Thursday October 3rd 2013 ~ A Better Day

33809 on its delivery run last Wednesday. It has now completed 1500 miles on the road. Photo copyright : Jamie Vendie

The question I asked yesterday about punctuality and the Enviros appears to have been answered today. XL01-K14 had 33810 all day and this is the first time that this very long bus duty (it starts at 05.20 and ends at 00.29) has been entrusted to a single vehicle. On previous days a swap had taken place at lunchtime. K15-XL02 had 33808 which did come off at 12.50 for 37573 to work forward to Peterborough. The problem, if indeed there was one, must have been minor as 30808 was later able to resume the diagram at 15.41 to Lowestoft.
 K16 saw the first day in use for 33813 and this ran to time this afternoon. Likewise K17-XL04 had 33805 running almost on time and this too worked all day.
Other Enviro workings today were K1-XL07 33811, K3-XL09 33806, K4-XL08 33804 and K5-XL09 with 33812. All these ran pretty near to time.
An accident involving a couple of cars closed the B198 near Walton Highway at about 12.00 and the road was not reopened until late afternoon. X1 services ran via the A47 bypass at this time, but Y9-XL15 was heavily delayed reports Paul Bennett. It departed Lynn 30 late and passengers were told they would have to change buses at Norwich so that 33809 could go light to Lowestoft to make up time. 33809 passed me at Wisbech at 12.02, about 12 late but was then spotted by Bruce on Pullover Road at 12.49 with 37574 just 3 minutes behind it.
Paul continues "37574 eventually caught up 33809 at Dereham ,so passengers changed onto the Gemini there". The other Enviro out today hitherto not mentioned was 33807 on L8-XL14. This came off at Lynn this evening for 37566 (off Y7) to work forward at 19.01 to Peterborough.
The reason for the Enviro swaps yesterday was attention to the air conditioning systems and tomorrow could be similar with technicians due to be at King's Lynn to make some amendments to the on board announcements (triggered by GPS), attend to the wi-fi set up where necessary and to make adjustments to the vinyls featuring the main calling points of the service. 33803/6/7/9/10/13 all require some or all of these modifications.
New deliveries recommenced today with the arrival of 33814 (YX63 LKC) and 33815 (YX63 LKD) and two more, 33816 & 33817 are coming tomorrow (Friday). Richard hopes to have all 15 ready for traffic by the middle of next week. On the Gemini front, 37570 & 37578 were in the garage today undergoing maintenance but these have now both been laid off from X1 use. 33423 was also sent to the compound this evening where it joined 37157 awaiting repairs, 37565 awaiting MOT, 37567 & 37573 spare and the day's two new arrivals.

The Norwich Bus Page have recently run a story on the X1 history and have details of the expected arrivals at Yarmouth and Lowestoft : http://www.norwichbuspage.com/