From the Editor

An interesting issue with nearly 250 pictures and plenty of news around our region..

I include some news of our local fleet with new buses here and imminent recorded.

I now intend taking a two week break and the next issue will be after Sunday, September 28th but do still send your contributions to me please.

In this issue

Catford Open Day and running day on the 54 by Andrew Webb

Midland Interlude from Keith Briant

Obituary of Michael Dryhurst

Grahame WAreham remembers COMS 364

A Moots gem from Paul Bateson

All change in Swindon from Jack Cooper

Michael Wadman visited the Oxford Bus Museum

Picture links from Thomas Walker-Werth

Readers Write

Coach visitor to Oxford by David Beynon

Fleet News & Developments

 

Catford Open Day by Andrew Webb

Catford garage celebrated its 111th birthday with an open day on 13 September.  Opened in 1914 by London General Omnibus Company, it is now part of the Stagecoach London operation.

A feature of Stagecoach open days has been unveiling a bus in a special livery.  Catford's choice is the appropriately numbered 11011 which has been turned out in a livery reminiscent of London in the late 1980s / early 1990s and named 'Selkent Envoy'.  It's position in the garage, along with many people getting on and off, meant photographing it was a challenge.

The Stagecoach open days raise significant sums for Macmillan Cancer Research.  Previously featured on this page,
the latest bus to carry the distinctive green livery was on display, now re registered with a former Routemaster number plate.

  
Previous generations of buses were remembered with various preserved buses on display including L97 and DM1002.

... and Route 54 running day

To compliment the Catford garage open day London Bus Museum arranged for heritage vehicles to operate over route 54 which passes the site enroute from Elmers End Green to Blackheath Royal Standard.  

 
Oldest bus in use was RT1 dating from 1939. 

Only 6 years younger is G351 which entered service in 1945.

 
Routemasters are a staple of running days as illustrated by RML903 and RMC1469.

Another pioneer to take to the road was DMS1, itself now over 50 years old.

 
The DMS class was replaced in part by the Titan.  T961 represented the type at the running day.

 
Several small batched of vehicles were tried by London Transport as replacements for the Titan
and its contemporary competitor the MCW Metrobus. 
This included a small batch of front engined Volvo Ailsa's.  V1 is a preserved example.

 
The Leyland National found favour across the country with NBC fleets and eventually found a role with London Transport.
LS30 provides a reminder of how the class looked when in everyday service.

Leyland Tiger WPH135Y hides its London pedigree well . 

Originally delivered to London Country in 1982 with an ECW body for Greenline services it later gained an East Lancs body and found its way to operate with Hedingham in East Anglia.

 
A more recognisable representative of the London Country fleet was RF600.

 
Chaseside is a relatively new operator focussed on rail replacement using a fleet of former London vehicles repainted
into this attractive blue livery and reregistered with 'CSP' number plates. 
V77CSP started life as ENL43 in the Arriva London fleet and has gained a pair of substantial air horns on the roof.

 
Another operator specialising in rail replacement is Replacement Bus Hire. 
This former London United Citaro is now in the fleet and turned out on the running day.

A great report. Ed.

Midland Interlude from Keith Briant

This issue seemed a good time to focus on Centrebus as they've now returned to the Hinckley area for the first time since 2013.  

On 27 August service LC6 was launched linking Hinckley with Coalville. It's a Leicestershire County Council cntract covering a route that last operated in February 2023 as Roberts Travel Group 159 before funding was withdrawn. See Roger French's blog on this link :

https://busandtrainuser.com/2023/02/09/bus-cuts-back-in-the-news/

 

Almost new Optare Solo 3005 (YJ25 EFA) has been the regular bus. Here it is on day 4 of the service in the village of Stapleton working the first journey of the day to Hinckley.  The village has seen a small revival of fortunes in the last couple of months with the reinstatement of its only bus service and the reopening of the only village pub, seen here, after several months of closure.  

The Optare Solo surprisingly re-entered production after a large order was placed by Stagecoach for the diesel engined variety in 2023 and smaller add-on orders were then placed by other operators. With the demise of Switch in the UK (who kept the Optare name only for diesel buses), these are likely to be the last.  

 

Centrebus have operated in Leicester for a couple of decades with a small network of city and country services, both commercial and tendered. Here Volvo B8RLE/MCV eVoRa 643 (BV73 MKC) in the latest livery and Enviro200 543 (YX63 ZVU) in the previous scheme are seen on the 10 minute frequency service to Evington. The latter bus is now with Centrebus subsidiary Chaserider at Cannock.  

   

Leicester has been praised for the strength of it's bus partnership introduced by Leicester City Council in conjunction with the key operators. This has seen most vehicles used on city services either delivered new or repainted into a common green livery branded as Leicester Buses, with differing additional embellishments depending on the operator. (Does anyone else think it's the same shade used by Flixbus?!) There has been some small scale service renumbering to ensure route numbers aren't duplicated. Centrebus operates the 40N and 40S, north and south orbitals; the Hospital Hoppa and the Hop!, a city centre circular service with green liveried Yutong electrics. In the first photo, Yuntong E10 850 (YD72 FFU) passes an E12 model acquired in 2022 from Roberts Travel Group  - 824 (YD21 FFR).  The second and third photos show the Yutong E9s used on the city centre service - the Hop!  These actually make an audible croaking sound as they travel through pedestrianised areas! The batch is 840-2 (YD23 FML/M/O) with 23 seat dual door bodies. 841 is seen here.  

Centrebus Holdings came into existence after the company entered into a joint partnership with Arriva to purchase the Stagecoach operations in Huddersfield. This took place in May 2008. In August 2008, Arriva's Hinckley depot was transferred to the new company and then in the following month, Centrebus Holdings purchased the bus operations of Woods Coaches in Leicester. Despite the common name and livery, Centrebus Holdings was a separate company with a 56% holding by the Centrebus directors, led by Julian Peddle and 44% owned by Arriva.  

   

In the next photo taken pre-takeover, Arriva Mercedes-Benz Vario 1172 (R768 DUB), new to West Riding and then Centrebus 386 (FN56 CZS) an Optare Solo M850SL new to the company are seen.  Both are in Nuneaton on my local service. A small number of former West Midlands Travel MCW Metrobuses were based at Hinckley as well, primarily for schools work. 819 (A719 UOE) and 831 (B831 AOP) are seen at the depot. 386 passed to Arriva when they purchased the Centrebus shareholding in 2013. They rebranded the Huddersfield operation as Yorkshire Tiger and Hinckley became Hinckley Bus.  

Hinckley Bus used an overall red livery. A mixed selection of Dennis Darts were transferred in to replace the Mercedes-Benz Varios which were not repainted. After takeover, the legal title of the company remained as Centrebus Holdings Ltd. The Hinckleybus website is still viewable on-line together with most of their timetables! Centrebus Vario 445 (YN54 WCO) was a late model example aquired from the Woods operation and similar post Arriva takeover 1909 (R149 UAL) is seen with Hinckleybus vinyls added. This bus was new to Midland Fox.  

   

Repainted buses were given a vibrant shade of red, although others aquired from London and Arriva's Wardle operation which had also adopted red, retained their original shades. Here 2569 (FN56 BWV), formerly Centrebus 384, another slimline Solo shows the Hinckleybus shade of red. 2169 (LF52 URN) is a former Arriva London Dennis Dart SLF with Plaxton bodywork and more unusually, 2204 (RN52 EYH) a Dennis Dart SLF with SCC bodywork. New to Linkline, Harlesden, it came to Hinckley from Arriva's Staffordshire based Wardle Transport subsidiary in this London based livery which was adopted for Wardle. Eventually Yorkshire Tiger was sold to Transdev Blazefield and is now Team Pennine and Hinckley Bus merged into the main Arriva Midlands organisation. (The Arriva/Wardle/Centrebus story is too lengthy for this article!) 

I began this piece by commenting on the final Optare Solos. Centerbus Holdings also later ran some of the first Optare Solos when they aquired some of the first production batch from Wilts & Dorset. The latter had a very close relationship with Optare in the 1990's and ordered 85 Solos off the drawing board which was the encouragement Optare needed to put the model into production. After the building of 2 demonstrators, the next 85 produced were those for Wilts & Dorset. One of those purchased by Centrebus Holdings for use in Huddersfield was 341 (R606 NFX). This had chassis number VN6009, the ninth to be built. It is also seen here in Salisbury having been repainted into the first livery introduced by Go Ahead before the Salisbury Reds rebranding.  

Please allow me a little indulgence here, but this isn't a total sidetrack! I have a particular interest in these as I was invited to their launch in Salisbury which took place on 26 August 1998. Wilts & Dorset took over the city's market place to launch the conversion of the entire city network to low floor, the first such complete conversion in the UK. 16 Optare Solos and 3 Optare Spectras entered service the following week. Most of these Solos with S-JRU registrations (except one I think, as it had been fitted with seatbelts so was retained) were later sold to Centrebus Holdings. This photo was taken by Wilts & Dorset's Richard Weaver from the roof of Salisbury's grand Guildhall building and I have an enlarged copy in my collection. It was also used on the Salisbury Reds Facebook page this week to mark the anniversary. 

Next issue, keeping it Hinckley, I'll focus on the X6 Coventry-Hinckley- Leicester express service which has recently had it's PVR increased. I'll also throw in an historical Oxford link! 

Obituary - Michael Dryhurst

with notes by Paul Bateson

Michael Dryhurst has passed away.  He was well known as an early bus preservationist when he bought FUF 63 (I think that was the number) back in the early 1960s.  He wrote several books, was a film director, contributed to Buses and Classic Buses and even contributed to BBA.  I met him back in 1996 when he visited Brampton Transit to see our Leyland Olympian.

 More recently, he had arranged with Alastair for the scanning and enhancing of his photographs.  Alastair has probably enhanced close to a thousand pictures for Michael. 

Here is a link to his obituary. 

Michael John Dryhurst Obituary (2025) - Hot Springs Village, AR - Caruth Village Funeral Home 

Grahame Wareham remembers COMS buses that have carried the fleet number 364. 

L364  NWL712 1949 AEC Regent III with NCB L30/26R lowbridge body. L364 was renumbered L138 in the new divided number series in 1952.  L138 spent its life at most of the country depots to the west of the City and was withdrawn in January 1963. It was subsequently sold to Transport (Passenger Equipment) Ltd, Macclesfield  (dealer) in March 1963. It was sold on to Homer & Jones, Quarry Bank in November 1963 and lasted with them until September 1965 when it was scrapped along with sister bus ex.L137 NWL711.. 

   

364  DFC364D 1966 AEC Renown 3B3RA with Park Royal H38/27F forward entrance low-height body. 364 spent its early life as a Oxford Cowley Road based bus used on City routes. It was an early withdrawal in 1973 and one of the four not selected for recertification and never received the OMO conversion. It was sold to Transport (Passenger Equipment) Ltd, Macclesfield (dealer) in October 1973. It was later exported to Tolley, Scott and Tolley, Melbourne, New South Wales (O-AUS) as a mobile wine-tasting unit in November 1974, joining ex. COMS Bridgemaster 307MFC, and re-registered ICZ 051. It was later noted in use as a mobile camper at Mossman, North Queensland re-registered STX.041 (Victorian registration) by May 1989.

     

364  V14OXF  2013 Volvo B5LH with Wright Eclipse Gemini 2 low-height H45/27F body. It featured  Volvo parallel hybrid technology using battery power when available to move the bus up until the first gear change into second gear where the engine automatically starts and the bus proceeds as a normal diesel bus. 364 was originally delivered in red City livery and operated mostly on service 2. In 2018 it received a white based colourbus  advert for Homestart, a charity which looks after the needs of young children. The graphics are red based. It carried this scheme until February 2024 when it was despatched to Stagecoach Manchester to run the franchised services on behalf of Transport for Greater Manchester becoming 13188 in that fleet, It was reregistered OE62ZRX prior to departure and has since been repainted in the TFGM canary yellow. 

   
   

and also some other pictures from the past.

 
The heyday of the Citaro taken in 2007.

Another excellent memory. Ed. 

from Paul Bateson

MOTTS COACHES VWG408 in MAIDENHEAD BUS STATION on 31st October 1974

All change in Swindon from Jack Cooper

On a visit to Swindon Jack recorded a Pictureview of the old and new.

     
     
     
     
     
These pictures will evoke memories, especially in the future.

The bus station closed after the last bus departed 30th August,

 The new "bus boarding area has been created in Fleming Way.

     
     
     
     

From a personal view I cannot say I like the new even though the old is looking past its sell by date. Ed. 

Metrobus Open Day at Crawley on September 6th by Jack Cooper