Tuesday August 27th 2013 ~ The Winds of Change

With the introduction into service of 33423, the long awaited changes to the X1 fleet have got underway. 33423 seems to have behaved impeccably since it began work on K3-XL09 last Monday, doing the turn daily until Saturday and then resuming it today (27th). This is not to say it has always run to time and on more than one occasion in the past week, K3 has become quite delayed. The arrival of the Enviro 400 meant that Gemini 37158 could go to Full Circle for repainting, prior to its move to the Potteries. It returned today in the new First delivery, but totally devoid of any fleet names or numbering. This will presumably be attended to before it returns to service. Going the other way for repainting today was 37157.
In the previous blog entry I mentioned about the failure of 37572 at Gorleston last Monday. Tony Irle kindly sent this photograph of 37572 shortly before departure from Queensgate on L10-XL16 11.38 to Lowestoft on the day in question :

The problem with 37572 turned out to be as steering fault and after being sidelined at Vancouver Avenue following recovery from Gorleston, it was finally despatched to Volvo for repairs today.

Sam Larke says " I realise you will probably have plenty of photos of 33423 this week, so here is something different. Monday's X1 shorts featured both 34114 & 34112 in action, here is 34114 at Norwich bus station ". 

On Tuesday 20th congestion around Great Yarmouth, due to an accident and races traffic, was responsible for some afternoon delays. 37564 was seen by Malcolm Hicks arriving in Lowestoft 21 late on the 15.40 arrival from Peterborough (Y9-XL15). L10-XL16 following was 35 late by the time it arrived in Yarmouth. The repercussions continued into the early evening and 37578 on L10 travelled part of its journey 'not in service' prior to working the 19.54 King's Lynn _ Peterborough. Behind it by some considerable margin was 37156 on L11 which was noted at Hardwick, on its way into Lynn at 20.38 (43 minutes late). One of the earlier services affected was K3-XL09 with 33423 which passed Walpole 23 minutes late and K5-XL11 was 35 late into Lynn with 37570, so 37157 worked the 17.12 Lynn - Peterborough instead. . Wednesday 21st August saw an inconvenience to X1 passengers when the road through Peterborough rail station was temporarily closed.

L11 (37159) and K1 (37571) manouevre themselves at Dereham on Wednesday while the Konectbus driver has a crafty smoke ! 

37159 gets away from Dereham on the 09.35 to Peterborough. Both pictures courtesy of Des Speed.

 On Thursday roadworks at Honingham caused some delays. Y13-XL19 was seen coming back from Peterborough on the 13.08 running 15 late with 37579 and once again 33423 was behind time, being seen 21 late this time, again on K3-XL09 12.55 ex Lowestoft.
The Friday before Bank Holiday is notorious for delays due to the holiday traffic, but this year was not quite so bad as on some other occasions in recent years. Y9 11.08 from Peterborough had 37160 which had lost 18 minutes by Wisbech. The traffic then became intense around Lynn and Chris reports 37159 on L11-XL17 12.08 ex Peterborough running via Tilney All Saints village and the A17 to avoid the congested Pullover Road, it had departed Wisbech 34 late. The service after this, 37568 on L12-XL18 was seen on the Southgates webcam emerging from the South Lynn exit at 14.29, approx 39 late. The last service which seemed to run late was K17 15.08 from Peterborough which with 37573 was 29 late into Wisbech, closely followed by 37575 on K18 just 6 minutes behind it. Over at the Lowestoft end, Malcolm saw 37563 arriving 20 late and departing 25 late on Y7-XL13 14.55 to Lynn and later 37569 appeared slightly late on Y9 having replaced 37160.
My annual visit to Peterborough beer festival took place on Saturday 24th, I travelled out from Wisbech on L9 10.19 departure with 37566 - yes again, this bus is really haunting me now !

Return was with 37563 which having begun the day working K5-XL11, was by evening working Y6-XL12 in place of 37575. Both journeys were managed well by their drivers, but the morning trip was made in heavy traffic.
 The Bank Holiday buses did quite well and at the time of peak traffic levels returning from the coast, the 15.50 from Lowestoft passed Terrington exactly 30 late with 37574, while the 16.50 with 37577 appeared just 10 late here at 20.20. To bring  the story up to date, today (Tuesday) services ran well in the morning but ran up to 15 minutes late in the afternoon. To add to insult to injury, 37571 was seen coming into Wisbech this evening on K19-XL06, the 16.08 from Peterborough about 10 minutes late and bearing a new advert for the film 'About Time' !
This morning 37573 was involved in a mishap shortly after leaving Yarmouth when a wheel overheated and the fire brigade had to attend. The passengers were successfully evacuated by the driver and then 37563 had to be sent out from King's Lynn to take over the service, the 06.45 from Gorleston. 37573 was recovered to King's Lynn with no outward signs of damage and was being examined this afternoon.
The first of the new fleet from Alexander Dennis are rumoured to be arriving imminently, so watch this space !
I have once again had several enquiries about the codes used in the blog - these can be found on the blog entry for 14/5/13 which features the full timetable and codes used.