Tuesday 17th February 2026
Readers may recall my post in February last year when I enjoyed a journey on JMB Travel’s fledgling route X1 providing a new fast link from Hillhouse and Hamilton into Glasgow using the M74/M73/M8. Well, they’ve done it again – introducing a second new route providing a quick “Glasgow fast” journey time using the same motorway connections.
This time new route X5, which began on 12th January, links Newarthill, Carfin and Motherwell with Glasgow’s Buchanan bus station.
Whereas the X1 resurrected a long withdrawn route once operated by First Bus, the X5 provides new links especially for the large residential area around Newarthill and Carfin as well as giving a great quick link between Motherwell and Glasgow as an alternative to ScotRail.
All the more so as, like the X1, the route taken by the bus in central Glasgow between the M8 junction and Buchanan Street conveniently serves Strathclyde University and the City of Glasgow College in Cathedral Street which are just a few minutes from the motorway.
As you can see the timetable comprises an hourly frequency on Mondays to Saturdays between around 06:15 and 20:00 (07:37 on Saturdays) with two buses allocated to the service. On Mondays to Fridays the first and last two journeys extend from (and to) Newmains, Coltness and Cleland.
I sampled the 15:00 departure from Glasgow on Saturday afternoon and was impressed to see 14 passengers board in the bus station with another passenger boarding in Cathedral Street. A similar number had alighted as the bus had arrived from its previous journey and I saw a similar number on the next departure when we passed that bus in Motherwell.
Obviously the return journey into Glasgow at 15:57 from Newarthill was less busy (being ‘against the flow’) but still carried seven including five into Glasgow.
As with my journey on the X1 last February the bus was a smart, recent addition to the fleet – a Volvo eVoRa – and bearing in mind the weather conditions, and preponderance of motorway driving, was also very presentably clean too.
The driver was absolutely excellent, very helpful and polite to everyone handing out timetable leaflets from beside his ticket machine and I also noticed a box containing a good supply above the front nearside wheel which another passenger helped himself to before announcing he’d been distributing them locally to ensure all his neighbours and friends “are aware of this great new service”.
The bus carries the same ‘Glasgow fast’ branding as developed for the X1 which will help raise the profile as since its introduction just over a year ago, that route has seen a frequency uplift with a half hourly frequency for much of the day as well as a Sunday service and I reckon it won’t be long before the X5 will be up for similar expansion.
It’s once again so refreshing to see a small independent, family owned business investing in, and trying out, new bus routes, making sure the timetable is tweaked in response to demand, the branding is to a high standard with a nicely turned out bus, both internally and externally and with excellent committed drivers
I saw this in action on the way back into Glasgow on Saturday afternoon when the two buses on the route crossed each other in Motherwell and the driver of the outbound journey called across to our driver to ask if he had any spare timetable leaflets on board to which the reply was yes and he jumped out the cab and took some across the road to the other driver who handed one to a passenger who was getting off the bus.
What great service. And I hear (from the driver) that four more brand new Volvos will soon be entering service too. Fantastic.
The X5 deserves to succeed tapping into a significant residential market in Cafin and Newarthill…
… as well as Motherwell itself…
… just as the X1 has done west of the town in Hilllhouse and Hamilton.
I have every confidence it will be a success and well done once again to Ian Bieniowski for overseeing the route’s development as well as Jennifer and Martin Bell, JMB’s owners for their continuing commitment to investing in new routes and new buses.
Roger French
Blogging timetable: 06:00 TThS
BusAndTrainUser 
Glasgow took hold of the idea of the urban motorway. I don’t know how much local destruction occurred but it dies seem to compare to how london failed to complete its network giving rise to a lot of now local congestion on roads north south and east making onetime Greenline semi fast coach journeys broadly impossible.
is Glasgow a young growing city these days?
JBC Prestatyn
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Glasgow also had uncompleted sections in a similar way and for similar reasons to London, although the original plans don’t appear to have been quite so extensive.
There’s a historic video on YouTube that covers the construction of urban motorways in Leeds. An interesting point is that even at the time when they were in vogue the conclusion was reached that for traffic to flow smoothly the roads would need to cover an area greater than the size of the city itself!
Surfblue
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Leeds geography is just odd and planned worse. The 621 sort of works but as means to avoid leeds and little use to fast bus services .
Cardiff interesting ad again the only useful interurban being the A48M for joint Newport Cardiff service and the half northern expressway into the M4 for the X services from Rhondda and Aberdare then commuter crawl through the last bit of Cardiff.
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Yes, JMB Travel have gained quite a reputation for being a good quality Operator in the region. Amongst the usual plethora of evening and Sunday bits, which ebb and flow like the tide according to the Strathclyde budget, they have developed the 41 (Lanark-Hamilton) to a very creditable service, and look to be having success with the X1 and X5.
Sadly, I see plans are in hand to mess about with Buchanan Street bus station (how dare buses take up space in City centres when said space can be used for better things such as offices and car parks, but no, I don’t know the details), and I suspect should services be pushed out to street stops, may become less attractive. There is also the prospect of re-regulation which may dampen any initiatives such as JMB’s services.
Terence Uden
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If fairness there probably are too many buses in Glasgow City Centre. They’re a really inefficient way of moving people around an urban area of almost two million people.
The city doesn’t need ‘fast’ bus routes. It needs Light Rail.
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A perfect bus service! Friendly driver, clean bus, fast, reliable- this is true bus rapid transport!
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And yet some would say that it should merely just feed into the rail network…
In some cases, a fast direct route is preferable to getting the train, changing and then waiting in a cold bus shelter for the onward connection!
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@anon 12:27 – indeed, some might say that with the same resource, a half-hourly service could be provided to and from Motherwell, feeding into the rail network there, giving passengers double the choice of times to travel.
Malc M
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But Malc M, they already have the existing 254 every 12 mins to do that Newarthill/Carfin journey to Motherwell station…
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@anon 14:29 – in that case, what is the point of the X5?
It may offer a “single seat” journey, but at lower frequency than the bus/train connection at Motherwell (and without offering evening or Sunday connections, at least at the moment) – not forgetting that a train service already links Carfin with Glasgow with quicker journey times than the X5.
If the X5 offers more attractive fares than bus/rail, I would argue that, as well as integrating bus and rail services with buses acting as feeders to suburban rail or metro, fares should also be integrated to allow transfer between modes. German cities have been doing it for decades. Tyne & Wear introduced similar nearly 50 years ago.
Malc M
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Well Malc M, you’d have to ask the passengers who are clearly beginning to use it. Perhaps they value the convenience of not having to get a train, then get off and wait in the cold for a 254, preferring to have a direct bus?
You mention Tyne and Wear. One of the reasons that bus companies re-extended services from Gateshead to Newcastle was that people preferred the direct option rather than buggeration of getting off a bus, wandering down into a metro station, and then getting a train.
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@anon – a cynic might suggest another reason the bus companies re-extended services into Newcastle was so that they could keep all of the Newcastle revenue, rather than sharing it with the metro (thus undermining the metro just a few years after it had opened).
And yet, there are services which still terminate at Gateshead, rather than running into Newcastle.
Malc M
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Yes Malc M – I’m sure there was a commercial benefit to the operators but ask yourself why the passengers behaved in the way that they did at Gateshead, but not at Heworth?
Answer – because the faffing at Gateshead wasn’t worth the hassle for passengers whilst they were prepared to change at Heworth because the “juice was worth the squeeze”.
Clearly with the X5, people are prepared to travel on a low frequency (relatively) service and outwardly slower service rather than faster and more frequent 254/Scotrail because of convenience. The X5 will survive or die on what passengers want.
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Tried 50 years ago in Glasgow. Corporation buses from the large Castlemilk housing scheme, rather than head for town, set down commuters at the nearest suburban railway station so they could complete journey by the “faster” trains. A. After settling down with their newspapers and fags, passengers objected to having to leave the bus and forced to stand on a draughty and (frequently) rainy railway station. B. Delays were frequent, not just caused by local issues; with the suburban railway system directly connected to the wider network, a goods train derailment at, say, Wigan, 200 miles away, could have a knock-on effect on commuter services in Glasgow. Even when everything operated like clockwork, travellers seemed to much prefer the longer journey by bus rather than the quicker bus/rail option and the scheme was soon quietly dropped.
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Always encouraging to see an operator (of any size) trying something new and meeting a need. Such a shame that this approach isn’t replicated in many other places.
John
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Small operators, like JMB, seem to be able to achieve greater commitment and loyalty from their staff than the larger concerns. The larger operators are perhaps seen as managing their businesses from afar, leading to a lack of commitment, trust and respect from their staff. Nothing beats a respected and knowledgeable local manager, who can take effective local decisions without having to comply with dictates from the top brass, often located hundreds of miles away. Even within larger depots, creating smaller drivers rotas that allow the staff to build a relationship with their regular customers has, in my experience, been beneficial, as it allows many of them to enjoy coming to work, which is reflected in their customer service skills.
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For completeness, Motherwell already has the First X11 to/from BBS on the same route, same duration and approx half-hourly (no doubt the benighted AI optimisation has been applied).
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An excellent, positive report. More of this please.
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Under 22 and over 60 Scottish concessionary pass holders have to pay on trains so JMB’s route may be more attractive to these groups. Did you see anyone paying a fare Roger when you travelled?
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Most had passes but a few paid a fare.
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First are clearly not happy with what JMB are doing. They are making major changes to their Lanarkshire network, including an increased frequency on their X11, with which JMB ‘s new X5 competes. They are also returning to serving Lanark, with a service from Motherwell at a 15 min frequency, which is direct competition with JMB’s 41. So another bus war breaks out.
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