Another historical question...
Was wondering what operators (either NBC or early privatisation, so I'm talking about an approximate date range of 1978-93 or thereabouts, essentially the National and VR-dominated era) had the largest range of route numbers. Just picking that era as it was my 'formative years' for buses; I can't remember buses from as far back as 1978 but picking then as a lot of Nationals and VRs had been introduced by then...
Were there any, for instance, that began with route 1 and went right up to the 900s? Would obviously have to be quite a large company. I am wondering about Midland Red here in particular, as I distinctly remember route numbers in the 8xx range out of Stafford in the 1980s, I think there was an 872 but I may have got this completely wrong.
I am not talking about 'discontinuous' schemes so much, or council-numbered schemes, so I'm discounting cases where most numbers were say 100-499 but there were a few town services in the range 1-10. Similarly, Alder Valley circa 1986 which used numbers up to about 60 for the Guildford and Aldershot areas, and 200+ for everything else would be discounted, and council schemes such as the Avon 500-899 are also discounted.
Likewise schemas (Southdown, say) which used 7xx for expresses would also be discounted unless they also covered 1-699 with regular services. I never knew Southdown's exact range TBH, other than 2xx was used for everything west of Brighton but 7xx for expresses and a lot of routes out of Portsmouth (perhaps because they went via the M275 and were thus part-expresses).
I'm talking specifically about continuous numbering without any large gaps, though small gaps (due to services being withdrawn or introduced from time to time) such as the sequence: 260-268-269-271-273-274-279-280-281-282-283-284-285-286-289 are acceptable. (Bonus points if you can name the operator of this sequence and approximate era!)
Candidates I can think of:
Midland Red (see above), though not sure what their lowest numbers were.
Bristol Omnibus, which I am almost certain went all the way from 1-499 (1-99 Bristol City; 100-199 Weston and Wells; 200-299 Bath; 300-399 Bristol regional; and 400-499 Cheltenham, Gloucester and Swindon, though this was I think separated out into Cheltenham and Gloucester, and Swindon and District fairly early, certainly well within the NBC era - I distinctly recall a red 'Swindon and District' NBC bus sometime in the early 80s).
If one thinks of London Buses and London Country as one entity, then you have 1-499 again.
Any others?
What about restricting it to the early-privatisation era specifically? Due to break-ups of large NBC companies, there were not really any companies with wide geographical area left, and also in the late-80s low numbers tended to become more fashionable. Biggest continuous ranges I can think of for a private company are Wilts and Dorset in the 90s, which went from 1-199 (<100 Salisbury, >100 Poole), and Badgerline using 100-399 for inter-town services (inherited from the Bristol days) and low numbers for town services, primarily Bath, with a gap from around 20-99.
Was wondering what operators (either NBC or early privatisation, so I'm talking about an approximate date range of 1978-93 or thereabouts, essentially the National and VR-dominated era) had the largest range of route numbers. Just picking that era as it was my 'formative years' for buses; I can't remember buses from as far back as 1978 but picking then as a lot of Nationals and VRs had been introduced by then...
Were there any, for instance, that began with route 1 and went right up to the 900s? Would obviously have to be quite a large company. I am wondering about Midland Red here in particular, as I distinctly remember route numbers in the 8xx range out of Stafford in the 1980s, I think there was an 872 but I may have got this completely wrong.
I am not talking about 'discontinuous' schemes so much, or council-numbered schemes, so I'm discounting cases where most numbers were say 100-499 but there were a few town services in the range 1-10. Similarly, Alder Valley circa 1986 which used numbers up to about 60 for the Guildford and Aldershot areas, and 200+ for everything else would be discounted, and council schemes such as the Avon 500-899 are also discounted.
Likewise schemas (Southdown, say) which used 7xx for expresses would also be discounted unless they also covered 1-699 with regular services. I never knew Southdown's exact range TBH, other than 2xx was used for everything west of Brighton but 7xx for expresses and a lot of routes out of Portsmouth (perhaps because they went via the M275 and were thus part-expresses).
I'm talking specifically about continuous numbering without any large gaps, though small gaps (due to services being withdrawn or introduced from time to time) such as the sequence: 260-268-269-271-273-274-279-280-281-282-283-284-285-286-289 are acceptable. (Bonus points if you can name the operator of this sequence and approximate era!)
Candidates I can think of:
Midland Red (see above), though not sure what their lowest numbers were.
Bristol Omnibus, which I am almost certain went all the way from 1-499 (1-99 Bristol City; 100-199 Weston and Wells; 200-299 Bath; 300-399 Bristol regional; and 400-499 Cheltenham, Gloucester and Swindon, though this was I think separated out into Cheltenham and Gloucester, and Swindon and District fairly early, certainly well within the NBC era - I distinctly recall a red 'Swindon and District' NBC bus sometime in the early 80s).
If one thinks of London Buses and London Country as one entity, then you have 1-499 again.
Any others?
What about restricting it to the early-privatisation era specifically? Due to break-ups of large NBC companies, there were not really any companies with wide geographical area left, and also in the late-80s low numbers tended to become more fashionable. Biggest continuous ranges I can think of for a private company are Wilts and Dorset in the 90s, which went from 1-199 (<100 Salisbury, >100 Poole), and Badgerline using 100-399 for inter-town services (inherited from the Bristol days) and low numbers for town services, primarily Bath, with a gap from around 20-99.