DanNCL
Established Member
TPE upped its service at Chester-le-Street to compensate. Back when TPE were reliable. Not sure exactly when this was, but some point in the early-mid 2010s. XC retained a single stopping service until March 2020, the 17:32 from Newcastle.A point worthy of query you raise. Historically, what reason was given at the time you quote for XC to remove Chester-le-Street from its itinerary and now in 2023, what reasons could be given to cause this aspirational reinstatement by that TOC.
XC could, in theory, resume calling by having Newcastle starting services leave 3 minutes earlier, they’d regain their current paths from Durham. A quick look at Realtimetrains suggests this would be possible, but obviously someone with timetabling experience would be able to more accurately determine that than I could.