Saturday 22nd August 2026 Despite the hot weather I’ve hardly done any open-top bus riding this summer. Aside from East Yorkshire’s Beachcomber in Scarborough (blog coming up next weekend in the 'Every Route 99' series), my only other journey exposed to the open air was last Tuesday afternoon when I enjoyed a round trip from... Continue Reading →
Saturday 18th July 2026 Photo courtesy: blog reader Keith Readers may recall I mentioned in Thursday's blog how “I’ve known tendered bus routes with less than six passengers per journey” ….. which is a nice lead in to today’s blog which tells the story of another route to be resurrected thanks to Local Authority Bus... Continue Reading →
Saturday 11th July 2026 Back in April 2024 there was much joy at the return of a "vital" bus service linking North Yorkshire villages with the Ribble Valley and Clitheroe over in neighbouring Lancashire. The Lancashire Guardian at the time reported how "The move follows discussions with local residents, with Lancashire County Council joining forces with Ribble Valley Borough... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 7th July 2026 It's yet another Tuesday tale of competition between bus companies in the Home Counties. While Thames Valley and Carousel have dampened down their skirmishes with tactical withdrawals in Berkshire, the battle for the High Wycombe and Slough to Uxbridge corridors between Carousel and First Bus continues and over in neighbouring Bedfordshire... Continue Reading →
Saturday 27th June 2026 During last year’s countdown of Britain’s Top 10 Quirky Bus Routes, blog reader Stephen got in touch with an intriguing question.... "Not sure whether this meets the criteria for ‘quirky bus route’ or some other category but next time you’re in Northumberland you might like to check out Chathill station and... Continue Reading →
Thursday 25th June 2026 I enjoyed another Awayday in the fabulous North York Moors last Saturday and once again came away hugely impressed with the dedication of the volunteer team who put together and oversee the Moorsbus network serving this stupendously scenic National Park. I've blogged about Moorsbus before, in July 2018 and July 2021... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 23rd June 2026 It’s Tuesday so that means yet another blog about a further outbreak of competition between bus companies which began at the beginning of this month. Early June has not only seen Arriva move to outwit First Bus in Southend-on-Sea, Stagecoach tread on Arriva’s toes in Stevenage and Stagecoach hit back at... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 16th June 2026 This is becoming a bit of a habit. Two Tuesdays ago I reported on new competitive developments in Southend-on-Sea between First Bus and Arriva; last Tuesday it was about Arriva and Stagecoach's new battle in Stevenage and today I'm catching up with further competitive developments, this time in Preston where a... Continue Reading →
Saturday 16th May 2026 Cumberland has seen some interesting developments of expanded timetables and new bus routes over the last few months so I recently spent a couple of days taking a look around this scenic part of the country and trying out some of the new routes. Together with neighbouring Westmorland and Furness, Cumberland... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 5th May 2026 Yet another spat between bus operators broke out last week. This time in Burton-on-Trent. It follows the award of a tender for routes 402 and 403 between Burton-on-Trent and Uttoxeter via various Staffordshire villages, to Buslink, the company set up in 2023 by James Boddice who sold his previous business, the... Continue Reading →
Saturday 4th April 2026 This week has seen Go-Ahead owned Pulhams Coaches take over the lovely trans Cotswolds bus route linking Oxford,Witney, Burford, Northleach and Cheltenham. Going back in time Swanbrook ran the route as its service 853 but in more recent times Stagecoach had been operating it from its bus garage in Witney but... Continue Reading →
Thursday 2nd April 2026 Another bus ‘war’ has broken out. This time in Lanarkshire. And this one reminds me of the time Arriva began competing with Safeguard, the much respected long standing independently owned small bus company in Guildford in a David and Goliath style battle. I think Arriva thought it could knock a fatal... Continue Reading →
Saturday 28th March 2026 This week saw Transport Scotland begin its twelve month £2 fare cap 'pilot' for all bus journeys across the Highlands (as well as Moray, Argyll and Bute). It follows the launch of the same £2 cap in the Shetland Isles on 30th January, in the Western Isles from 23rd February and... Continue Reading →
Thursday 19th March 2026 At a meeting of Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority's Transport Committee in January, a recommendation was made to the Combined Authority Board to approve the withdrawal of five funded bus routes (13B, 19A, 65, 117 and 129). In the grand scheme of things they're fairly minor league routes and indeed the... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 17th March 2026 CCB31, Cuckmere Buses' latest vehicle in the fleet wearing a special gold 50th Anniversary livery. (Photo courtesy Philip Ayers/Cuckmere Buses) 2026 is a very special year for Cuckmere Buses. The long standing East Sussex community bus operator, based in the village of Berwick, is celebrating its 50th Anniversary. That's an incredible... Continue Reading →
Saturday 14th March 2026 And no, it's not TfL's circular routes R5 and R10 in Orpington (each running every two and a half hours) nor is it the twice a week route 969 between Whitton and Roehampton Vale. It's the once a week, one return journey, route R17 that runs between Carpenders Park and Hatch... Continue Reading →
Thursday 12th March 2026 When I last wrote about First & Last Mile (FLM) in May 2022 the then fledgling Oxfordshire Community bus operator hadn't long been running but readers may recall I came away from travelling on its two new routes impressed with the number of passengers it had already built up from restoring... Continue Reading →
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... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 13th January 2026 Franchising may be a thing in many parts of Britain, but down in the Home Counties bus deregulation appears to be alive and well as it approaches its Ruby anniversary later this year. Hot on the heels of Berkshire’s Bus Battle described in last Tuesday’s blog comes another skirmish in Kent... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 16th December 2025 I’ve been taking a look at three bus routes on which established bus companies are currently competing to see how things are working out. Morecambe-Carnforth: Routes 5 and 85 First up is in Lancashire where Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire began operating a couple of new hourly routes in the Morecambe area... Continue Reading →
Thursday 11th December 2025 Has TfL given up on Putney High Street? Never mind Oxford Street, it's Putney High Street that's got the bigger problem of air quality from slow moving traffic. The south west London shopping street leads south from Putney Bridge and is notorious for almost round-the clock daytime congestion and just like... Continue Reading →
Thursday 20th November 2025 You don’t have to spend long in Bury St Edmunds bus station to appreciate the variety of bus operators serving the town. Stephensons and Mulleys are frequent visitors... ... as well as Coach Services... ...Chambers and Simonds CountryLink... ... both now owned by... ...Transport Made Simple. For a town of around... Continue Reading →
Thursday 2nd October 2025 There’s never a dull moment in Cornwall’s ever changing bus scene. In recent times we’ve seen……First Bus show no interest in its Cornish operations, running ageing second hand vehicles in a dreadful state transferred from other parts of the country... ... allowing the rising star that was Western Greyhound... ...to steal... Continue Reading →
Thursday 18th September 2025 Scotland has two National Parks: Loch Lomond & The Trossachs and The Cairngorms. I enjoyed an absolutely brilliant day on Tuesday sampling two of Britain’s most scenic journeys - one across each National Park. If you enjoy a scenic bus and coach ride, I heartily recommend adding these two to any... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 16th September 2025 This post was going to be about my journey last Thursday on bus route LC6 which runs four times a day between Coalville and Hinckley Operated by Centrebus with one bus on behalf of Leicestershire County Council, the route was introduced on 26th August providing a north-south link between these communities... Continue Reading →
Sunday 7th September 2025 Blog reader Natasha recently got in touch to suggest I visit Chartwell House in Kent and sample the options to travel there by bus. Situated down a country lane (called Mapleton Road) off the B2026, Hosey Hill, south of Westerham, the National Trust property, famous for being the home of Sir... Continue Reading →
Thursday 28th August 2025 I recently experienced an enjoyable round trip through the Derbyshire Dales and Peaks which I thought I'd share. Alighting from the train at Derby's railway station a smart new '25' plate Kinchbus operated Enviro200 soon arrived on the Skylink branded route from Leicester and Loughborough to whisk me over to the... Continue Reading →
Thursday 21st August 2025 The end of this month sees changes to two bus routes that cross London’s border with Hertfordshire so a small group of bus industry veterans recently joined me for an enjoyable wander cross-crossing the border four times to sample routes 84B and 610 for one last time. We began our travels... Continue Reading →
Sunday 27th July 2025 Having tried out new route 714 and the soon-to-be-amended 'almost quirky' route 555 to one of Britain's best served villages, I can also report on a few other enjoyable journeys I made in the north of Surrey earlier this month. As previously explained on my first abortive attempt to visit Wisley,... Continue Reading →
Thursday 17th July 2025 Regular blog readers will appreciate I couldn’t resist giving last week’s media reports about the bus route costing a £180 subsidy per passenger journey in the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority area the BusAndTrainUser Verify treatment. Not that I disbelieved for one moment the veracity of the claim as it came... Continue Reading →
Sunday 13th July 2025 I'd never been to Whiteley Village prior to my bus wanderings around Surrey last week. I'd known it from seeing the destination emblazoned on the front of buses serving Heathrow Airport on route 555.... ....Whiteley Village being the southern terminus of the meandering route operated by White Bus which connects the... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 8th July 2025 The end of an era for two odd ball tendered bus routes beckons in a few weeks time. I took a ride on both routes last week to experience the passing of the old guard. Both upcoming changes are as a consequence of a county council re-tender exercise resulting in a... Continue Reading →
Saturday 5th July 2025 As TfL's Superloop brand becomes ever more nonsensical with more routes planned that are questionably 'super' and are certainly nothing about being part of a 'loop', I took a ride on one of the longest standing and original non-loop routes to be added to the brand - the SL6, renumbered from... Continue Reading →
Saturday 21st June 2025 Quite a bit of negativity was expressed on various online forums earlier this year when news broke First Bus was ceasing its extensive use of open-top buses in Cornwall this summer. These had run over the last few years with particular emphasis on attracting the post Covid growth in the leisure... Continue Reading →
Thursday 19th June 2025 I enjoyed a fleeting visit to the far south west corner of Cornwall at the beginning of this week to check out a few developments in the county’s bus network. Here’s the first of a couple of posts about those travels. (Part 2 follows on Saturday). First up when I arrived,... Continue Reading →
Thursday 24th April 2025 I took a ride on Red Eagle’s newly introduced route 500 on Tuesday to see how it was settling in. Readers may recall this competitive service against Arriva’s troubled route X5 between Hemel Hempstead and Aylesbury was announced a few weeks ago before Arriva publicly admitted it was throwing in the... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 22nd April 2025 New tenders for subsidised bus services issued by the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead earlier this month have meant changes to many routes and their operators with Go-Ahead's (Oxford Bus) owned Carousel expanding its reach as far as Staines and (Reading Buses' owned) Thames Valley taking on the infamous Windsor... Continue Reading →
Thursday 17th April 2025 There’s a new ‘kid on the block’ providing express coaches between London and Stansted Airport. Flibco has been awarded a five year contract by the Airport's owners commencing 1st April, replacing previous incumbent Airport Bus Express, for the lucrative link to Stratford and Liverpool Street where it competes with National Express,... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 15th April 2025 Readers may recall an Explore Wales trip I did with my brother last September when we missed out on a planned journey on the lovely Sherpa'r Wyddfa branded route S1 through Llanberis and a ride on the Conwy Valley railway line from Betws-y-Coed to Llandudno Junction due to a late running... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 25th March 2025 Many inter-urban bus routes have seen booming passenger demand in recent years as bus companies invest in new vehicles, improved frequencies and attractive branding to encourage growth along key corridors. But on the border of Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire it’s a different story. Specifically the Aylesbury to Hemel Hempstead corridor along what... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 4th February 2025 As identified in a recent blog, the future of route 84B between Potters Bar and Barnet is far from secure with confirmed funding in place only until April. Hertsmere Borough Council stumped up the initial £183,600 to fund the service for its first 12 months in September 2023 after which Hertfordshire... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 29th October 2024 Today marks an important milestone in BusAndTrainUser blogging. This is blog number 997. And by a happy coincidence, ignoring Stagecoach's contrived route number 1066 (Hastings to Tunbridge Wells), 997 just happens to be the highest number taken by any of Britain’s scheduled daily bus routes (numbers 998 and 999 are school... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 15th October 2024 There's been understandable concern raised recently about the future role for Small and Medium sized Enterprises (SMEs) in the bus sector particularly following the franchise experience in Greater Manchester where they didn't really get a look in and, aside from the University of Hertfordshire owned UNO, the recent withdrawal of the... Continue Reading →
Thursday 10th October 2024 Readers will know I like to get out and about and see what's actually happening on the road as well as on the tracks when commenting. Something I wish more managers and especially senior directors of transport companies would do more often so they can take informed decisions based on real... Continue Reading →
Thursday 26th September 2024 Here's another one of those community involvement success stories. It's from the Lake District where a volunteer-led community group called Sustainable and Integrated Transport for Ullswater (SITU) has set about organising and funding two additional bus routes to supplement Stagecoach's successful and well used bus network through the National Park. Key... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 3rd September 2024 I featured the three seasonal bus routes that ran in Kent this summer in a blog last month so thought I’d better also take a ride on neighbouring Medway’s summer offering before it ended last weekend. As you can see it was a convoluted circular route linking Chatham, Gillingham and Rainham... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 20th August 2024 It was fifty years ago in 1974 Jeff Morss set up his one man bus company called Fareline. Based in Wingfield, Suffolk - a village close to the County’s border with Norfolk, eight miles east of Diss - the Company has made a speciality of running rural bus routes in north... Continue Reading →
Saturday 10th August 2024 All is not well on a rural bus route in Bedford. As you can see from the above headlines in last week's trade press (Route One) and the Bedford Today online news website, a row has broken out between the respected locally based Grant Palmer bus company, Bedford Borough Council and... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 6th August 2024 This summer school holiday has seen three new bus routes hit the road in Kent. First up, commencing on Saturday 20th July, is a free shuttle bus on new route 51 connecting Folkestone West and Folkestone Central railway stations with Folkestone Harbour Crosskeys are running the daily service on behalf of... Continue Reading →
Tuesday 30th July 2024 As explained in a recent blog about Arriva’s exit from High Wycombe (enacted at the weekend), Carousel Buses and Reading Buses began providing their competitive replacement bus routes between Henley and Reading on Sunday. Carousel has replicated Arriva's previous routes 800 and 850, each on an hourly frequency between High Wycombe,... Continue Reading →
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