'Scene' recently in Loughborough part 1

This small selection of bus images taken recently brings together two brief visits. One at the very end of 2013 and another in the first week in February 2014.

 

Loughborough, a small compact town sits astride the A6 North of Leicester and South of Derby.

 

It is blessed with a wide selection of bus operators who provide a busy and colourful scene.

 

There are a couple of locally based operators.

 

‘Kinchbus’ (Kb), a ‘Wellglade’ group subsidiary has the highest profile.

 

‘Kb’ has a history dating back to 1987 when Gilbert Kinch started trading as GK Kinch. At that time his operation was based in Barrow on Soar.

 

Expansion followed in the 1990’s and in 1998 the company was sold to the ‘Wellglade’ group.

 

Apart from local services in the Loughborough area, longer distance services operate as far as Leicester, Nottingham and Derby.

 

At the time of writing ‘Kb’ operates approximately 30 vehicles.

 

‘Kb’ took 4 Optare Tempo’s and 7 Optare Solo’s in 2007 and both deliveries are represented here.

 

 YJ07 VSV

 

YJ07 EFW

Seen in the dedicated livery of the ‘sprint' service which links the town with the University and the railway station.

FE02 KDZ

Another Solo, came from 'trentbarton's (tb)s main fleet having previously been painted in both fleet and ‘Harlequin’ liveries.

'tb' being another 'Wellglade' group company.

In 2008, 'Kb' took 6 Volvo B7RLE’s with Plaxton Centro bodies for the ‘skylink’ service that links Derby to Loughborough via the East Midland Airport. 

 

These were supplemented by another of the same which came into the fleet when (tb) took over ‘Felix of Stanley’ in January 2012.

 

YN08 CWV

Volvo B7RLE/Plaxton Centro.

 

FJ03 VWM

The route has since been extended to Leicester which necessitated the addition of one of 'tb's Scania L94UB's with Wright Solar Urban bodywork.

 

It is also anticipated that more of them will follow.

 

FJ03 VWM

 

 

X234 WRA

An Optare Excel. Now in the twilight of its career and helping out on Town Service No.11. It still carries the remnants of the old 'tb' fleet livery.

 

 

FJ03 VWN

Other Scania/Wright buses work on service 9 to Nottingham. At one time it worked on 'tb's Rainbow 5 service.

 

Route 9 was originally a ‘Premiere’ travel route that came to ‘Kb’ when ‘Premiere’ ceased to operate in early 2013.

 

 

FJ03 VVP

Another Scania/Wright working for 'Kb'. 

 

The livery it carries is for ‘tb’s  H1 Derby, Heanor and Alfreton service.

 

This bus and others in the same livery have been displaced on the H1 by new Optare Versa’s. See my blog

‘H1 New Shiny Bus’ dated 11/01/14.

Another ‘Wellglade’ group bus in town was,

 

FJ03 VWY

Another Scania L94UB with Wright Solar Urban bodywork working for (tb) on the lengthy ‘skylink’ service from Nottingham via the East Midlands AirportThis vehicle previously worked on and carried the liveries of the ‘Calverton’ and ‘H1’ services.

The other local operator ‘Paul S. Winson’ always operates buses and coaches that are superbly turned out.

 

I have never seen a dirty bus in service.

 

W647 SNA Dennis Trident 2 with East Lancs Lolyne bodywork came from ‘Nottingham City Transport’.

W563 RSG

A Dennis Trident with Plaxton President bodywork that was previously operated by ‘Lothian Buses’.

XX12 PSW and XX13 PSW PSW

ADL Enviro 200’s, Both purchased at the same time. 

 

The company makes regular use of PSW suffixed registrations.

 

'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.

The Steeple Grange Light Railway

An evening visit to

The Steeple Grange Light Railway (SGLR)

 

I was fortunate recently to be able to attend a ‘Transpire’ (The Chesterfield Bus Society) 
visit organized by Shayne Howarth to the SGLR.

 

The railway is located on the outskirts of Wirksworth in Derbyshire and alongside the High Peak Trail to which there is direct access.

 

Living locally, I decided to forego going to Chesterfield for the bus ride there. I immediately regretted my decision when I saw the groups choice of transport.

 

This turned out to be FJC 736F. One of only two Dennis Pax buses specially built for Llandudno UDC in 1968 and I think the only one to survive. They were for services up the Great Orme and to St. Tudno’s church. 

 

They replaced two Fodens with Metalcraft bodies built in 1951 

 

I apologise for the poor quality of this image but I had a choice between this and getting run over !!!

I have perhaps gone overboard with the images of the bus but I have done so because of its rarity.

 

It also brings back memories of riding on it in Llandudno in 1968 or ’69 when it the had a cream top half to go with the blue lower half.

 

 

 

The SGLR is built to a gauge of 1 foot 6 inches and runs on the trackbed of what was a standard gauge line running from the Steeple House Junction on The Cromford and High Peak Railway up what is known as the ‘Killers’ branch. The name derives from the brothers who owned it and not to anything more sinister.

 

The C&HPR line dates from 1830 when horses provided the traction whilst the SGLR dates from 1985.

 

A lot of the loco’s and rolling stock come from an industrial background, most having worked in quarries, mines and factories etc.

 

The ‘centre’ of operations is this sturdily built stone engine house which provides cover and accomodation for some of the loco’s and their crews.

 

To the rear is a paved area with a heavy duty hoist and access to the right of the image to a two track traverser which allows loco’s to be securely stored in a modern container in what appropriately were old standard gauge railway vans.

 There were two trains in service.

 

The first of which took the members assembled up the branch in the direction of Middleton to its current end at a little over half a mile distant.

 

This comprised this Ruston and Hornsby built 4 wheel diesel loco dating from 1957 coupled to two former NCB ‘manriders; which came from Bevercotes colliery in Nottinghamshire. The ‘manriders’ were originally built to a gauge of 2 feet 3 inches so they both needed to be re-gauged.

 The Ruston, named ‘Horwich’ was built for and named after the British Railways works in Lancashire where it worked. It then resided in a museum at Blaenau Ffestiniog from where it was purchased in 1997. 

The second which runs to the Steeple house quarry was comprised of two four seat ‘manriders’ hauled by ‘Greenbat’.

The manriders came from the Ladywash Mine at Eyam in Derbyshire.

 Greenbat was built in 1960 by Greenwood and Batley and is a 5 H.P. battery electric that spent most of its earlier working life in factories.

 Here we can see ‘Greenbat about to take the branch off to the left to Steeple house quarry. The quarry has been designated as a ‘Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) because of the fossils dating back millions of years that can be seen.

 

 The track as it wends its way through the woods in typically delightful narrow gauge style.

 

 The end of the line in the quarry. If the first barrier fails to stop you, the second one certainly will.

 

As the main line ascends towards its present terminus on the way to Middleton, it passes what is known as Dark quarry where the railway has built a shed which accomodates various items of rolling stock.

 

And finally, a footnote (sorry about that). 

 

Is this the shortest temporary platform on any UK railway ??

 

Conclusions then. 

 

A excellent outing made even better by the very obliging and welcoming ‘crew’ at the SGLR. 

Combined with perhaps a visit to the Ecclesbourne Valley Railway and/or the nearby National Stone Centre it would make a good day out for those who have to travel further than I did.

Further images of the SGLR are here  Flickr