Rivals round on Houghton Regis

Thursday 5th February 2026

There’s another competitive battle playing out in the Home Counties aside from Berkshire and Sevenoaks (Z&S Transport has given up on its spat with Red Rose in Aylesbury) and this time it’s in Luton and neighbouring Houghton Regis in Central Bedfordshire.

Both Grant Palmer and Arriva are serving two expanding residential areas on the north western fringe of the large Luton/Dunstable/Houghton Regis conurbation in Thorn and Linmere. I recently had a look at the situation on the ground to see how things were looking for the new residents who’ve moved in.

Grant Palmer was first on the scene in both Thorn and Linmere in Houghton Regis although obviously Arriva has been around in the wider Luton conurbation since its predecessor British Bus acquired Luton & District (ex United Counties in 1986) back in 1994.

Thorn is the older of the two new residential areas and Grant Palmer launched new route ‘numbered’ Hi to serve the area back in March 2022 following an award of Section 106 funds by Central Bedfordshire Council. It provides two buses an hour between the expanding residential area and nearby Bidwell with Morrisons in central Houghton Regis, Dunstable and Luton using the Busway. Alternate journeys do a circuit of Dunstable town centre serving the large Asda located there.

Buses terminate alongside a large Amazon warehouse in Thorn and at the Transport Interchange by Luton railway station. Buses run over a 12 hour day, Mondays to Saturdays with a two hourly service on Sundays.

In June last year Arriva joined the party in Thorn by introducing a new half hourly route ‘numbered’ H which replicates Grant Palmer’s Hi except both Arriva’s journeys divert via Asda in Dunstable and in Luton buses continue beyond the Interchange to terminate at the Airport.

End to end journey time is half an hour compared to only 22 minutes for Grant Palmer’s once-an-hour journeys avoiding the Dunstable town centre loop.

Southbound departures times from Thorn are to a classic competitive clash. Grant Palmer departs at 26 and 50 and Arriva at 23 and 53. Northbound journeys are a little better spaced with Grant Palmer at 25 and 55 from the Interchange and Arriva at 17 and 47.

Residents must find it perplexing. It was interesting to note four passengers let an Arriva departure set off from the terminus at Thorn and hang back for the Grant Palmer bus a few minutes later, but there again no one else boarded all the way to Houghton Regis.

Thorn is not big enough for two bus companies, that’s for sure.

Linmere is a more recent addition to the network with Grant Palmer again being first off the mark launching its new route ‘numbered’ Jo with a fairly limited timetable last February running via Morrisons and the Busway to Luton Interchange. The timetable was expanded in the summer to an hourly frequency and another hourly journey added serving the huge Lidl warehouse and distribution centre close to the M1 junction 11A and located to the east of the new Linmere residential area.

As with Thorn, Arriva arrived on the scene by adding its newly ‘numbered’ route L to Linmere last June which was part of a wider rejig and expansion of its bus routes using the Busway. Busway routes A and Z were rerouted in Lewsey Farm and Parkside Drive as well as introducing new route L to improve frequencies and deliver a 24/7 link to the Airport.

The upshot is Arriva now runs four buses an hour on route L to the new Linmere estate from the Interchange via a short stretch of the Busway then via Luton & Dunstable Hospital, Lewsey Farm and Parkside Drive then to Linmere with an end to end journey time of just over half an hour.

Grant Palmer’s Jo is only hourly to Linmere itself (also hourly to nearby Lidl) but is quicker into Luton by going via the Busway taking around 25 minutes.

Commendably Arriva produce a comprehensive network map for the whole area which includes routes run by both Arriva and Grant Palmer as well as Centrebus and you can see both H and Hi to Thorn on the top left corner and Jo and L in the top left of centre although the journeys on Jo to Lidl are omitted.

I took a ride up and down to both Thorn and Linmere recently and found numbers travelling from mid morning through lunch time rather disappointing on all four routes, H and Hi, Jo and L. Average loadings were around half a dozen per trip and there’s clearly some over provision. Linmere itself, doesn’t need five buses an hour (four from Arriva and one from Grant Palmer). The section of Arriva’s route H through Parkside Drive, Levsey Farm and past the Hospital is busier but much of that is covered by Arriva’s routes A and Z which also run frequently.

Arriva runs a half hourly service on Sundays to Linmere whereas Grant Palmer doesn’t run to the residential area that day but does operate two return journeys to the Lidl warehouse.

It seems to me some sensible sharing out of the spoils would be best for everyone here. Arriva are clearly keen to serve Linmere with its substantial provision of four buses an hour, so let that be, and pull off Thorn to leave that to Grant Palmer. Maybe Central Bedfordshire could broker a deal under some kind of partnership working?

I see the Council has installed some excellent quality bus shelters with good information provision at bus stops all over its area including in Houghton Regis.

So far Linmere is still waiting to receive its shelters and in the meantime there are some interesting termporary ‘dolly stops’ around the estate with a familiar looking logo.

Roger French

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