Cities with duplicated bus numbers

Old Yard Dog · 17 Apr 2018

Chester is probably in a league of its own for duplicated route numbers. It has three high frequency number 1's running north, south and west to Liverpool, Wrexham and Blacon (plus a 1A to Blacon, and an X1, DB1 and PR1). The 1's are all operated by Stagecoach and/or Arriva. Can any other city compete with this?

The reasons are largely historical and hark back to Crosville and Chester Corporation days, but surely the time has come to sort this confusing situation out.

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TheGrandWazoo · 17 Apr 2018

Old Yard Dog said:
Chester is probably in a league of its own for duplicated route numbers. It has three high frequency number 1's running north, south and west to Liverpool, Wrexham and Blacon (plus a 1A to Blacon, and an X1, DB1 and PR1). The 1's are all operated by Stagecoach and/or Arriva. Can any other city compete with this?

The reasons are largely historical and hark back to Crosville and Chester Corporation days, but surely the time has come to sort this confusing situation out.

Bristol has the 1, A1, X1, U1, AG1 and, having lost the X1a is now getting the m1 and T1.

backontrack · 17 Apr 2018

Stagecoach South East operates two different number 11s, if that counts - one from Canterbury to Broadstairs via Plucks Gutter, and the other from Ashford to New Romney via Ham Street.

TheGrandWazoo · 17 Apr 2018

backontrack said:
Stagecoach South East operates two different number 11s, if that counts - one from Canterbury to Broadstairs via Plucks Gutter, and the other from Ashford to New Romney via Ham Street.

Lots of firms duplicate numbers.

This is specifically about cities (and perhaps towns), where numbers and variations of, are duplicated.

158756 · 17 Apr 2018

Accrington, a fairly small town, has two 9s from Transdev and Pilkington, and a 9A as a variant of Pilkington's. Burnley has the 1, M1 and soon V1 (a works bus, but is advertised online) and used to have 1A,1B and 1C, all from the same operator.

edwin_m · 17 Apr 2018

Nottingham has two 9s, Kinch to Loughborough and NCT to Wilford Hill. They have several stops in common on the way.

Adlington · 17 Apr 2018

Old Yard Dog said:
It has three high frequency number 1's [...] plus a 1A to Blacon, and an X1, DB1 and PR1

In my (simplistic) mind, 1, 1A, X1, DB1, PR1 or any <letter(s)>1 are different route designations. If somebody is told to take a DB1 bus, is (s)he really likely to board an X1, or "plain" 1, instead?

Andyh82 · 17 Apr 2018

158756 said:
Accrington, a fairly small town, has two 9s from Transdev and Pilkington, and a 9A as a variant of Pilkington's. Burnley has the 1, M1 and soon V1 (a works bus, but is advertised online) and used to have 1A,1B and 1C, all from the same operator.

The 1 and M1 are not the same number.

As pointed out elsewhere from this week, Leeds now has two 7s, as Transdev renumbered the 70 to 7 and there is already a First 7

plcd1 · 17 Apr 2018

There are endless examples of route number duplication in Tyne and Wear. Go North East numbers overlap with Arriva North East and both overlap with Stagecoach "town" services. I appreciate commercial bus companies like to use "simple" numbers but there used to be a logical number structure across Tyne and Wear that stretched into Northumberland and County Durham but not any more. Of course if you go back far enough you can find the old Northern General and United Auto route numbering that was not unlike the deregulated numbering schemes in some areas.

transmanche · 17 Apr 2018

Newcastle is terrible for this. There are two of each of routes: 1, 10, 11, 12, 45, 46, 54, X9, X10, X30, X85. And three of route 6 and X21.

To make it even more confusing, one set of the 45, 46, X9, X10, X21 and X30 serve Haymarket Bus Station and the other set serve Eldon Square Bus Station - the two bus stations are next door to each other and share a common bus stop numbering scheme. On the streets, both 1s serve the same stop in Pilgrim Street and the duplicate X85s serve the same stop in Eldon Square Bus Station.

In most cases, it's Go North East who have renumbered their routes to duplicate existing numbers.

matt_world2004 · 17 Apr 2018

The N7 crosses the London boundary into Heathrow Airport and the N7 runs from Northolt to central London.

Smethwickian · 17 Apr 2018

WMPTE eliminated duplicate numbers from the ex-Corporation legacy with a logical series across the county but NatExWM has steadily undone all that such that there are many examples of potential confusion. Taking Birmingham's city boundaries alone, there are two 6s (Birmingham to Solihull AND Sutton Coldfield to Walsall}, two 25s (Erdington to Ward End AND Kingstanding to Bloxwich), etc etc. Some are barely two miles apart: the 46 runs from West Bromwich to Great Barr AND nearby Perry Barr to Birmingham city centre.

gingerheid · 17 Apr 2018

Not quite a duplication unless you have dodgy eyesight, but Stagecoach run an 8 and a B down Histon Rd in Cambridge (and the 8s stop but the Bs are non-stop...).

Statto · 17 Apr 2018

matt_world2004 said:
The N7 crosses the London boundary into Heathrow Airport and the N7 runs from Northolt to central London.

Not anymore the Slough N7 was withdrawn a couple of months ago.

Even London there are quite a few duplicated numbers, TFL numbers, duplicating with commercial services mostly the former London Country numberss that have been rebranded into local numbers, like there's 3 no 8s,
8 Tottenham Court Road-Bow, TFL.
8 Mount Vernon Hospital-Abbots Langley, Arriva.
8 Slough-Heathrow, First Berkshire.

Typhoon · 17 Apr 2018

Smethwickian said:
WMPTE eliminated duplicate numbers from the ex-Corporation legacy with a logical series across the county but NatExWM has steadily undone all that such that there are many examples of potential confusion. Taking Birmingham's city boundaries alone, there are two 6s (Birmingham to Solihull AND Sutton Coldfield to Walsall}, two 25s (Erdington to Ward End AND Kingstanding to Bloxwich), etc etc. Some are barely two miles apart: the 46 runs from West Bromwich to Great Barr AND nearby Perry Barr to Birmingham city centre.

Thank you saving me a job.

I noticed this when looking at a bus map recently, having lived in the city for almost 40 years until the turn of the decade. Its absolute madness - if you live locally it is fine(ish) but for visitors it must be a nightmare. The previous system made sense:-
up to 100 - Birmingham
100s - Birmingham long distance
200s - Black Country (Dudley)
300s - Walsall
400s - West Brom
500s - Wolverhampton.

I would add to your list 96 - one terminates at Chelmsley Wood (from Kingstanding), the other at Sheldon (from Hall Green).

route101 · 17 Apr 2018

Glasgow has two 38s McGills and the real 38 First .Both just about there most frequent routes

Bletchleyite · 17 Apr 2018

Bedford used to have a couple because two MK town routes were extended to Bedford. They were promoted in Bedford as MK<number> but that wasn't what was on the bus.

Tetchytyke · 17 Apr 2018

transmanche said:
the duplicate X85s serve the same stop in Eldon Square Bus Station

To be fair, the two duplicate X85s also go to the same place as one (Go) is a direct competitor to the original (Arriva).

But Go have made a mess of the numbering in Newcastle, especially as so many of the different services use the same or nearby stops.

overthewater · 17 Apr 2018

Edinburgh has a few:

Lothian: 21, 22, 27, 28, 38
First: 21, 22, 27, 28, 38

During the bus war there had the exact same numbers along the same routes, and the 44 stayed that way until the First pulled the route off.

It was a bit worse for period within First Scotland east, Falkirk and West lothian were all renumbered to the 1-20, it was stupid, thankful West Lothian got renumbered again into the 20'0/30's which is close enough to be fair.

overthewater · 17 Apr 2018

Arctic Troll said:
But Go have made a mess of the numbering in Newcastle, especially as so many of the different services use the same or nearby stops.

I thought most of the routes now have names?

W-on-Sea · 17 Apr 2018

A small city, but St Andrews has two route 92s - one run by Stagecoach, and one run by Moffat & Wiliamson.

Dai Corner · 17 Apr 2018

Here in Newport we have the Newport Transport 15 to the Bettws estate, Stagecoach 15 to Cwmbran and Pontypool and Stagecoach X15 to Brynmawr (a completely different route to their 15).

transmanche · 17 Apr 2018

plcd1 said:
I appreciate commercial bus companies like to use "simple" numbers but there used to be a logical number structure across Tyne and Wear that stretched into Northumberland and County Durham but not any more.

Indeed! And from memory it was something like this:

up to 99 Newcastle/Gateshead
1xx Sunderland
2xx East Durham
3xx North Tyneside/Cramlington area
4xx Northumberland
5xx South Tyneside
6xx Tyne Valley
7xx West Durham
9xx Works' services

Tetchytyke · 17 Apr 2018

overthewater said:
I thought most of the routes now have names?

Some have brand names, of a fashion, but the routes are numbered.

transmanche · 17 Apr 2018

Arctic Troll said:
To be fair, the two duplicate X85s also go to the same place as one (Go) is a direct competitor to the original (Arriva).

Well they both go to Hexham, but one continues to Newbrough and the other to Highford Park.

(Do both X85s follow the same route and serve the same stops along the way? I know the GNE X85 follows a slightly different route to the 685.)

Arctic Troll said:
But Go have made a mess of the numbering in Newcastle, especially as so many of the different services use the same or nearby stops.

Indeed!

overthewater said:
I thought most of the routes now have names?

Most GNE routes have route branding (which annoyingly seems to change frequently) but they all still have numbers. Branding is often shared amongst groups of routes; such as 45/46/47 Red Kite, or 6/6A/X30/X31/X70/X71 Toon Link.

ChathillMan · 17 Apr 2018

transmanche said:
Newcastle is terrible for this. There are two of each of routes: 1, 10, 11, 12, 45, 46, 54, X9, X10, X30, X85. And three of route 6 and X21.

To make it even more confusing, one set of the 45, 46, X9, X10, X21 and X30 serve Haymarket Bus Station and the other set serve Eldon Square Bus Station - the two bus stations are next door to each other and share a common bus stop numbering scheme. On the streets, both 1s serve the same stop in Pilgrim Street and the duplicate X85s serve the same stop in Eldon Square Bus Station.

In most cases, it's Go North East who have renumbered their routes to duplicate existing numbers.

I remember when the GNE Pink Angel 22 operated, it used the same stop as the Stagecoach 22 on Grainger Street. Lunacy by GNE

TheGrandWazoo · 17 Apr 2018

transmanche said:
Indeed! And from memory it was something like this:

up to 99 Newcastle/Gateshead
1xx Sunderland
2xx East Durham
3xx North Tyneside/Cramlington area
4xx Northumberland
5xx South Tyneside
6xx Tyne Valley
7xx West Durham
9xx Works' services

A reasonable summary/remembering Paul, but not quite as clear cut!

500-510 for the Great North Road expresses in Northumberland. 8** were schools services.

In Co Durham, there were also 1-99 which were vaguely

United 1-20 Bishop Auckland
United 21-37 Darlington and Richmond
United 40-65 Durham City
United 68-70 Sedgefield (inherited from Wilkinsons)
United 72-80 Darlington to Northallerton/Teesdale
OK 81-90
Eden 91-99

2** were East Durham but only up to 250! 251+ were United's Teesside services.

Note: Darlington had two number 1s - United had Darlington to Tow Law whilst Darlington Transport ran from Harrowgate Hill to Red Hall. Shocker o_O

Jordan Adam · 17 Apr 2018

In Aberdeen there's 2 that i can think of.

First Aberdeens N17: CityCentre - Stoneywood/Dyce
Stagecoach NScotland N17: CityCentre - Westhill

First Aberdeen 62: Harlaw Academy - Auchinyell Bridge / Bridge Of Dee
Stagecoach NScotland 62: CityCentre - Ellon Park & Ride.

To make matters worse both N17s are night buses (as you'd expect) and they use the same stops in the city centre. Luckily outbound journeys are on opposite sides of the road though!

transmanche · 17 Apr 2018

TheGrandWazoo said:
A reasonable summary/remembering Paul, but not quite as clear cut!

500-510 for the Great North Road expresses in Northumberland.

Weren't those just because of the joint United/Scottish Newcastle-Edinburgh services? I guess they must have fitted into the Scottish company's numbering system, as they duplicated the route numbers of PTE services in the South Shields area.

tbtc · 17 Apr 2018

Sheffield used to have a number, as the "out of town" services shared numbers with "city" services (e.g. the Chesterfield/ East Midlands/ Stagecoach 43/ 44/ 50/ 53/ 55/ 56 from Derbyshire shared numbers with the SYT/ Mainline/ First local services in the city).

Whilst it's maybe understandable to have multiple services with a single digit number (e.g. the "1"s in Chester that the OP refers to), we've also had some historic duplication of unusual numbers (e.g. the 143 at Meadowhall, where the "Sheffield" network and the "Rotherham" network overlapped).

However things have been rationalised (which, I understand is a posh way of saying "many services withdrawn"), so that there's only one number I can think of where two different services use the same number at the same place - First and Stagecoach both run a 72 at Sheffield Interchange - both services run along the Parkway (the First service towards Meadowhall, the Stagecoach one towards Chesterfield - whilst they don't share any other stops, they are both relatively recent numbers as the operators have renumbered tranches of services - First run/ran the 70/71/72/73/74 in Brinsworth, Stagecoach run/ran the 70/71/72/74/77 from Chesterfield towards Brimington - so it's maybe harder to renumber one service in isolation). There's a third "72" in Sheffield, but this doesn't serve the city centre (the "Yorkshire Tiger" aka Arriva service from Chapletown to Manvers in Barnsley).

gingerheid said:
Not quite a duplication unless you have dodgy eyesight, but Stagecoach run an 8 and a B down Histon Rd in Cambridge (and the 8s stop but the Bs are non-stop...).

That reminds me - I know someone who boarded a LRT/ Lothian 4A instead of a 44 (both running from Princes Street towards Willowbrae Rad) back in the '90s due to similar confusion

W-on-Sea said:
A small city, but St Andrews has two route 92s - one run by Stagecoach, and one run by Moffat & Wiliamson.

Good shout - whilst a lot of services around St Andrews have traditionally started with a nine, it seems daft to have two (different) ninety twos in such a small place.

Cities with duplicated bus numbers

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