Arriva Buses (including Greenline)

[TheGrandWazoo]

I think this might be because Arriva tend to operate in less prominent areas that don’t get as much attention by enthusiasts, they tend to operate in more secondary areas in between the biggest places

I'm not convinced by that argument TBH.

Drawlane/British Bus was headed up by a convicted felon in Dawson Williams, and was always financially under-resourced with a need to expand. When Cowie bought them, they were able to rebrand to Arriva. It had new management at the top, and there was definite new vehicle investment. Arguably, the rebrand enabled a long needed rationalisation of brands and whilst many may have mourned the loss of some identities (like Northumbria or West Riding), there was a mess in the North West (North Western, Bee Line, Leigh Line) and some that were hardly paragons of quality (Clydeside, Crosville Wales). So it was a fresh new look.

Contrast that with First Bus that had been created a year or two earlier. They too had a motley collection of firms yet continued to buy up businesses. There wasn't a stage where it felt that they were really tackling the group's issues consistently, spending on expansion and continuing to buy fleets that needed major investment e.g. GM Buses, Cawlett. Then there were other instances like the over-centralisation of the business (see central Scotland) before compounding things with the Laidlaw purchase came, plunging First into an abyss of underinvestment in UK Bus. Against those travails, the decline of Arriva didn't really register perhaps?

The problem was that, as evidenced on this forum, some people were still banging on about First's culture of the Lockhead era when the man was long gone and the culture had clearly changed. People just kept going back to the old favourites and still hadn't noticed Arriva's continued decline; it was like picking at an old scab and ignoring the fresh wound on the other leg!

For me, it was obvious as my native Arriva North East was perhaps one of the most pronounced declines. Steve Noble managed it on a shoestring with virtually no new vehicles for six years and continued depot closures and schemes aimed at rationalising the network and PVR (see Viva Durham and Viva Teesside). This is a corporate approach of trimming services and fleets and then realising that a depot overhead couldn't then be justified, so close the depot and cede all but a few routes. That approach is still evident now.

 

[DunsBus]

Drawlane/British Bus was headed up by a convicted felon in Dawson Williams, and was always financially under-resourced with a need to expand. When Cowie bought them, they were able to rebrand to Arriva. It had new management at the top, and there was definite new vehicle investment. Arguably, the rebrand enabled a long needed rationalisation of brands and whilst many may have mourned the loss of some identities (like Northumbria or West Riding), there was a mess in the North West (North Western, Bee Line, Leigh Line) and some that were hardly paragons of quality (Clydeside, Crosville Wales). So it was a fresh new look.

I often wondered why Drawlane/British Bus bought virtually nothing in this way of new vehicles for nearly five years, yet always seemed to be able to find money to be expand. I still shudder at the thought of what happened to Edinburgh Transport during its brief period in their ownership.

 

[A0]

I'm not convinced by that argument TBH.

Drawlane/British Bus was headed up by a convicted felon in Dawson Williams, and was always financially under-resourced with a need to expand. When Cowie bought them, they were able to rebrand to Arriva. It had new management at the top, and there was definite new vehicle investment. Arguably, the rebrand enabled a long needed rationalisation of brands and whilst many may have mourned the loss of some identities (like Northumbria or West Riding), there was a mess in the North West (North Western, Bee Line, Leigh Line) and some that were hardly paragons of quality (Clydeside, Crosville Wales). So it was a fresh new look.

Contrast that with First Bus that had been created a year or two earlier. They too had a motley collection of firms yet continued to buy up businesses. There wasn't a stage where it felt that they were really tackling the group's issues consistently, spending on expansion and continuing to buy fleets that needed major investment e.g. GM Buses, Cawlett. Then there were other instances like the over-centralisation of the business (see central Scotland) before compounding things with the Laidlaw purchase came, plunging First into an abyss of underinvestment in UK Bus. Against those travails, the decline of Arriva didn't really register perhaps?

The problem was that, as evidenced on this forum, some people were still banging on about First's culture of the Lockhead era when the man was long gone and the culture had clearly changed. People just kept going back to the old favourites and still hadn't noticed Arriva's continued decline; it was like picking at an old scab and ignoring the fresh wound on the other leg!

For me, it was obvious as my native Arriva North East was perhaps one of the most pronounced declines. Steve Noble managed it on a shoestring with virtually no new vehicles for six years and continued depot closures and schemes aimed at rationalising the network and PVR (see Viva Durham and Viva Teesside). This is a corporate approach of trimming services and fleets and then realising that a depot overhead couldn't then be justified, so close the depot and cede all but a few routes. That approach is still evident now.

There's an interesting article on line here > https://www.keybuses.com/article/rise-and-decline-arriva

This places the rot at the door of DB ownership - and perhaps there is something in that "In a normal year, Arriva represents around 12% of DB's turnover. UK buses represent about a fifth of that, half the size of the UK rail business, and also half the size of the European bus and rail element. But it typically gets less than 10% of DB's capital investment."

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

There's an interesting article on line here > https://www.keybuses.com/article/rise-and-decline-arriva

This places the rot at the door of DB ownership - and perhaps there is something in that "In a normal year, Arriva represents around 12% of DB's turnover. UK buses represent about a fifth of that, half the size of the UK rail business, and also half the size of the European bus and rail element. But it typically gets less than 10% of DB's capital investment."

Just my opinion is that some of the issues were already deep-seated in Arriva. The continued cutting and retrenchment, the centralisation with limited commercial freedom, internal return rates per route etc

First had problems that hadn't been resolved and were thereby exacerbated and laid bare by the Laidlaw process and consequent lack of investment. Arriva had a similar underlying issue but it was perhaps a more slowly evolving malaise as investment began to dry up.

I often wondered why Drawlane/British Bus bought virtually nothing in this way of new vehicles for nearly five years, yet always seemed to be able to find money to be expand. I still shudder at the thought of what happened to Edinburgh Transport during its brief period in their ownership.

That was it - revenues being used to fund expansion rather than investing in the current business. Not quite a Ponzi scheme but one with a limited shelf life.

 

[Andyh82]

I often wondered why Drawlane/British Bus bought virtually nothing in this way of new vehicles for nearly five years, yet always seemed to be able to find money to be expand. I still shudder at the thought of what happened to Edinburgh Transport during its brief period in their ownership.

What is this 5 year period people are talking about, because i'm sure West Riding/Yorkshire received new buses most years, unless it was before British Bus purchased them?

 

[Ken H]

This is sad because the bus companies that ended up with Arriva were good bus companies back in the day. These I remember with affection

Yorkshire Woollen District
West Riding and the company it acquired in 1950, Bullock and Son
United Automobile Services

 

[Fleetmaster]

That was it - revenues being used to fund expansion rather than investing in the current business. Not quite a Ponzi scheme but one with a limited shelf .

Standard capitalism. When things are being sold off en masse but there is a limited supply, you grab what you can and delay any other business imperatives. Market share is king. We can all name several smaller groups that stopped at a couple of divisions and then set about investing in vehicles and the like.

With some notable exceptions, they typically lasted a few years then realized they were between a rock and a hard place - too big to be nimble and thrifty like the tiny operators, too small to achieve the economies of scale needed to compete against the national groups, either on the road or at the fuel pump / showroom.

No surprise then that they tended to sell out, and it was by then only the big groups who could raise the best price (since market share is what the market likes and will thus back with loans and share capitalisation).

As above, Arriva definitely feels like they didn't expand quick enough in this period, failing to capture enough major non-London urban operations. Perhaps because British Bus had serious financial issues that needed rectification, and they are paying the price for this locked in weakness now, as their empire slowly decays.

They're in the same odd situation now. Too big to be comfortably swallowed by a rival, too small and weak to be of much interest to the sort of private equity groups hovering around the larger or more financially stable operations. A break up is possible, but the shareholders are probably unwilling to take the financial hit that would represent. I seriously doubt anyone wants to pay top dollar for any Arriva UK bus subsidiary not painted red.

 

[MedwayValiant]

I have to take exception to the description of the Medway Towns as a "genuinely deprived sinkhole area". In the 80s and 90s maybe that was true, but these days Medway's unemployment rate is below the national average. The only district in Kent which has unemployment substantially above the national average is Thanet, and for very different reasons.

That Medway has "a whole lot of buses carrying mostly fresh air" came as news to me as well. The ones I go on are usually well loaded, and on the 145 in particular they are often standing and sometimes crush loaded. That's mostly because of the proportion of scheduled journeys - some days it's more than one third - that don't run. Touching wood, that's been a bit better in the last week or two, but maybe I shouldn't have said that out loud.

If, as is asserted, most of the jobs in Medway are in "places with no bus service anyway", well maybe Arriva ought to take that on board and provide one. That said, I don't know what those places are. The obvious gap in Arriva's provision in the Medway Towns is that they choose not to go to Medway City Estate, but other operators do. Mind you, if Medway Council had ever delivered the footbridge there from Chatham Town Centre that it promised twenty and more years ago, it might not even need very much of a bus service.


Meanwhile, we have a ludicrous situation with the 145 right now. The route was on diversion for roadworks, which finished a week ahead of schedule. Some drivers have reverted to the usual routing, while others are still using the diversion route, claiming that the council has told Arriva that they must not revert to the usual route until the scheduled date.

Why would the council do that? The only possible reason would be to avoid confusion - but given that neither operator nor council ever actually announced the diversion in the first place, and that the stops left unserved carry no notification of this, it's not a very good reason. So instead, confusion is being caused by journeys not all going the same way.

 

[LOL The Irony]

Bullock and Son

Didn't Bullocks get bought by Stagecoach?

 

[northwichcat]

Didn't Bullocks get bought by Stagecoach?

Are you thinking of the bus operations of R Bullock, who are based in the Stockport area?

there was a mess in the North West (North Western, Bee Line, Leigh Line)

They acquired Starline as well. A Knutsford based company who had modern vehicles. They kept the Starline name on buses in the Altrincham area because they were so much more modern than the North Western buses so Starline had developed a good reputation. They even started branding the Starline vehicles as 'Premier' as this photo illustrates: https://www.railwaymedia.co.uk/Buses/S/Star-Line/i-fkTTzmN/A

 

[DunsBus]

What is this 5 year period people are talking about, because i'm sure West Riding/Yorkshire received new buses most years, unless it was before British Bus purchased them?

These were pre-British Bus IIRC. I'm surprised that what was the West Riding Group were allowed to hold on to them, as the usual British Bus practice following company takeovers was to asset-strip before the ink even had a chance to dry - Colchester, and the aforementioned Edinburgh Transport being but two examples.

I think the reason why they sold out to Cowie so quickly was because Dawson Williams knew that he'd been rumbled regarding the financing of acquisitions.

 

[A0]

What is this 5 year period people are talking about, because i'm sure West Riding/Yorkshire received new buses most years, unless it was before British Bus purchased them?

I think it's mid 90s - but I was going to mention Luton & District / The Shires which under British Bus saw a huge influx of new vehicles which pretty much saw off the large number of Leyland Nationals which Luton & District had - including a good chunk in the ex London Country NW areas like Hemel and Watford. British Bus bought LDT in 1994 and within a year new Scanias and Darts in the Blue / Yellow colours were everywhere.

 

[DunsBus]

I think it's mid 90s - but I was going to mention Luton & District / The Shires which under British Bus saw a huge influx of new vehicles which pretty much saw off the large number of Leyland Nationals which Luton & District had - including a good chunk in the ex London Country NW areas like Hemel and Watford. British Bus bought LDT in 1994 and within a year new Scanias and Darts in the Blue / Yellow colours were everywhere.

I remember that British Bus bought Northumbria in the summer of 1994, then Maidstone & District early the following year. Some of the engineering staff from both companies then got key engineering posts within the group and brought an end to the "rentawreck" approach to fleet renewal.

 

[L401CJF]

The demise of Arriva on the Wirral over the years has been quite sad to watch. Having taken over from MTL in 2000 the network was shaken up somewhat to shed some dead weight routes not long after takeover. There was some initial investment in fleet (X plate Darts/Cadets and Y reg DAF Myllenniums) but that was it until the CX58 E400s arrived about 7 years later.

Their main competitors were First, having not long taken over from PMT at the time, but First cut back further and further running their network into the ground over the years, giving Arriva the reign over the area. The only other bigger operator was independent Avon buses, who kept to themselves.

Once First ran off and Stagecoach came in Arriva suddenly had competition. A few years later Arriva pulled off the quality partnership Liverpool to Chester route. Stagecoach stepped on Avons toes and eventually they went out of business with Stagecoach taking their picking over some of the Avon routes.

The Crossriver Wirral night bus network has long gone too, disappearing about 7/8 years ago partly due to Merseytravel insisting concessionary passes were accepted meaning it didn't cover its costs.

In 2017 Merseytravel undertook their "Wirral bus network review" which saw Arriva withdraw and alter a chunk of their network (16, 17, 118, 119, 175, 218, 219, 418, 419). Stagecoach of course ended up running the 16/17 commercially once Avon went.

More recently there has been a shake up on times with a lot of frequencies reduced. It shows how easy they had it until some competition showed up.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Standard capitalism. When things are being sold off en masse but there is a limited supply, you grab what you can and delay any other business imperatives. Market share is king. We can all name several smaller groups that stopped at a couple of divisions and then set about investing in vehicles and the like

I wouldn't say standard capitalism. Stagecoach and Go Ahead managed to both buy up businesses and invest in their existing empire.

These were pre-British Bus IIRC. I'm surprised that what was the West Riding Group were allowed to hold on to them, as the usual British Bus practice following company takeovers was to asset-strip before the ink even had a chance to dry - Colchester, and the aforementioned Edinburgh Transport being but two examples.

I don't think it was standard practice in British Bus. Problem was that Colchester had a very modern fleet that was on the books at a consequently high value. However, they'd been sold to BB when Colchester BT was on its knees because of the competition that had been unleashed by Badgerline. They were losing nearly 500k per annum so they had to cut costs under BB ownership and part of that was sending the expensive Lynxes to Crosville Wales.

I don't recall much asset stripping at West Riding (Caldaire) or Northumbria (Proudmutual) but equally, BB didn't really have the funds to really have a decent fleet replacement programme. They had a penchant for anything East Lancs bodied and I remember those boxy, dark Scania L113s (?).

Arriva came in with a plan to sweep away much of the tat and that was ok in the early years. However, it was never great, and the DB purchase and later paralysis/restriction on capital has only exacerbated weaknesses in their business model.

 

[DunsBus]

I wouldn't say standard capitalism. Stagecoach and Go Ahead managed to both buy up businesses and invest in their existing empire.

I don't think it was standard practice in British Bus. Problem was that Colchester had a very modern fleet that was on the books at a consequently high value. However, they'd been sold to BB when Colchester BT was on its knees because of the competition that had been unleashed by Badgerline. They were losing nearly 500k per annum so they had to cut costs under BB ownership and part of that was sending the expensive Lynxes to Crosville Wales.

I don't recall much asset stripping at West Riding (Caldaire) or Northumbria (Proudmutual) but equally, BB didn't really have the funds to really have a decent fleet replacement programme. They had a penchant for anything East Lancs bodied and I remember those boxy, dark Scania L113s (?).

Arriva came in with a plan to sweep away much of the tat and that was ok in the early years. However, it was never great, and the DB purchase and later paralysis/restriction on capital has only exacerbated weaknesses in their business model.

Yes - I remember now that Colchester BT was bought by BB for a nominal sum, but BB also took on the losses. Hence the Lynxes being transferred to Crosville Wales.
You're correct, Northumbria was left alone post-takeover. I remember it was not long after that when BB started to invest in new vehicles again. I seem to recall there was an outstanding order when Cowie bought them out and one of the first things which Cowie did was to transfer the body orders elsewhere.

 

[Fleetmaster]

I wouldn't say standard capitalism. Stagecoach and Go Ahead managed to both buy up businesses and invest in their existing empire.

Stagecoach had first mover advantage, massive confidence in their own business strategy (by virtue of their early successes in the deregulated market), and were able to access market capital much earlier. It's also much easier to invest if you can go to Alexander Dennis and say you want hundreds of identical buses. That said, they definitely weren't above sweating inherited assets, they just did it sensibly, using these buses as low cost units for example. I dare say British Bus lost out on a few potential purchases simply because Stagecoach in the 90s presented such a fearsome image. If you didn't sell to Stagecoach, there was a good chance they would come for you anyway. That could very well be the reason BB failed to buy up more ex-PTE businesses, for example.

I'm not so sure why Go Ahead was such a success compared to BB, but my gut feeling is they benefitted from only buying businesses that were already doing well enough to invest organically, something they would know from their industry experience, and were only buying in territories that if necessary, could be defended using the assets already bought. Oxford was a bun fight for sure, but the eventual winner was never really in doubt.

Even stuff like Metrobus looks like such a wiser purchase than London & Country in hindsight, for example, which definitely gives you the sense they were making astute choices and perhaps preferring to grow slower than the market leaders, safe in the knowledge that once the dust had settled, they'd be in a strong enough position to hold their own and thus be able to buy other business as they became available, while others, most likely only BB, struggled to deal with their growing pains.

 

[TheSel]

For anyone interested in such trivia, Arriva Merseyside Enviro 400MMC 4693 (YX17NFH) - has been outshopped in a 'Eurovision' overall vinyl in readiness for some minor event taking place next month - not sure what.

Photographed today at Penny Lane. (my pic below).

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Stagecoach had first mover advantage, massive confidence in their own business strategy (by virtue of their early successes in the deregulated market), and were able to access market capital much earlier. It's also much easier to invest if you can go to Alexander Dennis and say you want hundreds of identical buses. That said, they definitely weren't above sweating inherited assets, they just did it sensibly, using these buses as low cost units for example. I dare say British Bus lost out on a few potential purchases simply because Stagecoach in the 90s presented such a fearsome image. If you didn't sell to Stagecoach, there was a good chance they would come for you anyway. That could very well be the reason BB failed to buy up more ex-PTE businesses, for example.

I'm not so sure why Go Ahead was such a success compared to BB, but my gut feeling is they benefitted from only buying businesses that were already doing well enough to invest organically, something they would know from their industry experience, and were only buying in territories that if necessary, could be defended using the assets already bought. Oxford was a bun fight for sure, but the eventual winner was never really in doubt.

Even stuff like Metrobus looks like such a wiser purchase than London & Country in hindsight, for example, which definitely gives you the sense they were making astute choices and perhaps preferring to grow slower than the market leaders, safe in the knowledge that once the dust had settled, they'd be in a strong enough position to hold their own and thus be able to buy other business as they became available, while others, most likely only BB, struggled to deal with their growing pains.

I wouldn't exactly agree with that assessment.

Stagecoach had some success in challenging the Citylink coaching operations but still needed external funding from the family (Fraser McColl, IIRC - a Canadian uncle?) to fund the purchase of Hampshire Bus. Of course, they were then able to make a killing on Southampton bus station and the depot site, flogging off the operations to Solent BlueLine so that they essentially paid for the business. However, they also very quickly began investing in new vehicles; not much more than a year after purchasing Hampshire Bus, United Counties and Cumberland, the first new Olympians arrived in those fleets. It wasn't until the early 90s that they were really able to flex their procurement muscles.

Drawlane was also busy purchasing in 1987 but it was a much murkier state of affairs. Not least they got caught with an associate firm attempting to subvert the bidding process (in excess of the three businesses that you were allowed to buy) but there were further allegations of collusion and connections with ATL Holdings as well as buying stuff like London Country SW but the property going to a partner bidder so dubious that they really received the full benefit of the property portfolio. Remember that Stagecoach and Badgerline Holdings were both a) early in the privatisation game b) invested in new fleet and c) continued to be acquisitive (though I do agree that the overtures of Stagecoach could be persuasive based on fear). That Drawlane that begat British Bus, that then became Arriva (at least in part) had the purchasing bug but never seemed to have the money to really improve the fleet profile despite having some form of vertical integration from the ownership of East Lancs. It seemed under-capitalised with a focus on market share without the money to sustain; something that Stagecoach (and Badgerline) were able to do initially before floating in 1993 whilst Drawlane never had access to that sort of capital nor could generate enough internally.

Drawlane (and so Arriva) had a mix of strong provincial operations (Northumbria, West Riding, Midland Fox and even Maidstone and District) and some stuff that was obviously much weaker (such as Midland Red North, Clydeside or Crosville Wales). However, that's no different from, for instance, Stagecoach who had Devon General or Busways yet still had perhaps more challenging stuff like Midland Red South. It's not the territory that is the problem for Arriva - it's the business model of how route profitability/sustainability is calculated, how investment decisions are made and, more latterly, the paucity of investment and paralysis of a business who's owner doesn't know what they want to do with it!

 

[northern506]

Not sure if this has been mentioned in another thread (can't find anything), but this is an interesting and positive change in Leighton Buzzard. Shame they couldn't sort Milton Keynes out first!

Source: https://www.arrivabus.co.uk/floating-pages/leightons-buses

In partnership with Central Bedfordshire Council, we are bringing a new network of buses to Leighton Buzzard from Tuesday 9 May 2023. The service will link residents in the new developments of Clipstone Park and Chamberlains Barn as well as providing seamless connections between bus and train, designed around fast services to and from London Euston.
Click here for a handy printable guide to Leighton's buses.
To see a map of our new network of services, click here.

We’re introducing a fleet of high specification, ultra low-emission buses which are fully accessible and packed with great on-board features such as next stop announcements, USB charging and free WiFi. And, as usual, our friendly team of local drivers will be ready to welcome you on board.

Links are below to the new timetables:
L1 Rail station & town centre to Grovebury Retail Park
L2 Rail station & town centre to Chamberlains Barn
L3 Town Centre to Chamberlains Barn
L4 Rail station & town centre to Apex Park
L5 Brooklands to Linslade
F70/F77 Central Milton Keynes to Luton
150 Aylesbury to Milton Keynes

We’ll be saying goodbye to routes D1, 32, 33, 34, 35 and 36C as these routes are replaced in part, or entirely, by the new network of services. For areas that are no longer served by regular bus services, Buzzer provides a door to door community transport service for Leighton Buzzard, Linslade and surrounding villages.
For feedback and suggestions on these changes, please contact Central Bedfordshire Council here.

Free buses until Christmas 2023​

We’re so excited to be bringing a whole new network of buses to our town that we’re making every journey free until Christmas 2023. There’ll be unlimited travel routes L1, L2, L3, L4, L5 and L6. Alongside this, Arriva are also providing free travel on routes F70/F77 between Apex Park and Bideford Green and on route 150 between The Star at Shenley Hill Road and Southcott Railway Bridge.
This fantastic fares promotion has been made possible thanks to support from the Department for Transport following Central Bedfordshire Council’s successful bid for Bus Service Improvement Plan (BSIP) funding.
If you’d like to go further to explore Aylesbury, get some retail therapy in Milton Keynes or jet off from Luton, fares are capped at just £2 for an adult single until 30 June 2023. With free fares in Leighton Buzzard town and capped singles for longer journeys, there has never been a better time to get on board.

 

[Soundwave]

Nhey are ot sure if this has been mentioned in another thread (can't find anything), but this is an interesting and positive change in Leighton Buzzard. Shame they couldn't sort Milton Keynes out first!

Source: https://www.arrivabus.co.uk/floating-pages/leightons-buses

They are going where the money is. There is no incentive these day for commercial acumen within Arriva - as we will probably see later this year elsewhere.

 

[markymark2000]

Not sure if this has been mentioned in another thread (can't find anything), but this is an interesting and positive change in Leighton Buzzard. Shame they couldn't sort Milton Keynes out first!

Source: https://www.arrivabus.co.uk/floating-pages/leightons-buses

It's all council funded. Central Bedfordshire is funding it using Bus Service Improvement Plan funding (any S106 developer funding given it serves new development areas?).

I'd put money on the fact Milton Keynes still isn't the area to make improvements given the unsupportive council and the fact the council reported all bus operators to the traffic commissioner during COVID due to the temporary timetables

 

[Fleetmaster]

Not sure if this has been mentioned in another thread (can't find anything), but this is an interesting and positive change in Leighton Buzzard. Shame they couldn't sort Milton Keynes out first!

Source: https://www.arrivabus.co.uk/floating-pages/leightons-buses

The cynic in me suggests this is a clever workaround to the requirement that BSIP (bus service improvement plan) funding shall not be used to fund existing services. And thee are other grant funds to upgrade fleets.

Still, a rare treat, someone taking the time to sit down and rethink a whole network.

 

[WibbleWobble]

Weirdly though, looking at the new timetables and the existing ones, some areas will be worse off than they are currently. The L1, for example, replaces the D1 which is currently half hourly.

I wonder if the BSIP money here is being used primarily to pump-prime the new network via the free travel incentive.

 

[Snex]

I wouldn't exactly agree with that assessment.

Stagecoach had some success in challenging the Citylink coaching operations but still needed external funding from the family (Fraser McColl, IIRC - a Canadian uncle?) to fund the purchase of Hampshire Bus. Of course, they were then able to make a killing on Southampton bus station and the depot site, flogging off the operations to Solent BlueLine so that they essentially paid for the business. However, they also very quickly began investing in new vehicles; not much more than a year after purchasing Hampshire Bus, United Counties and Cumberland, the first new Olympians arrived in those fleets. It wasn't until the early 90s that they were really able to flex their procurement muscles.

Drawlane was also busy purchasing in 1987 but it was a much murkier state of affairs. Not least they got caught with an associate firm attempting to subvert the bidding process (in excess of the three businesses that you were allowed to buy) but there were further allegations of collusion and connections with ATL Holdings as well as buying stuff like London Country SW but the property going to a partner bidder so dubious that they really received the full benefit of the property portfolio. Remember that Stagecoach and Badgerline Holdings were both a) early in the privatisation game b) invested in new fleet and c) continued to be acquisitive (though I do agree that the overtures of Stagecoach could be persuasive based on fear). That Drawlane that begat British Bus, that then became Arriva (at least in part) had the purchasing bug but never seemed to have the money to really improve the fleet profile despite having some form of vertical integration from the ownership of East Lancs. It seemed under-capitalised with a focus on market share without the money to sustain; something that Stagecoach (and Badgerline) were able to do initially before floating in 1993 whilst Drawlane never had access to that sort of capital nor could generate enough internally.

Drawlane (and so Arriva) had a mix of strong provincial operations (Northumbria, West Riding, Midland Fox and even Maidstone and District) and some stuff that was obviously much weaker (such as Midland Red North, Clydeside or Crosville Wales). However, that's no different from, for instance, Stagecoach who had Devon General or Busways yet still had perhaps more challenging stuff like Midland Red South. It's not the territory that is the problem for Arriva - it's the business model of how route profitability/sustainability is calculated, how investment decisions are made and, more latterly, the paucity of investment and paralysis of a business who's owner doesn't know what they want to do with it!

Not sure comparing Busways and Northumbria is a fair comparison mind.

One is a complete gold mine with short fares through some of the most dense parts of Newcastle. The other mostly suburban routes other than North Tyneside which had the Metro and Northern to fight with.

Arriva excluding London and maybe Liverpool doesn't really have anything urban like that. First is similar really with a lot of poor suburban areas as well.

Suburban bus routes are broken and have been for years now but no-one cares. Since Covid things have got worse fast and people are starting to notice. In the North, Blazefield and Go North East in particular have gone off a cliff lately and are doing exactly the same things so it suggests that they've been marginal at best. Some of their cuts have left communities without a bus service without Local Authorities bailing them out.

The system is broken and, unless the tax payer wants to pay for it. things are going to get worse. Arriva were just ahead of the game pretty much. Most of North Yorkshire pretty much doesn't have any form of usable bus service nowadays, just to pick somewhere out.

 

[Statto]

The demise of Arriva on the Wirral over the years has been quite sad to watch. Having taken over from MTL in 2000 the network was shaken up somewhat to shed some dead weight routes not long after takeover. There was some initial investment in fleet (X plate Darts/Cadets and Y reg DAF Myllenniums) but that was it until the CX58 E400s arrived about 7 years later.

Their main competitors were First, having not long taken over from PMT at the time, but First cut back further and further running their network into the ground over the years, giving Arriva the reign over the area. The only other bigger operator was independent Avon buses, who kept to themselves.

Once First ran off and Stagecoach came in Arriva suddenly had competition. A few years later Arriva pulled off the quality partnership Liverpool to Chester route. Stagecoach stepped on Avons toes and eventually they went out of business with Stagecoach taking their picking over some of the Avon routes.

The Crossriver Wirral night bus network has long gone too, disappearing about 7/8 years ago partly due to Merseytravel insisting concessionary passes were accepted meaning it didn't cover its costs.

In 2017 Merseytravel undertook their "Wirral bus network review" which saw Arriva withdraw and alter a chunk of their network (16, 17, 118, 119, 175, 218, 219, 418, 419). Stagecoach of course ended up running the 16/17 commercially once Avon went.

More recently there has been a shake up on times with a lot of frequencies reduced. It shows how easy they had it until some competition showed up.

That's not exactly right, Arriva on the Wirral is one of my local operators, so the 2017 network review, 16, 17 changed operator to Stagecoach, which is a better fit, as Stagecoach operate the Monday to Friday service, the 118, 119, 218, 219 were Merseytravel contracts, which Merseytravel wanted to withdraw them & did so.

418, 419 were commercially run, 418 still is commercially run, not many are going to travel end to end when their is far quicker routes, main traffic objective with the 418 is serving Arrowe Park Hospital & Beechwood Estate to Birkenhead

 

[L401CJF]

That's not exactly right, Arriva on the Wirral is one of my local operators, so the 2017 network review, 16, 17 changed operator to Stagecoach, which is a better fit, as Stagecoach operate the Monday to Friday service, the 118, 119, 218, 219 were Merseytravel contracts, which Merseytravel wanted to withdraw them & did so.

418, 419 were commercially run, 418 still is commercially run, not many are going to travel end to end when their is far quicker routes, main traffic objective with the 418 is serving Arrowe Park Hospital & Beechwood Estate to Birkenhead

What isn't exactly right? I said Merseytravel undertook a bus network review in 2017, which led to Arriva withdrawing/altering a portion of their network - which they did.

I am aware which were tenders and which weren't, I worked there at the time. The point still stands that the network has massively reduced in recent years.

The bus network review in 2017 resulted in Laird St being classed as a medium depot rather than large internally which caused quite a worry for the employees at the time.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Not sure comparing Busways and Northumbria is a fair comparison mind.

One is a complete gold mine with short fares through some of the most dense parts of Newcastle. The other mostly suburban routes other than North Tyneside which had the Metro and Northern to fight with.

Arriva excluding London and maybe Liverpool doesn't really have anything urban like that. First is similar really with a lot of poor suburban areas as well.

Suburban bus routes are broken and have been for years now but no-one cares. Since Covid things have got worse fast and people are starting to notice. In the North, Blazefield and Go North East in particular have gone off a cliff lately and are doing exactly the same things so it suggests that they've been marginal at best. Some of their cuts have left communities without a bus service without Local Authorities bailing them out.

The system is broken and, unless the tax payer wants to pay for it. things are going to get worse. Arriva were just ahead of the game pretty much. Most of North Yorkshire pretty much doesn't have any form of usable bus service nowadays, just to pick somewhere out.

Remember the context in which that discussion was taking place and that Stagecoach had some sort of first mover advantage over Drawlane. The purchase of Stagecoach came much later in 1994.

I don't disagree that Busways is a strong lucrative operation. However, it's not as if Arriva Northumbria was some marginal operation in which they were fighting for scraps. Those North Tyneside routes are the better ones (306/308) and the Blyth -Cramlington - Newcastle routes were known as The Killers as they were so lucrative.

 

[Mwanesh]

Am well versed with the Shires unit. The problems started when it was broken up to Southern Counties and Midlands. I did query how someone in Kent could make decisions for Stevenage or someone in Leicester could do for Luton. The answer was vague. I will give an example of the 101 between Luton and Stevenage those days if there were problems Stevenage end. Luton depot could run it from their end. Nowadays it's impossible with the different operating companies.

 

[MotCO]

Am well versed with the Shires unit. The problems started when it was broken up to Southern Counties and Midlands. I did query how someone in Kent could make decisions for Stevenage or someone in Leicester could do for Luton. The answer was vague. I will give an example of the 101 between Luton and Stevenage those days if there were problems Stevenage end. Luton depot could run it from their end. Nowadays it's impossible with the different operating companies.

Even stuff like Metrobus looks like such a wiser purchase than London & Country in hindsight, for example, which definitely gives you the sense they were making astute choices and perhaps preferring to grow slower than the market leaders, safe in the knowledge that once the dust had settled, they'd be in a strong enough position to hold their own and thus be able to buy other business as they became available, while others, most likely only BB, struggled to deal with their growing pains.

These comments are complementary. Metrobus made a success of Crawley because they were astute, locally focussed and knew their strengths. They were basically still the same outfit which ran the original Metrobus in Orpington, with much eye for detail, innovation, kept high standards, and able to smell out a commercial venture, but with the benefit of access to big group funding.

As @Mwanesh comments, how can you maximise the return on services, create new opportunities, maintain standards, recruit and manage good staff etc from a distance?