Darlington - the nearly full story....
Phase One
Prior to deregulation in mid 1986, Darlington Transport and Eden Bus Services were discussing how to deal with the impending threats and opportunities of D-Day. They decided to run services between Darlington and Newton Aycliffe under the DART brand, with Eden extending their Bishop to N Aycliffe services to Darlington. United responded by moving some VRs to Darlington and run additional shorts on services, and introduced a fast express from Bishop and Darlington to Middlesbrough to head off DTC doing so. At the same time, United introduced a batch of Merc minis on services linking Whinbush with Firth and Brankin Moor, the busiest DTC routes.
At de-reg, there were tender gains and losses on both sides. DTC gained evening and Sunday services to Middlesbrough and Spennymoor whilst United conversely gained Darlington local services on a Sunday. United introduced more minibuses but mainly in Newton Aycliffe but also a route to the suburb of Hummersknott (not a big draw). However, by mid 1987, they introduced more minibuses operating all over the town to outlying estates like Red Hall and Skerne Park and other parts of town not adequately served by DTC's fleet of conventional single deckers (like Broadway). DTC responded by operating to the nearby large village of Hurworth, aided by winning the tender for evening and Sunday journeys and starting their own Newcastle express.
Phase Two
The purchase of United by Caldaire (West Riding) came at the end of 1987 and this signified a pulling back of the worst of bus war. By 1989, United had pulled back on the major competition, still competing on the main Darlington routes and drawing their horns on some more peripheral elements. DTC even began to replace the fleet modestly with new minis and some Nottingham Fleetlines to replace the more esoteric vehicle types.
There were a few tender swaps with United regaining the Middlesbrough Sundays but more significantly, DTC expanded into North Yorkshire. They won the Richmond to Catterick circulars so United registered the daytime part commercially; whilst the tender was largely pulled, DTC ran the full service anyway and did a really good job of it. Later on, they took the Darlington - Richmond - Catterick evening tenders though United then registered Thu-Sat commercially. However, an uneasy peace was established d
Phase Three
Caldaire Holdings directors (4 of them) had a parting of the ways, with two of them taking the NE business as Westcourt Holdings. Outwardly known by three trading IDs (United, Tees and TMS) under the North East Bus banner, they recognised that the NEB fleet needed investment with new bus orders being accompanied by cost cutting on back office. As a result, the United MD (Andy Guest) was made redundant in 1992. He was quite embittered so he decided to strike back with a commercial operation in Darlington called South Durham Bus Co t/a Your Bus using a fleet of Iveco minis (and a couple of Transits).
This provocative action prompted United to respond and so service frequencies on the main routes were uplifted, with minibuses being drafted in from across the NEB fleet . Your Bus continued to expand, United did likewise with hired vehicles from firms like Ingfield Northern Rose whilst DTC were initially caught in the crossfire. However, with United having departed from the truce, DTC responded by buying more deckers from Nottingham, ex GM Leopards and hiring vehicles from West Midlands Travel, Go Ahead Northern, and Chester CT among others and registering more town services as well as routes to Ferryhill and the main route to Richmond and Catterick. For instance, the country run to Richmond and Catterick would see the usual half hourly Optare Vecta on the United X27/X28 behind a former Busways/GM Buses Leopard on the competing 22/22A that was in turn following some archaic United LH on a copy cat 12/12A.
DTC had been funded by a loan from the main shareholder, Darlington Borough Council, who then put DTC up for sale. We all know what then happened in that Yorkshire Traction trumped Stagecoach's bid so Stagecoach flooded the town with free buses drafted in from across their empire, duplicated the registrations by literally using the same paperwork but subtly amended, and poached the vast majority of DTC's drivers with the business turning turtle about three days later. In that environment, Your Bus quickly sold out to North East Bus aka United (by now owned by West Midlands Travel) and the two parties set about de-escalating the battle and retreating to their own pockets but with some areas still being served by both firms. Most Stagecoach operations were town services, but with a substantial schools contract operation and the Newcastle Express that initially prospered with some B10M/PS and then some Interurbans. However, the Express declined markedly and smaller firms swept up the schools work so the Stagecoach operation at sale time was much reduced.
Hope that wasn't too boring