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Bus route numbers

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NorthOxonian

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When did the suffix E started being used mainly for short journeys, my area Wirral, suffix E was used for PTE journeys to or near Laird Street or Seaview Road garage, A & B were still used in the early 80s for other short journeys, short journeys in Manchester used the already mentioned suffix X.

Weirdly, I've only seen the prefix E used in the context of differing evening routes - the current Go North East route 45E runs from Newcastle to Consett but runs via the route of the 47 as far as Blackhall Mill, then rejoins the 45 route again. In terms of mileage and time, it's actually a longer journey.
 
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DavidGrain

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West Midlands PTE quite early on, I reckon, mid seventies. I can remember timetable books that used spare space at the bottom of timetable books to claim that 'E (stands) for Exception'. I can remember one such book for North Division with a picture of a Bristol VRT on the cover. It is more likely to have been a newer vehicle, I would have thought. The PTE would have had a problem as Birmingham delighted in suffixes; if you take Alcester Road services, those terminating at Queensbridge had one suffix - possibly H), terminating at Kings Heath had a J suffix (like 49J), Alcester Lanes End K suffix, Maypole (possibly L), etc. Journeys that turned short of the City centre would also have a suffix so St Martin's Circus might be 'A'. To replicate this across the complete West Midlands would have been a nightmare. So, I guess they simplified the process by using 'E'. Incidentally there were routes where the 'E' journeys outnumbered those without a suffix; so much for exception.

Actually as far as WMPTE was concerned this goes back to Birmingham Corporation Days probably in the 1960s.
Taking the no. 9 Quinton service as an example I think it was 9A Town Hall (this would be inbound service) 9B Five Ways (I remember this when I was working at Five Ways, myself and other young men would in our lunchtime go into the city centre to watch the girls sunbathing in Pigeon Park (St Philips Churchyard) then catch a 9B back to work, 9C was Ivy Bush, 9D was Bearwood Kings Head and 9E was Holly Bush. 9E became the regular short working as it was where the buses turned off the route to go to Quinton Garage.

All this was a change from the previous practice of Birmingham Corporation which was to display Birmingham's favourite destination 'Service Extra' so you had to stop the bus to ask the conductor where the bus was going. Imagine this on Broad Street with about 8 routes sharing the same stop.
 

Dai Corner

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Mention of suffixes reminds me that Bristol used to use 'c' for journeys terminating in the city centre on what was normally a cross-city route. I'm pretty sure other letters were used for other variations too.
 

Deerfold

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Mention of suffixes reminds me that Bristol used to use 'c' for journeys terminating in the city centre on what was normally a cross-city route. I'm pretty sure other letters were used for other variations too.

When Nottingham City Transport ran mostly cross city routes in the 90s they did this too. They were most common on final services of the night and early evening as frequencies dropped. Other letters indicated other short running, usually A and B.
 

Mutant Lemming

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I vaguely recall that although Merthyr Corporation didn't use route numbers on buses but did have letters on some stops in the centre indicating the destination - ABCD for the Abercanaid route kind of stood out.
 

carlberry

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Mention of suffixes reminds me that Bristol used to use 'c' for journeys terminating in the city centre on what was normally a cross-city route. I'm pretty sure other letters were used for other variations too.
Only a few! A, B, D and E on some routes, C for central area, F, H, J or K for various factories and L for any other short working (local).
 

Statto

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Been looking at night bus numbers, London was originally 284 to 299, then renumbered into the prefix N series in 1960, the N series has stayed, but 24 hour bus concept saw routes with 24 hour branding with the N dropped. Edinburgh has prefix N for there night routes, some areas had/have 95 to 100. West Midlands finished with suffix N. Other areas did not renumber there routes, GMPTE area being one were they kept daytime numbers.
 

tbtc

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Edinburgh has prefix N for there night routes

IIRC Edinburgh used to have the 101-106 on Sunday to Thursday nights and the (improved) 202-206 on Friday and Saturday nights. Or could have been the other way round. But the routes were different to the "day" routes (with no attempt to mirror the numbers) and there was an enhanced service for the two busiest nights of the week. I think the Sunday-Thursday services were hourly from Waverley Bridge, but the overall network was nothing like as good as nowadays.

Sheffield had night buses in the nine hundreds, generally departures from the city centre at midnight and 02:20 IIRC (last departures in Sheffield were 23:15 for pretty much all routes, I think all Rotherham departures were at 22:45) - the days when pubs and nightclubs all closed at predictable hours made it a lot easier to find a critical mass of passengers for late services.

Then, in Sheffield, there were early morning services, numbered in the seven hundreds, a combination of more than one route in the same area, some big looping services ticking various boxes to ensure that people had some way of getting to their early shifts.

It's a tricky balance, the simplicity of replicating daytime services versus the need to spread resources over different suburban branches, whether passengers would rather have a regular late/early service on a handful of main corridors or have unfamiliar numbered routes (i.e. not replicating the "day" ones) that loop round to try to serve as many places as possible.

Didn't Reading stop their regular services around nine/ten at night and run "night" routes after that time? Or did they abandon that plan?
 

Busaholic

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Been looking at night bus numbers, London was originally 284 to 299, then renumbered into the prefix N series in 1960, the N series has stayed, but 24 hour bus concept saw routes with 24 hour branding with the N dropped. Edinburgh has prefix N for there night routes, some areas had/have 95 to 100. West Midlands finished with suffix N. Other areas did not renumber there routes, GMPTE area being one were they kept daytime numbers.
You're absolutely right. but I'll just add a little more detail, if I may. Night routes had been 285 to 298 until the third and fourth stages of the trolleybus replacement brought in the 284 and 299 numbers respectively, there being quite a famous picture of the first journey on the 284 as it was the first ever Routemaster bus replacing a trolleybus in the very early hours of 11th November 1959. Later trolleybus replacement saw numbers up to 283 being required for new bus routes, so a new system for night route numbers was needed, so that 285 etc could be used as 'ordinary' numbers. The 285 number could then be used in the final trolleybus replacement stage at Kingston in place of the 605 trolley: a shame that the 685 trolleybus in the East End had earlier to become 58 as 285 was then still a night route. There were a very few day routes that were officially classed as night routes too, using their day numbers, the majority of which had been new tram replacement routes in the early 1950s, such as the 168, 177 and 182, though the allocation of buses was taken from the day routes (usually only one or two buses.)
 

Statto

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You're absolutely right. but I'll just add a little more detail, if I may. Night routes had been 285 to 298 until the third and fourth stages of the trolleybus replacement brought in the 284 and 299 numbers respectively, there being quite a famous picture of the first journey on the 284 as it was the first ever Routemaster bus replacing a trolleybus in the very early hours of 11th November 1959. Later trolleybus replacement saw numbers up to 283 being required for new bus routes, so a new system for night route numbers was needed, so that 285 etc could be used as 'ordinary' numbers. The 285 number could then be used in the final trolleybus replacement stage at Kingston in place of the 605 trolley: a shame that the 685 trolleybus in the East End had earlier to become 58 as 285 was then still a night route. There were a very few day routes that were officially classed as night routes too, using their day numbers, the majority of which had been new tram replacement routes in the early 1950s, such as the 168, 177 and 182, though the allocation of buses was taken from the day routes (usually only one or two buses.)


That's a shame that LT felt the need to renumber the trolleybus routes, they were in the 5xx & 6xx series weren't they, but in a way maybe just as well, as they'd be needed now, 6xx for schools.


Speaking of schools, Merseyside area school routes are 6xx or 7xx, the system came in after d-reg, as before d-reg the numbers were more or less normal main all day number sometimes with the suffix letter added at the end, quite a few other areas have different number schemes for schools as well.
 

56 1/2

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I'm surprised no one has mentioned the trend of Airport services having 7x7 numbers, obviously referencing Boeing's Aircraft range. x00 numbers are also common for Airport routes.

Greenline 727 was the first in about 1968, early publicity included pictures of airplanes and an invocation to fly to ?Barbados? by 727 change at Heathrow
 

noddingdonkey

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First Huddersfield have a bit of an anomaly from the usual 3xx in the Huddersfield-Marsden corridor.

The old 365 Huddersfield-Oldham was replaced by a 184 Manchester-Huddersfield, operated by First Manchester about 10 years ago. Huddersfield replaced the 348-352 with 181-186, and used the same purple line branding Manchester were using for the 184.

Somebody mentioned a service M62 Leeds-White Rose-Halifax which was a joint effort between Leeds and Halifax depots and routed via the motorway. There was previously a service M1 Huddersfield to Sheffield via Meadowhell - you can guess the route it took.
 

Dai Corner

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Talking of school services, Newport Transport use the JF prefix for John Frost School and SJ for St Joseph's. They are registered local bus services though the drivers don't seem to realise and won't let ordinary passengers board, even in the afternoon when half the children have got off and there are plenty of seats.
 

Statto

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First Huddersfield have a bit of an anomaly from the usual 3xx in the Huddersfield-Marsden corridor.

The old 365 Huddersfield-Oldham was replaced by a 184 Manchester-Huddersfield, operated by First Manchester about 10 years ago. Huddersfield replaced the 348-352 with 181-186, and used the same purple line branding Manchester were using for the 184.

Somebody mentioned a service M62 Leeds-White Rose-Halifax which was a joint effort between Leeds and Halifax depots and routed via the motorway. There was previously a service M1 Huddersfield to Sheffield via Meadowhell - you can guess the route it took.

I remember the 365 extending to Manchester, this was a Saturday only extension in the late 80s.

When the 365 was merged & became the 184, you could use First day tickets on Firstbus throughout Greater Manchester & West Yorkshire, you could also use the same ticket on Firstbus in South Yorkshire as well, that was great value for money.
 

PeterC

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Greenline 727 was the first in about 1968, early publicity included pictures of airplanes and an invocation to fly to ?Barbados? by 727 change at Heathrow
A little earlier, I have a Green Line map from 1967 which shows the route.
 

Mal

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Speaking of schools, Merseyside area school routes are 6xx or 7xx, the system came in after d-reg, as before d-reg the numbers were more or less normal main all day number sometimes with the suffix letter added at the end, quite a few other areas have different number schemes for schools as well.

Arriva still operates a 699 from Carnatic Student Village - L'pool University - Liverpool city centre. I believe it is open to the public, but may be wrong.
 

Ken H

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The Hadrians Wall tourist bus is AD122

Its the year Hadrian ordered the wall to be built
 

Mwanesh

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Talking of school services, Newport Transport use the JF prefix for John Frost School and SJ for St Joseph's. They are registered local bus services though the drivers don't seem to realise and won't let ordinary passengers board, even in the afternoon when half the children have got off and there are plenty of seats.
Having driven those buses with school kids i am sure no sane passenger would want to be stuck with the school lot. They are drivers who would rather go home than school runs.
 

Dai Corner

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Having driven those buses with school kids i am sure no sane passenger would want to be stuck with the school lot. They are drivers who would rather go home than school runs.

I used to work in a school so am used to kids (and know which names to drop if they misbehave!). I'd have put up with them for the 10 mins journey I wanted to make rather than wait for the next service bus which turned out to be standing room only.
 

Deerfold

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I remember the 365 extending to Manchester, this was a Saturday only extension in the late 80s.

When the 365 was merged & became the 184, you could use First day tickets on Firstbus throughout Greater Manchester & West Yorkshire, you could also use the same ticket on Firstbus in South Yorkshire as well, that was great value for money.

I used to use the FirstDay ticket in GM and WY. Annoyingly, it wasn't valid on the short section of route X84 in North Yorkshire - this made it one of the most expensive sections of route they ran for regular or long distance passengers, and I suspect may have reduced its use and contributed to the removal of evening, Sunday and peak time extra services between Ilkley and Skipton.
 

Deerfold

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Somebody mentioned a service M62 Leeds-White Rose-Halifax which was a joint effort between Leeds and Halifax depots and routed via the motorway. There was previously a service M1 Huddersfield to Sheffield via Meadowhell - you can guess the route it took.

In its later years, the M62 only called at White Rose in one direction. If you wanted to travel White Rose to Halifax you had to travel via Leeds.

The M1 only ran briefly to Sheffield before being curtailed at Meadowhall. I sometimes used to travel back to University using it (900 Ripponden to Huddersfield, M1 Huddersfield to Sheffield, Stagecoach 737 Meadowhall - Nottingham) - could be quicker than National Express as I had to get to Leeds to catch that (and at the time train connections at Sheffield were even slower).
 

daodao

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I remember the 365 extending to Manchester, this was a Saturday only extension in the late 80s.

When the 365 was merged & became the 184, you could use First day tickets on Firstbus throughout Greater Manchester & West Yorkshire, you could also use the same ticket on Firstbus in South Yorkshire as well, that was great value for money.

I once caught a bus on route 184 (destination Huddersfield) to travel from Piccadilly to Newton Heath for a meeting at a hotel there. The driver didn't have a clue about the bus stops on Oldham Road so was uncertain of the appropriate single fare to charge.
 

PeterC

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I vaguely recall that although Merthyr Corporation didn't use route numbers on buses but did have letters on some stops in the centre indicating the destination - ABCD for the Abercanaid route kind of stood out.
Not displaying route numbers used to be common in South Wales. Very occasionally there would be "via ....... " under the final destination. I found out the Western Welsh route numbers where my aunt lived by looking at the big timetable boards that were displayed in a few locations. "Helpfully" they displayed all the routes in the area without any indication of which stopped where you were and which were using the parallel road on the other side of the valley.
 

noddingdonkey

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I once caught a bus on route 184 (destination Huddersfield) to travel from Piccadilly to Newton Heath for a meeting at a hotel there. The driver didn't have a clue about the bus stops on Oldham Road so was uncertain of the appropriate single fare to charge.

It's always fun when there are roadworks in Huddersfield centre, the 184 drivers never seem to be aware of the diversions and often get stuck
 

Deerfold

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I once caught a bus on route 184 (destination Huddersfield) to travel from Piccadilly to Newton Heath for a meeting at a hotel there. The driver didn't have a clue about the bus stops on Oldham Road so was uncertain of the appropriate single fare to charge.

I often have a West Yorkshire ticket when I get the 184.

Drivers rarely know what to charge me for the rest of the trip. As I catch it rarely and First don't publicise the fares I don't know if I've ever paid the right fare. I have been sold a child fare once (whilst in my 40s).
 

NorthernSpirit

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I used to use the FirstDay ticket in GM and WY. Annoyingly, it wasn't valid on the short section of route X84 in North Yorkshire - this made it one of the most expensive sections of route they ran for regular or long distance passengers, and I suspect may have reduced its use and contributed to the removal of evening, Sunday and peak time extra services between Ilkley and Skipton.

Hasn't that restriction since been removed, therefore the First Day is valid to Skipton?

I often have a West Yorkshire ticket when I get the 184.

Drivers rarely know what to charge me for the rest of the trip. As I catch it rarely and First don't publicise the fares I don't know if I've ever paid the right fare. I have been sold a child fare once (whilst in my 40s).

I've been sold a child single once whilst travelling from Brunt Clough Reservoir (where the Pennine Way crosses just west of Standedge Cutting) to Huddersfield, and yet I'm in my early 30's!

The West Yorkshire First Day is valid for the whole route, Metro tickets are not though.

I've been told of two boundary points on the 184, one was where the Great Western pub is/was and the other was Brunt Clough Res - even I'm not sure. Although interestinly when Stagecoach ran the 20 (and eventally the 25) between Holmfirth and Barnsley/Penistone, the boundary was suppose to be Snittlegate, Flight Hill/Dunford Road but I was told by two drivers, that as far as they knew, Metro products were valid as far as Dunford Bridge.

I'm sure that there was an oddity when First York ran the long withdrawn X64 between York and Leeds, that the Leeds FirstDay's weren't valid on it and neither was the York FirstDay's despite First York running it.
 

TheGrandWazoo

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I used to use the FirstDay ticket in GM and WY. Annoyingly, it wasn't valid on the short section of route X84 in North Yorkshire - this made it one of the most expensive sections of route they ran for regular or long distance passengers, and I suspect may have reduced its use and contributed to the removal of evening, Sunday and peak time extra services between Ilkley and Skipton.

Sadly, it was NYCC pulling the subsidy that meant the X84 was axed on evenings and Sundays as happened over much of the county.
 
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