Stagecoach MCSL - Chester & Wirral Depots

[wirralbus]

RE: Stagecoach Chester & Wirral
Arriva havent been anywhere near Cheshire Oaks and its inherent traffic problems for years now.

[busesdotorg1920x]

RE: Stagecoach Chester & Wirral

(11/11/2017 22:13)gka472l Wrote:  All four still there, 10828/30/31/35, saw all of them on the X8 yesterday, along with a 19*** Enviro400 and an Enviro300, Stevel Knight Media reported a few days ago that the four Enviro400's recently up from Devon are to be branded for the X8, presume the MMC's will go to Gillmoss then?

I would guess not all of them, if any, due to the X8 PVR being 6 and if they would want to make it fully double-decked they would need 6 buses.

[iMarkeh]

RE: Stagecoach Chester & Wirral

(11/11/2017 23:41)mtl97 Wrote:  Arriva are not as strong as they were, around 2007 they ran buses on nearly every route out of chester, Liverpool 401/x11, west kirby 421/422, runcorn 21/x30, northwich 82, winsford 230,x20, Crewe 84 & the wales routes including x94 to barmouth, since then arriva have abandoned routes to the wirral, halved frequency on runcorn & Crewe routes, only back on northwich route & now on db routes due to the collapse of gha, stagecoach only problem is land for buses to park on but that is being sorted out, if stagecoach end up on any arriva routes it will because arriva dont want it anymore, stagecoach have got what they want in chester anyway, park & rides, e port routes & cheshire oaks to themselves

Maybe that is the case but look at Townlynx T1. If that is what they do to competition running only hourly, imagine what it will be like if Stagecoach ran it much more frequent. Even in Widnes on the 110, they are trying to wipe out Link Network even though Link only run from Widnes - Warrington. If Stagecoach were to compete, I think 1, it would have been done by now and 2, they would do the whole route and flood. The reason they have so many tenders in Wales is to get their foot in the door but Arriva can't complain it is competition as they are tenders not commercial. IF they want to expand, it will be a task and a half for them. Hopefully they win the DBs. That will help them majorly around Handbridge and Saltney. Any whiff of Stagecoach competing not on tenders and Arriva will have them.

[chester285]

RE: Stagecoach Chester & Wirral

(12/11/2017 15:27)iMarkeh Wrote:  Maybe that is the case but look at Townlynx T1. If that is what they do to competition running only hourly, imagine what it will be like if Stagecoach ran it much more frequent. Even in Widnes on the 110, they are trying to wipe out Link Network even though Link only run from Widnes - Warrington. If Stagecoach were to compete, I think 1, it would have been done by now and 2, they would do the whole route and flood. The reason they have so many tenders in Wales is to get their foot in the door but Arriva can't complain it is competition as they are tenders not commercial. IF they want to expand, it will be a task and a half for them. Hopefully they win the DBs. That will help them majorly around Handbridge and Saltney. Any whiff of Stagecoach competing not on tenders and Arriva will have them.

You make it sound as if stagecoach aren’t capable of
Handling competition

[motormayhem1]

RE: Stagecoach Chester & Wirral
Stagecoach and arriva wont go head to head on routes unless they are in a quality partnership or other wise both sides of the water would be flooded with stagecoach as they are not scared of competition as look at manchester for instance with first.

[Turbostar19]

RE: Stagecoach Chester & Wirral
Personally, I very much doubt that Stagecoach will directly compete against Arriva. Neither company would do well in any scrap over routes in & around Chester.

As others have suggested, I expect Stagecoach will expand by going for any contracts that come up, such as the DB's. They tried to bolster the local services around Chester when they first took over there, but some of that has been rolled back.

The only other avenue I can think of for Stagecoach would be if Arriva decided to withdraw from any of their depots in the area, which would allow Stagecoach to take on additional routes. Can't see this happening any time soon though.

[MPTE1955]

RE: Stagecoach Chester & Wirral
Don't think either company really wants to get in to a bus war, really isn't a lot of point as neither would win.

[mtl97]

RE: Stagecoach Chester & Wirral
Arriva are struggling to make a profit on 84 thats why they keep trying different vehicles on 84, some years ago arriva service was doubled as there was rumours that first were looking at competing on route, this was when first had chester & pmt Crewe depot was still open, i think if stagecoach would compete it would be on east routes out of chester, more than likely x30 as the x2 would help it on core route, when stagecoach took on 36 gillmoss had a working on it so if you had vehicle issues they could help out,

[iMarkeh]

RE: Stagecoach Chester & Wirral

(12/11/2017 15:56)chester285 Wrote:  You make it sound as if stagecoach aren’t capable of
Handling competition

I know they are capable of it but Chester doesn't have the space and when I say it would be a task and a half, I mean in terms of routes. Anywhere they would want to expand (apart from into Wirral), Arriva is already there so without competing (as others have said, is highly unlikely).

(12/11/2017 20:54)Turbostar19 Wrote:  Personally, I very much doubt that Stagecoach will directly compete against Arriva. Neither company would do well in any scrap over routes in & around Chester.

As others have suggested, I expect Stagecoach will expand by going for any contracts that come up, such as the DB's. They tried to bolster the local services around Chester when they first took over there, but some of that has been rolled back.

The only other avenue I can think of for Stagecoach would be if Arriva decided to withdraw from any of their depots in the area, which would allow Stagecoach to take on additional routes. Can't see this happening any time soon though.

To be fair, the Blacons are a prime example of this already happening. You can't tell which company it is but there is a lot of holding back or going slow to grab the extra passengers then with the Arriva punctuality, that is hitting Stagecoach hard as Arriva run upto 20 minutes late taking almost 2 lots of passengers. Both companies seem to do well though with the competition (odd but true). Arriva won't drop routes at all or expand in Chester really so the chance for either to expand is slim. Part of the reason is no one will trial anything. If they both trialled a few routes, they could make a fortune.

[wirralbus]

RE: Stagecoach Chester & Wirral
The new depot will have room for how many vehicles against the existing depot ?