'Scene' in a sunny Edinburgh 2013 Part 4 of 4

My son Andrew and his wife Joy recently had a short holiday in Edinburgh. Knowing of my weakness for buses they kindly brought me back a variety of images. Joy quite got into it. Nipping in and out of the traffic whilst Andrew was more laid back settling himself on Princess Street with a couple of cans of I’rn Bru. Their combined efforts are pictured herewith, the words are mine.

Whilst LB are the dominant operator in Edinburgh, there are others.

 

‘First’ group have a strong presence and are represented here by.

 

LT02 ZCE 

A Dennis Trident with Plaxton President bodywork. Cascaded from ‘First London’. Whoever replaced the second door made an excellent job of it.

 

YM52 UVS

A Scania L94UB with Wright’s Solar body had a spell in Lancashire with ‘First Oldham’ before coming to Scotland where it also worked in Larbert.

 

CU05 LGK

A Volvo B7R with Plaxton Profile bodywork at one time worked for ‘First Cymru’ in Swansea in the full ‘First’ barbie coach livery. Now resident in Edinburgh.

 

SN08 BZA An Optare Solo SR owned by LB in a dedicated Standard Life (Insurance) (SL) livery. Route 61 on which it operates, at one time was provided as a free shuttle service around its different Edinburgh locations for SL employees only.

 

The route was opened up to the public who have to pay a fare whereas it still remains free for SL employees. I wonder how the Taxman sorts that one out.

 

SV55 FKL A Volvo B7R with Plaxton Profile Interurban bodywork is based at Stagecoach Western’s Dumfries depot and is seen working the service 100 from Moffatt which lies 60 Miles to the South.

 

LSK 879 A Volvo B13R with Plaxton Panther 2 bodywork shown being operated by  

‘Parks of Hamilton’ in Scottish ‘citylink’ livery. The M 91 route on which it is operating runs from Inverness to Edinburgh via Perth.

 

 

SF62 CPU Another winner from Plaxton with the ‘Elite i’ bodied Volvo B11R chassis which was new in February this year. I had a look around and inside of one of these vehicles at the Euro Bus Expo 2012 at the NEC last year and they really are impressive. It is operating on megabus.com’s route 900 which is the Glasgow-Edinburgh shuttle that it runs jointly with Scottish ‘citylink’.

 

No visit to Edinburgh would be complete without a ride on an open top bus. No matter which of these open toppers you chose to ride on despite the varying liveries and vintages, you would still be riding with LB.

V513 ESC built in 1999 and VLT 143 built in 1959 are separated by 40 years.

 

V513 ESC being a Plaxton President bodied Dennis Trident and of course VLT 143 is an AEC Routemaster and was RM 143 in its London days.

 

 

 

The Trident is one of five former main fleet vehicles painted in the ‘Edinburgh World Heritage Tour’ livery while the RM is one of ten RM’s together with two RCL’s in the fleet.

 

 

 

T503 SSG is another Lothian vehicle under the paint being an Alexander ALX 400 bodied Dennis Trident. The batch of buses that this was part of were amongst the first low floor deckers in service with Lothian.

 

 

VLT 143 once more.

 

'scene' in a sunny Edinburgh 2013 part 3

Like many other major operator’s, ‘LB’ are trying to reduce both their costs and carbon footprint by using vehicles with propulsion systems that offer alternatives to diesels. 

 

SN11 EES

is an Alexander Dennis 400 Hybrid which is described as a “diesel-electric parallel hybrid”. 

 

The use of white in the livery is replaced with what is described as a light silver/gold and the vehicles carry ecoLothian buses.com fleetnames.

 

Single deck hybrids also have their place in the fleet.  

SN13 BDV 

This bus first appeared in a livery where the ‘weinrot’ was replaced by a bright green as if to underline its green credentials but it was rapidly replaced to bring it in line with the rest of the fleet.

SNO9 CUX

As is quite common in other fleets, route branding is used. this Volvo 9TL with Wright’s Gemini body serves Clerwood through Seton Sands to Tranent.

 

SN09 CVK

Another Wright Gemini bodied Volvo 9TL carries ‘22 connect’ branding which serves Gyle Centre through to the Ocean terminal at Leith where as its advertising panel shows it meets up with the former Royal Yacht Britannia.

'Scene' in a sunny Edinburgh 2013 part 2

By 2010, the whole fleet was ‘low floor’ so the need for a distinguishing livery was no longer needed.

 

SN08 BWY another Volvo B9TL with Wright Gemini body and SK52 OJL a Dennis Dart with Plaxton ‘Super Pointer’ body show off the ‘new’ livery which uses ‘wein rot’ (which translates from the German as red wine) instead of madder and white with the addition of gold. The ‘Super Pointer’ is super insofar as it is built to a length of 11.3 metres whereas the ‘standard’ Dart is 10.7 metres long

 

A very attractive livery in my view in which the style of the application of the colour dates back to an earlier age. Anyone who can remember Kingston upon Hull’s ‘streamlined’ livery will know what I mean.

Other buses appearing in current fleet livery were SK52 OJH another Super Pointer Dart

SN04 AAK a Transbus Trident with Plaxton President Bodywork

 

'Scene' in a sunny Edinburgh 2013 Part 1

 

My son Andrew and his wife Joy recently had a short holiday in Edinburgh. Knowing of my weakness for buses they kindly brought me back a variety of images. Joy quite got into it. Nipping in and out of the traffic whilst Andrew was more laid back settling himself on Princess Street with a couple of cans of I’rn Bru. Their combined efforts are pictured herewith, the words are mine.

 

The main operator in Edinburgh is Lothian Buses plc (LB). LB has its origins in the Edinburgh Street Tramways Company of 1871. Edinburgh City Council took over the operation in1919 becoming Edinburgh Corporation Tramways Department (ECTD). The first buses joined the fleet in 1919 and the things continued much as before until the tramway was finally abandoned in 1956 when ECTD became Edinburgh Corporation Transport (ECT). 

 

In 1975, following local government re-organization in Scotland. The ownership of ECT passed to Lothian Regional Council Department of Public Transport and so Lothian Regional Transport came into being (LRT).

 

In 1996 the Lothian Council was abolished and after some political manoeuvring LRT became LB in January 2000. 

 

For as long as I can remember, the fleet livery has been based on Madder (a deep red)

and White applied traditionally in bands of block colours. I have also seen this described as Plum and Spilt Milk but as is the case these days nothing stays the same for long.

 

In 1999, LB introduced the ’Harlequin’ livery which still used Madder and white. This was to advise intending passengers that  buses so painted were low floor and could accept mobility limited passengers. An earlier version that used smaller diamonds was replaced with this simplified version.

 

 SN04 ABK

A Transbus Trident with Plaxton’s President bodywork threads its way through roadworks which are part of the building work taking place to provide Edinburgh with a tramway system.

SN04 ABX

Another Trident/Plaxton President combination shows the offside livery to good effect.

 

SN08 BWO

A Volvo B9TL carries Wright’s Gemini bodywork in the same livery. This combination of chassis and body has been LB’s ‘standard’ choice since 2007.