact I have often thought that extending the 002 to Northfield could provide some useful links.

I think we may have discussed this before? But didn't Ludlows introduce a new Merry Hill to Northfield route that was short-lived 003 IIRC?

[sonic84]

The 003 ran Merry Hill to Weoley Castle hourly but instead of going through Bartley Green it went down Clapgate Lane and served Woodgate Valley South. The 002 was the reduced to a 20/40 minute split so combined the 002 and 003 ran every 20 minutes.

The gap in service at Bartley Green was apparently covered by the 202 service so the 20 minute frequency was maintained.

A little off topic but I always remember that when Ludlows were due to introduce the 003 service one of the regular 002 found out when a passenger enquired after seeing a centro poster advertising the changes at Merry Hill Bus Station.

[MrBevan2000]

30823 has the pleasure of doing the final 56.

[Kevin]

30823 has the pleasure of doing the final 56.

Rode it to the end. Sad to see them go.
In other news, Brownhills West truly is the a**e end of nowhere

[PM]

Rode it to the end. Sad to see them go.
In other news, Brownhills West truly is the a**e end of nowhere

Genuinely nothing there is there?! I remember once making the mistake of riding to the end of the route, at least expecting to find something like a Greggs, but no. Aldridge isn't a lot better tbh

Sad to see the 56 go but surely inevitable after NX launched and then Platinum'd the 936. Long routes with little passenger turnover are always destined to struggle in the WM due to the flat fare structure, especially if the buses are very quiet off peak (they always seemed so when I used it!) and in the peaks you're using a lot of resources to provide the capacity. Other WM routes seem to have more passengers in the daytime than the 56 ever did