From the Editor

This issue has been delayed due to domestic issues and I apologise for any disappointment. 

Another interesting issue which I hope everyone enjoys.

In this issue

IMBERBUS 2025

Wycombe Wanderers Matchday Bus Services 2025-2026 season
by Gavin Francis

Keith Briant finds much of interest in Skegness

Interdeck Interlude by Keith Briant

Grahame Wareham on COMS buses that have been numbered 361

Oxford Bus Company Interdecker 76

Derek Taylor reports on Rail Replacement services for Chiltern Trains

Coach Visitors to Oxford

Fleet News and developments

First glimpse of the livery being applied to Red Rose's eVoRa fleet

Andrew Webb in London

Andy Millwood - Greatest gathering Derby

James Allum from Chester le Street

with David Gray

Imberbus | Providing a classic bus service across the Salisbury Plain to the lost village of Imber

The photos were taken at Chippenham, Imber, Gore Cross and Chitterne. 

It was a really well attended event (I had to wait 40 minutes in the queue at Warminster in the morning and there were many in the queue behind me!) but it really is a superbly organized event. Apart from heritage vehicles there were a number of modern vehicles including one of the River Rapids liveried Volvos. 

A most interesting election. Further pictures from Jack Cooper in the next issue. Ed, 

Wycombe Wanderers Matchday Bus Services 2025-2026 season
by Gavin Francis

For the 2025/2026 season WWFC in conjunction with Carousel Buses have introduced 5 Matchday Special Services to bring supporters to the ground.

WW0 from Holiday Inn, Cressex

WW1 Shuttle from The Railway Station and Bus Station

WW2 from Aylesbury via Stoke Mandeville and Princes Risborough

WW3 from Thame via Chinnor, Stokenchurch and West Wycombe

WW4 from Maidenhead and Marlow.

I went to the match on Tuesday evening against Exeter and find some of the buses.

Those used were, 80219, 80221, 80600 and 80620

 
80221 was only showing PRIVATE on the destination which may have proved a bit confusing on the return trip for passengers to find the correct bus.

Overall there seemed to be passengers on each bus so let’s hope the demand is there to continue the services.

 
Tally Ho  and Berry’s Coaches pictures
The Exeter team coach was a Neoplan J19THC from Tally Ho Coaches and the supporter’s coach was a Van Hool K100BCL from Berrys. 

Keith Briant finds much of interest in Skegness

With the warm weather this week, I thought we'd all appreciate a trip to the seaside. Don't forget the sun cream though! 

Skegness may not be the massive holiday destination that it was during the heyday of coach travel, but it's native population of just over 21,000 is doubled every season by it's many caravan parks. Stagecoach East Midlands (and it still says Lincolnshire Road Car Company Ltd on the legal lettering) run highly popular route 1 from Skegness Interchange to Chapel St Leonards. A journey of around 7.5 miles.  

A glance at the route map shows that it passes close to a total of 53 caravan parks. For several decades open top buses have been used during the summer months and these were replaced for the start of the 2024 season by Alexander Dennis Trident hybrid buses with Enviro400 bodies transferred from Stagecoach Manchester. Twelve were refurbished locally by Stagecoach with ten converted to partial open top and two kept as closed top buses. A number of others were moved to Skegness depot for spares.  For the 2025 season they have been joined by two fully open top diesel versions transferred from Stagecoach South West. 

This article illustrates the entire current fleet which are branded as Skegness Seasiders and each carries an individual character livery. All have been given dateless registrations, many of which were used by the pre-Stagecoach Road Car on coaches and then used on each successive open top fleet.  

 
12029 (TIL 7901) Rocky and 12030 (PSU 764) Milly

Rocky isn't demonstrating a new Lincolnshire form of real time monitoring (!), it's passing Skegness' landmark clock tower erected in 1898 to commemorate the diamond jubilee of Queen Victoria. Milly is seen at the outer terminus of the route in Chapel St Leonards. The small village centre has a gift shop which contains second hand books with a small but always interesting transport selection.  

 
12034 (S815 BWC) Sunny and 12036 (DAZ 5455) Sweetie

Sunny carries a registration transferred from a former Stagecoach London Trident, one of the previous batch of Skegness Seasiders. It is seen at Skegness Interchange, the town's bus station which adjoining the railway station. This was originally railway land and sadly the station platforms nearest to the bus stands are long disused. Sweetie is photographed at Chapel St Leonards.  

 
12037 (BLZ 1424) Scoop and 12038 (PSU 443) Salty

These buses were given an extensive refurbishment over the winter of 2023/24 and were gradually released into service from Easter 2024 onwards with a public launch being held. As part of their refurbishment they were fitted with new top deck seating.  

 
12041 (S813 BWC) Sandy and 12045 (PIW 4456) Teddy

Sandy is the other bus to carry a former London Trident registration. Teddy is seen on North Parade, a hive of activity during the summer peak with amusement arcades, takeaways and bars.  

  
12046 (WOI 3002) Shelly and 12047 (BLZ 1423) Candy

Shelley's registration has an unusual history. It was new on Citybus 3002 (WOI 3002) a Leyland B21 with an Alexander Belfast body new in 1981. The Leyland B21 was designed as an export model and only built in small numbers. It was basically a chassis version of the Leyland National. The only ones supplied new to the UK went to Citybus and Ipswich Buses. Both batches were originally licensed as Bristols.  

? No pix    
12048 (IUI 3463) Rolly and 12052 (WOI 3001) Pierre

Rolly is seen passing the Marine Boathouse Bar and I can highly recommend its carvery! Pierre is the other bus to carry a former Leyland B21 registration.  

19106 (MF07 HMF) is one of two similar buses transferred to Skegness this year to boost the open top fleet.

 They are normal diesel and full open top. Formerly with Stagecoach South West, 19106 still carries the branded livery for route 21C between Barnstaple and Croyde in North Devon.  

The other vehicle is 19107 (MF07 HMG) which carries the new slate blue livery.

From a quick scan of Bus Tines, it appears to be the only open top bus so far repainted into the new livery. In the first photo it's seen passing Skegness Pier. When opened in 1881 it was the fourth longest in England, but was sadly shortened several years after a storm in 1978 left the pier head isolated. It was sold in 2021 and the new owners have invested heavily in the structure and have announced plans to rebuild it to its former length.  

A number of other hybrids were transferred to Skegness to provide spares and did not enter service. More recently though, another of the same batch, 12053 (MX60 BVV) was transferred from Manchester after franchising changes and entered service in Magicbus livery.  

Finally, a previous generation Skegness Seasider has been retained by Stagecoach locally for special events.
16314 (IUI 5454) Hettie, is a 1998 Alexander bodied Volvo Olympian new to Stagecoach South as 314 (S314 CCD) . 

Interdeck Interlude by Keith Briant

Having been contributing for a few months now, I've still only managed to provide a photo of one Oxford or Chilterns linked vehicle. This week, I can double it! 

One of my teenage lads has spent a few days in Snowdonia this week with our church youth group. I went to pick him up on Thursday a bit earlier so I could photograph their coach as it arrived back at the church car park, not knowing what it would be. It was a pleasant surprise to discover it was former Oxford 75 (X90 OXD) Volvo B11RT, Plaxton Elite Interdeck. Latterly Go North East 7153 (XL10 NCL), then to Mighty Travel of Birmingham registered OW15 WKC where it was repainted in Megabus livery. Now in unbranded Megabus blue, it was on hire to TNS Travel of Walsall on the day. Photographed in Bedworth, Warwickshire. 

Grahame Wareham on COMS buses that have been numbered 361 

L361  NWL709 1949 AEC Regent III 9612A  with NCB L27/26R Low-bridge body. In 1952 L361 was renumbered L146 and continued in service until March 1963 when it was withdrawn and sold to TPE (dealer), Macclesfield. Later in August 1963 it had passed to Derwent Coaches, Swalwell in October 1963. In August 1964 it was bought by Hoyle (dealer) Wombwell Diesels who later resold it to Parker, Bradford in September 1964.  

361 DFC361D 1966 AEC Renown 3B3RA with Park Royal H37/28F forward entrance low-height body. This batch of AEC Renown's featured a modified cooling system with a coolant header tank under the bonnet with a concealed radiator cap. 361 was allocated to Cowley Road Garage as a country route bus until 1974 when it was re-allocated to Witney depot for RAF Brize Norton school contracts, prior to that 361 had spent a great deal of time off the road awaiting parts and was indeed itself heavily cannibalized between 1971 and 1973 until recertified in late 1973. It received a nice new coat of poppy red paint without ever receiving the intermediate two colour 1970 livery along with 360. 

Before I started work at COMS in 1974 I worked at Prince, Yarnton, full time for a year, mainly working on COMS bus engines under contract. I well remember 361 being towed out to us with so called head gasket problems and that was my task. Upon putting it back together it fared no better and it was found to have the coolant draining into the sump, so off with the cylinder heads again and out with the pistons and liners and liner seals put it all back together with new parts and lo and behold the water was still p****ng into the sump and it was then found that Western Welsh had fitted a rogue engine to it during their part of the recertification job. Now putting an AEC 590 engine into a Renown parked on uneven ground is a big ask so out with the front axle and await a freshly overhauled engine from Cowley Road............only to get a phone call the next day as to when can we deliver the bus back! Needless to say the answer was somewhat short!! 

361 did get its new engine fitted and a couple of my images show it parked up at Blenheim Service Station in Yarnton after a long road test..............usually we liked to put about 50 miles on the clock to make sure the bus was serviceable.

Well 361 went back to Witney depot and continued there until a depot change to Chipping Norton saw it run its final service with COMS in 1978 when it was withdrawn with further mechanical issues. The bus was gradually stripped for spares once again, I claimed the gearbox for spares for our preserved fleet and in October 1978 it was sold to Ensign Bus (dealer) at Grays who immediately sold the remains to Beckett (dealer) Carlton Barnsley for scrap. 

361  R11OXF  Volvo B5LH with Wright Gemini 2 low-height H45/27F body. When new 361 was used mainly on 2 and 5 routes in the City but from March 2021 361 was repainted into a light blue allover light blue 

On 22/12/2023 361 was reregistered.OE62ZRR prior to eventual cascade to Go North West; however the franchising arrangement was altered and 361 became TFGM/Stagecoach 13184 on transfer on 28/2/24. Subsequently the former 361 lost its bright 2 road blue livery in favour of TfGM canary yellow.

Oxford Bus Company Interdecker 76 

In 2015 Oxford Bus introduced a fleet of Plaxton Interdeckers to operate their X90 Oxford to London service.

 
76 pictured in Buckingham Palace Road, Victoria on 22nd November 2016 and again in Headington on 17^th July 2017

The X90 service was withdrawn after January 4^th 2020 and new homes had to be found for the fleet.

 
A small number were moved to Carousel at High Wycombe to operate Rte 102 and given new branding.
Not long afterwards the pandemic struck the service was withdrawn and never reappeared.

It’s next home was Go North-East where it arrived with registration OW15WKD but this was changed to X9XLS. Again it’s time there was short lived and it moved onto East Anglia with Angies Tours and Wrights who had 2 of them.

 
Both coaches wore their Go-North East livery and 78 P31PJO is seen in Windsor Coach Park on Sunday 24^th July  2024,
and Nigel Eadon-Clarke was on Stonham Barns Park on 10^th August this year
where 76 has now been repainted and gained its 4^th livery and 4^th registration mark R25PTS. 

The Arriva X5 history by Tony Bungay - Part 4.