'Scene' in Bury Bus station

Bury is a very interesting place for transport enthusiasts not only because of its bus station which forms part of Bury Transport Interchange which also includes the terminus of the Tramway line to Manchester city centre.

 

If that is not enough, there is also the preserved ‘East Lancashire Railway’ that runs North to Rawtenstall and Ramsbottom. This being based at Bolton Street station which is barely 5 minutes walk from the Interchange.

 

I will deal with the ‘rails’ connection in Bury in a later ‘blog’. So to the buses.

 

MX06 VMZ

A Volvo B7RLE with Wright Eclipse Urban bodywork belonging to ‘First Manchester’. It is seen in the livery formerly applied to ‘Ramsbottom Urban District Council’ (RUDC) colours.

 

Like many other operators, the years 2013 and 2014 have brought up the 100 years of operation and again pleasingly, the operator has seen fit to reproduce a ‘heritage’ livery.

 

Call me old fashioned but I personally prefer this ‘elegant’ style of livery to the swoops and swirls of more recent liveries.

 

 

Speaking of which....!

 

YJ61 JDZ

An Optare Solo diesel electric hybrid owned by ‘Greater Manchester Integrated Transport’ but operated by ‘First Manchester’ (FM).

 

YN05 GYG

A Scania N94UA with Scania Omnicity AB58D bodywork in ‘FM’ livery. I think this is the first Omnicity artic. that I have come across.

 

W332 RJA

 

A Mercedes-Benz (M-B) 0.530 Citaro carrying ‘FM’s rapidly disappearing ‘barbie’ livery.

 

I notice in the press that M-B have just produced their 40,000th. Citaro.

 

W735 DWA 

A Volvo B7TL with Alexander ALX400 bodywork with ‘FM’. It previously worked for ‘First South Yorkshire’ based in Rotherham.

 

 

MX07 BUH

A Volvo B9TL with Wright Eclipse Gemini bodywork again with ‘FM’.

The other major operator in Bury is ‘Rossendale Transport’ (RT) who are currently going through a re branding and re liverying process. 

 

The operator appears in ‘Buses’ magazine for June 2014 on page 38 in an excellent article written by David Barrow.

 

LK51 XGX

A Volvo B7TL with Plaxton President bodywork. It previously worked for ‘Metroline’ in London as its VPL 227.

 

YN06 NXV

 

A Scania L94UD with Wright bodywork which was previously No. 1026 in the ‘Reading Transport’ fleet.

 

FJ57 CYX

A Volvo B7RLE with Wright Eclipse Urban bodywork wearing a hybrid livery. It previously worked in the area for ‘First Manchester’.

 

PN52 WWR

A Dennis Dart with East Lancs Spryte bodywork. Wearing the previous ‘RT’ livery which dates from the mid1990’s.

 

 YJ05 JWD

An Optare Solo in the same livery.

 

PF51 KMV

Another Dart/ELC Spryte combination of ‘RT’.

 

Bolton Buses 2

The second of a 2 parter covering Bolton such was the variety on display.

 

YJ60 KAA

An Optare Tempo working for ‘Transdev’ subsidiary ‘Lancashire United’. The first of a batch of eight which are all based at Intack depot in Blackburn.

 

The original company of ‘Lancashire United Transport’, dates back to 1905 and was at that time a tram operator. Eventually moving on to buses it disappeared into ‘Greater Manchester PTE’ in 1976 at which time it was the largest independent operator in the UK.

 

The modern ‘Lancashire United came out of a deal where ‘Stagecoach’ sold its East Lancashire services to ‘Blazefield’ who separated out the Blackburn, Bolton, Clitheroe and Hyndburn services into the new company with the ‘old’ name.

 

‘Blazefield was bought out by ‘Transdev’ in 2006.

 

X573 YUG

A Volvo B10BLE with Wright Renown bodywork in ‘Transdev’ subsidiary ‘Hyndburn’ livery.

 

Hyndburn Borough Council operated buses in Accrington and sold out to ‘Stagecoach’ in 1996.

 

YJ12 GXF

An Optare Solo M810 Hybrid operated by ‘COMFYBUS’ who operate widely across Lancashire. I have seen them in both Liverpool and Southport also.

 

The two buses immediately below are operated by ‘Tyrers’ of Adlington. The standard of finish on these two elderly, second hand buses has to be seen to be believed. They are superb.

 

Both were ferrying football fans to ‘Bolton Wanderers’ ground at the Reebok stadium.

 

X596 USC

A Dennis Trident with Plaxton President bodywork.It was formerly in the ‘Lothian Buses’ fleet.

R477 RRA

A Volvo Olympian with East Lancs bodywork. New to ‘Nottingham City Transport’. It had a spell with ‘Go-Ahead’ group company ‘Go North East’.

 

X131 JCW

A Dennis Dart SLF with Plaxton Super Pointer bodywork. Operated by ‘Rossendale Transport (RT) in the new (2014) ‘Rosso’ livery.

 

An excellent article about ‘RT’ by David Barrow appeared in ‘Buses’ magazine for June 2014 on page 38.

 

YJ54 UXV

An Optare Slimline Solo again in ‘RT’s new livery,

 

‘South Lancs Transport’ (SLT) of Atherton, Greater Manchester has its origins in a company called ‘Green Triangle Transport’. Expansion and the takeover of rival ‘Bellairs & Dootson in 1999 led to the adoption of the current name.

 

Further expansion combining commercial work with contracted services for ‘Greater Manchester PTE’ has seen the fleet strength grow to over 50 buses.

 

T700 SLT

An Optare Tempo.

 

MX58 ACF

An Optare Solo. it previously worked for Sheffield Community Transport in ‘Travel South Yorkshire’ livery.

 

 

S600 SLT

A Scania CK230UB Omnilink. Of the current fleet. Approximately half carry registration with the ‘SLT’ suffix.

 

M88 SLT

A Dennis Dart SLF with Plaxton Pointer 2 bodywork.

 

I like this type of operator. Five buses in an hour, ALL different.

 

YJ11 ENU An Optare Diesel-Electric Hybrid Versa.

 

Owned by ‘Transport for Greater Manchester’ it was used with 3 others on a ‘Salford Quayslink’ service operated by ‘Maytree Travel’. That ceased in 2012.

 

Here seen operating for ‘SLT’ on the Bolton town centre ‘Metroshuttle 500’ service.The bus at one time carried ‘Metro Shuttle’ branding between the wheels.

 

Bolton Buses 1

The first of a 2 parter covering Bolton such was the variety on display. The bus station, although it only dates from the 1980’s is a bit old fashioned but it serves its purpose.

The major operator is ‘First Manchester’ (FM) which has a history dating back to the days of Manchester and Bolton Corporation Transport departments. This leads me nicely into the first image which is that of.

 

MX06 VOP

 

A Wright bodied Volvo B7RLE which although owned by 'FM' carries the Bolton livery of 50 years ago and doesn’t it look good.

 

MX58 DYS

 

A Volvo B9TL with Wright Eclipse Gemini bodywork working for ‘First Manchester’.

 

I think that this is the first (no pun intended) time I have seen the ‘Alexander Dennis Ltd’ (ADL) Enviro 400 body in a ‘First’ group fleet and although I do not care for the livery, it suits the E400 better than it does some others.

 

SN12 AGX

However, parked alongside was this ‘tired’ looking bus which although it was clean did rather spoil the effect of the shiny new buses around it.

 

T905 KLF

 

A Volvo Olympian with Northern Counties Palatine bodywork which spent much of its working life with ‘First’ in South Yorkshire.

 

I can just imagine the look of glee on the Fleet Engineers face as he despatched it over the Pennines....!

 

I think another first for me is an Enviro 300 in a ‘First’ fleet.

 

SN13 CJV

‘First Manchester’s fleet list gives the details as being. ‘Alexander Dennis Trident E30D’ with Alexander Dennis Enviro 300 bodywork. 

 

I do not know wether the Trident bit is correct. Should anyone out there be able to confirm or deny that, I would be obliged.

 

BD11 CEN

A Volvo B7RLE with Wright Eclipse Urban 2 bodywork again with ‘First Manchester’.

 

Y36 KNB

A DAF SB220GS with Ikarus Polaris bodywork is an unusual beast working for ‘Arriva North West’.

 

 

 

MF52 LYY

 

A MAN 14.220 with ELC Myllenium bodywork.

 

At one time operated in ‘Blue Bus’ livery with ‘Arriva’ titles. ‘Blue Bus Bolton’ having been acquired by ‘Arriva’ in 2005.

 

CX58 EUP

A VDL SB200CS with Wright Pulsar bodywork.

 

I was starting to suffer from ‘Stagecoach’ starvation not having seen any of ‘Sir Brian’s fleet for quite a long time. However although there were not many, there were some.

 

PX59 CTF

A Scania N94UD with Alexander Dennis Ltd (ADL) Enviro 400 bodywork working for ‘Stagecoach Merseyside  & South Lancashire’ based in Chorley. 

 

The branding carried is for the ‘Urban Connect’ route 125 from Preston to Bolton.

 

YJ61 JGO

A Optare Versa Diesel Electric Hybrid.

 

Working for ‘Stagecoach in Manchester’ (SiM) as its No. 25347 but intriguingly used to work in the same livery for ‘First Manchester’ as its No. 49123.

 

It would seem that the bus is owned by the ‘Greater Manchester Integrated Transport Authority’ and for whatever reason they have moved it around the local operators.

 

 

MX62 LTN

A Dennis Enviro 300 with Alexander Enviro 300 bodywork (The wording is EXACTLY what ‘Stagecoach’s fleet list says) working for ‘SiM’ out of Wigan depot.

‘Scene’ in Derby on ‘citylink’ on 27 July 2014

What was ‘scene’ in Derby today was the demise of ‘yourbus’ (yb) ‘citylink’ service on the direct Derby to Nottingham route. 

 

It had started on the 18th. of February 2013 challenging ‘trentbarton’ (tb) and the long established ‘red arrow’ service matching the six departures between Derby and Nottingham an hour.

 

Operated with low floor Mercedes-Benz Citaro’s. It seemed that ‘yb’ would entice many of ‘tb’s passengers that suffered from some form of disability or members of the baby buggy generation that sometimes struggled with ‘tb’s fleet of high floor coaches.

 

At that time, writing for the ‘Focus Transport’ website I said,

 

 “trentbarton are not known for giving way easily, if at all. It will be very interesting in the coming weeks to see if, how and when they respond”.

 

To my eyes, there was little response. The odd fare deal maybe but ‘tb’s coaches came and went pretty much as they always had. There were more low floor Scania’s, the odd Volvo and the occasional Optare Solo turned up in service but that may have been because of operational necessity. It didn’t seemed to be planned.

 

‘tb’s passenger numbers seemed to hold up while ‘yb’s never seemed to take off. 

 

It was interesting to watch the comings and goings of passengers in Derby bus station where the departure bays for ‘tb’ and ‘yb’ were adjacent to each other.

 

One day about a year ago, I watched a young woman with a double buggy, two small children and several bags of shopping make three journeys up the steps to put the children and the shopping onto a ‘tb’ coach and then to fold her buggy and put it in the luggage locker. At the next bay stood an almost empty ‘yb’ Citaro onto which she could have just walked without breaking stride.

 

I realised then that ‘yb’ were facing an up hill battle which was not helped when they reduced the frequency of the service to every 20 minutes.

 

It is hard to say where ‘yb’ went wrong. There was plenty of publicity, there were new buses. The drivers were helpful and courteous.

 

Would it have been better to start small and build the operation, Who knows?

‘yb’ might have fared better if they had extended the service North from Derby via Ripley and Alfreton to Chesterfield as ‘tb’ have always done. A lot of passengers travel to and from destinations along that corridor and anyone making the through journey to or from Nottingham were never likely to break their journey in Derby just to travel with ‘yb’.

 

I suspect that at the end of the day people are creatures of habit and the habit for years has been to use the ‘red arrow’.

 

There was the odd time that a ‘citylink’ branded bus turned up on another route and sadly during the last few weeks, buses ran without any branding at all.

 

In the past year or so ‘yb’ have expanded to operate many other routes in the East Midlands, It will be very interesting to see what their next moves are.

 

In the meantime, enjoy the images, for after today, they are a part of history.

Further photos can be seen on my Flickr 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

‘ Scene’ in Nottingham, Heanor and Ripley today Saturday 26th. July 2014

This week has seen the launch of the new ‘trentbarton’ ‘rainbow1 and ‘rapid 1’ Optare Versa buses to the public (see my yesterday’s blog). 

 

Today saw them launched into service.

 

The plan it seems was to start the day much as usual and gradually replace the Wright bodied Scanias and Volvo’s that have given such excellent service down the years during the course of the day. 

 

All the images in this blog have been taken today so we start with a last look at how it used to be.

 

The rainbow 1 livery has always been a darker shade of blue than the rapid 1.

 

FN04 HSG

 

FJ09 BXE

 

I was lucky enough to catch old and new together in Nottingham’s Victoria Bus Station where YJ14 BTE is passing one of the rapid 1 Volvos.

 

It is also interesting to note that ‘rainbow 1’ and ‘rapid 1’ have now become ‘rainbow one’ and 'rapid one’.

 

Later in the day in Heanor we see FN54 AEX passing YJ14 BUE as the former is replaced in service by the latter. No doubt FN54 will re emerge in weeks to come on some other service in the Wellglade empire. I hope so !

 

A chance to admire again the new rolling stock.

 

 

 

The sticker on the drivers cab door.

 

It would not be ‘trentbarton’ without a bit of humour on the engine bay doors. All you might notice directed at persuading car drivers onto the bus !!