Saturday 9th October 2010 ~ Meltdown

Traffic queuing into Lynn this morning. 37564 can just be seen arriving from Peterborough. DS

The law of averages states that a long distance route like the X1 will sometimes come unstuck with several incidents on the same day. Today was that day !
An accident blocking the A47 at Hockering around 08.00 combined with temporary traffic lights on London Road in King's Lynn brought the service to its knees. At one stage, the Peterborough service from Lynn had reduced to hourly. It's impossible to detail all the events, but here is a snapshot. west of Lynn, things seemed to be going Ok first thing. Y6 05.52 Yarmouth - Peterborough was on time from Lynn with 37157 and this managed to get back to the South Gates roundabout from Peterborough at 11.09, approx 20 late. Next westbound service, Y7 06.22 from Yarmouth had the fated 37568 and after getting past the Hockering obstacle, this passed the South Gates inbound at 09.17, 43 minutes late and went by me at Wisbech 52 late. By this time then 82 minutes had passed between P'bo bound services from Wisbech and 568 was filled to capacity.  L8 with 37578 hit the peak of the traffic delays at Lynn and was past the Southgates roundabout at 09.37, but not reappearing until 10.21 heading to Peterborough, around an hour late. By the time it passed Bruce on the 10.35 from Peterborough it was running a huge 78 minutes late. Next going west was L9 with 37158 and this was about 39 late into Lynn and 61 late by Walpole Highway. 158 was later seen leaving Wisbech at 13.02, now 66 late and was finally seen heading Lowestoft bound past Southgates at 14.11, so by now running in the times of L12.
Des takes up the story of Y10 which he was driving : "37569 - 07:15 Gorleston to Peterboro' - Great till I got to Norwich and a Lynn driver informed that the A47 was closed at Hockering. I thought and decided that, there's time to spare on a Saturday, traffic is light, we'll go and see what's happening.
No problems getting into Hockering. I spoke to 2 people waiting for an eastbound bus and told them to board and I would get them to Dereham to catch a bus to Norwich. Then no exit from Hockering westbound - Accident was just over the brow of the hill on a straight piece of single track road between the end of the bypass and the turn off to Hockering church. An artic and a car were involved.
My own diversion took me back to the Mattishall roundabout and over the A47 at Eckling Grange. (2 passengers there. previous buses had gone via Yaxham and missed Eckling Grange.) See below for my route.

I was 12 late at Dereham (09:19) - I was at Lynn Cemetery at 10:07 and on good time to hand over for the 10:15 King's Lynn to Peterborough BUT there was traffic - I arrived at Lynn at 10:29 and the bus in front (37158 due 09:45) was still loading. I transfered my onward passengers to 37158 and put 37569 into the centre of the bus station. Lynn control were pleased, they had a spare bus!
I was told to take 37569 back to Low on the L9 11:32 Lynn to Lowestoft. I left on time and outbound traffic meant I was 12 late at East Winch. I was back on time by Yarmouth at 14:00 for my relief driver.
I spent the rest of the day on service 8".

So Y10 as we have seen was terminated at Lynn, next service was L11 with 37579, 17  x 25 late at Southgates. This one is believed to have terminated at Wisbech and returned to Lynn immediately. L12 with 37567 was through Walpole Highway at 12.25 (booked 11.33) and went through to Peterborough.

Des tells us about Y13 : "37156 - this should have operated 07:30 Yarm to Low, then 08:25 Low to P'bo - a water pump problem and a cracked destination screen kept it at Yarmouth. - B10M 20115 was dispatched as a replacement". This got Bruce quite excited as 115 is a very rare coach on the X1, my own records show that the last time it was used west of King's Lynn was on 24th August 2009 ! Unfortunately though, circumstances conspired against it today and it was seen emerging from Nar Ouse Way at 11.58, the driver having opted to use the Lynn bypass instead of queuing for ages on Hardwick Road. Lynn was as far as it got and it then returned east later, believed to have been still on Y13 in which case doing the 14.32 from Lynn. Instead of coming back to Lynn on the 17.48 from Lowestoft, 37567 (off L12) replaced it. This then left 20115 to return in the path of L12 light to Yarmouth. By mid afternoon, the traffic in Lynn had eased, but there was still fallout with Lowestoft services seen leaving Lynn at 16.05 and 16.17.
 By the end of the day, many buses had ended up in a different location to that expected and one of these was 37571 which ended up spending its first night away from Lynn since its return to service. It berthed overnight at Lowestoft.