Y is for York Pullman

Saturday 18th November 2023

The current use of the York Pullman name began as recently as 2007. That’s when haulage firm K&J Logistics which had a small fleet of buses and coaches resurrected the York Pullman brand, it being unregistered having been abandoned five years earlier by First York which in turn had acquired the original York Pullman operations from Durham Travel Services.

The history of the first York Pullman company goes back to 1926 but it’s not really relevant as there’s no link to the present day York Pullman. Suffice to say after decades of family ownership it ended up being owned by Durham Travel Services..

More pertinent to today’s York Pullman business is the fact that in 2012 the company’s small network of bus routes centred on York was sold to Transdev Blazefield but the company returned to the local bus market again in 2016, since when it’s continued to operate three York based routes in addition to school contracts, an open top sightseeing tour, shuttle buses for York Races and an extensive coach fleet.

The three bus routes are the 21, 36/X36 and 37.

These routes are branded as My21, My36 and My37 with buses carrying that high profile name on the sides, although on the day I visited York a few weeks ago both buses operating routes 36 and 37 were plain vanilla branded Volvo B8RLE with MCV eVoRa bodies.

I took the opportunity to have a ride on the 21 and part of the 36 both of which run two-hourly with an hour’s journey time from York to Colton (My21) and Sutton upon Derwent (My36); villages located south west and south east of York respectively.

Route 37 runs a couple of off peak return journeys between Tadcaster and York via villages north of the A65 supplemented by a third afternoon journey on Saturdays and school holidays.

All three routes offer a lovely taste of rural Yorkshire and I saw both routes with good numbers travelling out of York on a Saturday lunchtime. The 21 serves a number of caravan/mobile home sites on its route which gave it custom but I was the only passenger for the last 15 minutes of the journey which included a five minute double run to serve the village of Bolton Percy, served before reaching the terminus at Colton on both the outbound and inbound journeys with no takers.

The Saturday I was in York was the last day of the racing season at York Races which made the traffic congestion even worse than normal for a Saturday.

The bus on route 36 I’d planned on getting arrived at York railway station from its previous journey 18 minutes late and by the time it had crawled through slow moving traffic around d the city centre to reach the main picking up point at Merchantgate for its outbound journey, it was half an hour late.

However York’s economy obviously benefits with race days bringing thousands into the city, as does York Pullman, as it had its fleet of ex Lothian double deck buses, assisted by Reliance and First Bus, taking hundreds of racegoers on a shuttle bus (route 197) from the railway station to the racecourse.

The company must have a tie up with the local commercial radio station YorkMix Radio …

… as it’s breakfast show presenters Ben and Laura are the voices of the on board next stop announcements which they introduce as though playing the next piece of music on their programme with added witticisms …. “the next stop … is a real page turner … Bishopthorpe Library …. Howzat … Bishopthorpe cricket ground … you’ll learn a lot at this next stop …. York College”.

It was all quite different and refreshing on the journey out to Colton but quickly became somewhat predictable on the return and I’d imagine is very repetitive for regular travellers. I also wonder what will happen if and when Ben and or Laura move on to pastures new, as often happens in the world of micro local radio.

I was impressed to see a basket in the luggage pen with a supply of timetable leaflets for all three bus routes.

This really was good to see, although there was nothing on board the vanilla liveried MCV eVoRa bus on route 36 which also didn’t feature Ben and Laura or any next stop displays but had some smart looking seats….

… while the seats on the Enviro200 on the 21 were very comfortable for the two hour ride out to Colton and back.

York Pullman’s bus fleet is mainly Volvo based with 17 double decks for school contract being ex Lothian and London as well as five open top Volvo B9TL MCV DD103s which it operates for Golden Tours on its sightseeing tour of York.

Three ADLEnviro 200s and a couple of Wright bodied single deck Volvos complete the bus fleet but the company also has a number of other vehicles – minibuses …

… and coaches for private hires which were kept busy on the race day I was in York taking parties to the racecourse.

York Pullman is a very typical small bus and coach business operating tendered bus routes, school contracts, private hires and tours and other contracts. Good for them.

Roger French

Previous AtoZ blogs: Avanti West Coast, Blackpool Transport, Chiltern Railways, Delaine Buses, Ensignbus, Faresaver, Grand Central, Hull Trains, Ipswich Buses, JMB Travel, Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire, Lynx, Isle of Man Transport Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Nottingham City Transport, (London) Overground, Preston Bus, Reading Buses, Southern Vectis, trentbarton, unō, Volks Railway, Whippet, Xelabus.

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