Saturday 8th June 2024
It seems a good idea to complete the trio of bus routes numbered 100, all operated by the associated bus companies of Centrebus, Chaserider and D&G Bus, by taking a ride on the latter’s service between Hanley and Stone in Staffordshire. Routes 100 operated by the other two companies (in Melton Mowbray and Telford) were featured last month.
This Staffordshire route 100 has all the hallmarks of being a tendered bus route with seven return journeys a day Mondays to Fridays, including one aimed at school children that follows a slightly different route, with six journeys on Saturdays on a roughly two hour frequency and no Sunday service.
The round trip time from Hanley to Stone and back takes about 70 minutes with the route serving Stoke-on-Trent railway station seven minutes after leaving Hanley’s bus station, before taking in a short stretch of the fast flowing A500 then turning off to serve the lower half of Trentham – the rather posh end of the area situated opposite a golf course – then continuing south via Barlaston to rejoin the A500 for another short stretch before turning off for Stone.
It doesn’t take long to reach the terminal point in Stone from where the bus runs out of service around the town’s one-way system to reach the origin stop for the return journey to Hanley.
I took a ride on the route on Thursday when the 11:28 departure from Hanley’s large and functional bus station was in the hands of friendly driver Steve.
He’s a regular on the route and knew some of the passengers which is always a heart warming thing to see. He’d been driving with D&G Bus for six years and clearly enjoys his work.
We left the bus station with three passengers and picked one more up at the stop before Stoke-on-Trent railway station which is currently surrounded by roadworks meaning Hanley bound buses are on a diversion via the A52/A50.
Full marks to the contractors for installing clear signs showing where passengers need to go as they leave the station to pick the bus up.
Mind you, with what look like street beautification works set to last until Autumn 2025, it’s essential good signage is part of the deal. Buses from Hanley are still able to go past the station….
… but heading to Hanley involves a diversion and a relocated stop on the main road.
One of the four passengers on board alighted as we passed the edge of Hanford with another alighting in Trentham (where two more boarded) and a third alighted in Barlaston where another boarded making for four who travelled to, and alighted in, Stone with seven passengers having travelled on the journey in total.
Steve kindly let me stay on the bus as he continued round to the first stop for the return journey and although we left at 12:01 with no-one on board three passengers, a buggy, a dog and two suitcases boarded at a couple of stops in Barlaston with another in Trentham.
Two, the dog and buggy got off as we approached Stoke, the third with the two suitcases, alighted at the railway station (heading off via train to Birmingham then a flight to Paris – Steve knew him) while the fourth continued on to Hanley along with four students who boarded at the stop before the station.
You can see why it’s a tendered route. It’s not overrun with passengers but it certainly provides a useful bus service for residents of Trentham and Barlaston as well as connecting Stoke-on-Trent by road to Stone.
And the weekday journey at 07:30 which takes a different route in Barlaston (I guess for school children) and the return from Stone at 15:31, which starts back at Alleynes Academy in nearby Oultoncross, must help to boost numbers using the service overall.
It’s a nice functional route that is definitely welcomed by passengers using it. And Steve is a great ambassador for it, and D&G Bus.
I travelled on this journey on Thursday (along with five other bus route 100s, to be featured over coming weeks in this fortnightly series) during an extensive itinerary around the country using a 7-Day All Line Rail Rover over this past week.
From tomorrow there’ll be a temporary enhanced timetable for the next ten days or so of daily blogs featuring highlights of bus and rail initiatives seen on these travels beginning tomorrow with a look at the new railway line which opened last Sunday in Fife.
Roger French
Have you read the eleven ‘Every route 100’ blogs featured so far? Here’s 1 of 26 (Stevenage-Hitchin) 2 of 26 (Crawley-Redhill), 3 of 26 (Lincoln-Scunthorpe), 4 of 26 (Glasgow-Riverside Museum), 5 of 26 (Campbeltown local), 6 of 26 (Guildford’s Onslow Park & Ride), 7 of 26 (Warrington-Manchester), 8 of 26 Chatham-St Mary’s Island, 9 of 26 St Paul’s-Wapping, 10 of 26 Syston-Melton Mowbray, 11 of 26 Wellington-Telford Sutton Hill.
Temporary enhanced blogging timetable: 06:00 Daily.
Comments on today’s blog are welcome but please keep them relevant to the blog topic, avoid personal insults and add your name (or an identifier). Thank you.
BusAndTrainUser 
isn’t this also the rail replacement bus for Barlaston and Wedgwood stations?
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Yes, it is now, after many manifestations of a Rail Replacement service and other oddities. Although involved with the then “temporary closure” of these two stations during the WCML upgrade (time for another one soon perhaps??), like others, I assumed a rail service would be restored. But, unlike the fuss that went on just the other side of Stoke when Etruria was similarly closed to allow Virgin to shave a minute of the Manchester-London journey times, nobody seemed to worry about Barlaston and Wedgwood. Interesting.
Terence Uden
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Wedgwood lost its entire raison d’etre when the Wedgwood factory was closed down; it was only ever used by a handful of workers towards the end, and Barlaston station is (was) walking distance – it’s about three-quarters of a mile along the canal and some of the aforementioned workers who lived in Barlaston would only catch the train if it was raining; they’d usually walk it.
Barlaston itself would probably still be open if it was in the south-east but it’s in the Potteries so nobody really cared. I was pretty surprised than Stone reopened, as neither station was particularly busy when I worked the route in the 1990s. Wikipedia claims that Barlaston was supposed to reopen in May 2021, so I suppose it could be said to be a victim of Covid.
A Train Driver
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Sorry to nit-pick, but…
In the third and fifth paragraph, unless there are two similarly named towns close to each other, Hanley is renamed Harley; and
The ‘dialogue box-‘ for Stoke on Trent Railway Station on your map appears to have moved or is missing an arrow.
MotCO
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Thanks.
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The 100 is one of six separate services which replaced the 14 between Hanley and Stafford a few years ago. The 14 seemed a clever and succinct way of meeting many individual rural bus needs in an efficient way which also catered for overlapping flows and through journeys.
The replacement services do not synchronise with each other or provide through ticketing. The replacements also serve less destinations and use more vehicles. It seems a retrograde step by the authorities responsible for funding these services.
The 14 (Hanley-Stafford) has been replaced with:
24 (Hanley – Trentham Lakes)
100 (Hanley-Stone)
102(A) (Stone – Yarnfield)
103 (Stone – Eccleshall)
104 (Stone – Barlaston)
432 (Eccleshall – Stafford)
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Hanley’s bus station being “large and functional” sounds like faint praise, the phrase saying nothing about passenger facilities or the quality of information. I remember its predecessor as large, basic and cheerless, with the fabric coming apart and little weather protection. On the other hand, the stands did have timetables on display.
Garry Brown
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The predecessor hasn’t been completely knocked down yet but was definitely best described as large, basic and cheerless. The remains now just look very 1960s brutalist and unwelcoming, not helped by the construction/security fencing around it.
The new one is a bit strange in that the information office/staff facility is a separate building outside the bus station and the council have decided that it’s not Hanley bus station but “Stoke On Trent City Centre bus station” – I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone call Hanley “Stoke on Trent city centre”.
That aside it’s just a bog-standard modern bus station: not quite enough queuing space at the stands, but nothing makes it stand out from any other modern bus station. They’re all functional at best.
A. Nony Mouse
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One point of detail, though not strictly bus-related.
The OS map extract below the timetable shows the dual carriageway road south of Hanford to Stone is shown as the A500 – it is in fact a short stretch of the A34 (Winchester – Salford, albeit with a gap between M40 J9 and M42 J4). D&G 100 therefore only follows the A500 between Stoke-on-Trent and Hanford, then the A34 to Trentham Gardens and again between Barlaston and Stone.
The A500 runs between J15 and J16 of the M6 and was designed along with the M6 to link the motorway with the Potteries towns, and is known locally as the ‘D-road’, because of the shape it forms along with the M6. 500 is ‘D’ as a roman numeral, and there is debate as to whether it was named A500 because of this or because the number happened to be free and was suitable for a major project, with the roman numeral link a happy coincidence.
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