- Off-peak evening services on 236/237 to run between Ashton - Glossop;
- 4 hour gap between direct Manchester services in Dukinfield cut to 1 hour 45 minutes;
- 220 Sunday service replaced by 217/218;
- New direct link with Carrbrook and Mossley on Monday - Saturday for Dukinfield (King Street and Boyd’s Walk) residents.
Most often than not, the very two words ’service changes’ fill me with dread. Thankfully not this time.
With the summer season ending in the Peak District, the Tameside area often gets four sets of service changes from Stagecoach alone. In addition to those affecting Manchester routes, Tameside’s are also affected by revisions affecting Glossop and Peak District routes at the beginning of and at the end of the summer season.
For probably the first time ever, the King Street and Boyd’s Walk area of Dukinfield will have a direct link with Mossley on Monday - Saturdays. Between the Albion Hotel and Mossley (Brookbottom), this will augment Speedwell’s 343 service. This is the knock on effect caused by the withdrawal of Mayne’s routes 232 - 235. Mossley passengers travelling into to Manchester by bus will take the 217 in a clockwise direction, with the 218 moving anti-clockwise.
Sunday services on the 220 will be renumbered 217 on journeys to Manchester from Stalybridge and 218 on journeys out of Manchester into Stalybridge and follow the route of the present 218 service. The present 217 Sunday service to Tameside Hospital will see westbound journeys renumbered as the 218.
The Littlemoss and Smallshaw sections of the 232 - 235 routes will be served by an upgraded 231, with a 15 minute daytime frequency between Ashton - Manchester - and buses running every 7/8 minutes in the weekday peaks. This will also replace the whole 230 route operated by Stagecoach.
The revisions also end an embarrassing gap in service provision in Dukinfield where there is at present a 4 hour gap between direct Manchester buses (1515 - 1915 from the Albion Hotel). However, there are some gripes with the changes, in that a more direct link with Tameside Hospital has been severed, and that there is no longer a journey between 0830 and 1012 to Stalybridge from Dukinfield (Albion Hotel).
Though less of a gripe (and of surprise) evening services on the 236/237 will terminate at Ashton, with extra journeys on the 216 taking over. I was also relieved to find that the 236/237 will still run to and from Manchester in the peak hours.
All other services are unaffected, thus meaning the evening 217 (Speedwell), evening 220 and 230 journeys (both First Manchester) will run as normal. The new 217/218 will also augment the extra peak hour journeys on the 220 and 221, also operated by Stagecoach Manchester.
S.V., 03 October 2008.
