Eastern Scottish (inc SMT/ City Sprinter etc) in the 1980/ early 1990s

[tbtc]

Rather than derail the existing thread about McGills, I thought that there was enough discussion/ interest in that older era to warrant a separate thread

There’s been a lot said about Lothian/ LRT during this period but I don’t think I’ve seen any publication devoted to the “green” buses during the same decades (certainly some historic stuff, but nothing post deregulation from what I’d seen)

(For arguments sakes, I’m defining this as any Eastern Scottish services, between 1980 and the takeover by Grampian in 1994, so pre/ post deregulation, the end years of the SBG, the brief independence and rebranding as SMT in the early 1990s)

I lived near Edinburgh at the time, but visits were sporadic, and visits involving the travel office at St Andrew Square Bus Station even rarer (compared to the LRT timetables that could be picked up at Waverley Bridge/ Hanover Street etc), so my knowledge has a lot of gaps, as you’ll see!

A few questions to set the ball rolling (bearing in mind that this was thirty/ forty years ago, and I was never an expert at the time and have forgotten much over the decades…)

1. Eastern/ SMT shrunk over the years (having previously operated from the east end of Glasgow to the English border). I get the argument for chopping it up, given plans to privatise etc, but what did the Linlithgow depot do (before being given to Midland, as they themselves lost various depots to Strathtay/ Kelvin)? Was it just some journeys on the (Stirling?) Falkirk - Linlithgow - A8 - Edinburgh corridor, on a service shared with Midland, plus token infrequent services to Bo’ness? Or did the through running off what were now call the 38/X38 only happen later, and Eastern ran everything east of Linlithgow?

2. The setting up of Lowland Scottish always felt a bit awkward to me, especially in East Lothian, which had nothing much to do with the “core” operation in the Borders (a handful of 104s between Dunbar and the Eyemouth area aside) and created a delicate situation where they had to co-exist with Eastern. Would it have made more sense to give Lowland the Musselburgh depot too, to give them a critical mass in East Lothian? A lot of the redistribution of depots seemed logical (whilst Linlithgow is obviously in West Lothian, in bus terms it fitted better with Midland… I understand the setting up of some of the new companies to create “sellable” packages/ allow more focus in certain areas… but the East Lothian area never seemed big enough for Eastern and Lowland plus the inevitable expansion of LRT post October 1986

3. When the original City Sprinter routes were set up in 1986, my memory is that one of the services (C6?) didn’t go into the city centre (running something like Leith - Lochend - Northfield Broadway - Niddrie?). Sounds “brave” (as they’d say on Yes Minister)… did that last very long, or was it quickly abandoned?

4. We saw on the other thread that the Penicuik buses ran through to Balerno. Some cross-city stuff seemed to work well because it lasted a long time (the 129 linking it’s established eastern section to the Western General and Silverknowes, the 86 going being the city centre to the Zoo/ Corstorphine) some cross city stuff didn’t last too long (certain 16s from Bathgate running to Leith Walk/ Lochend). What did you like/ dislike? I think that there was a complicated equivalent to the LRT 2/12/21 Broomhouse loop, where the “rosewell” and “Gorebridge via Newbattle” routes (79/80?) ran a coordinated fifteen minute service from Gilmerton - Bridges - Princes St - Gorgie Road - Stenhouse - Broomhouse then became a 64A/ 70 and continued via Corstorphine - Murrayfield - Princes Street - Liberton - Burdiehouse (and on to Loanhead/ Roslin/ Penicuik). Am I imagining this, or inferring wrongly from the limited timetable I had access to during that era, or was it really a through bus from Rosewell to Roslin via far flung Broomhouse? Corrections welcome!

5. What seems the most niche corridor to compete on, in hindsight? Or route that had multiple operators but now no commercial service exists? I think that winning the tender for the 38 (Crewe Toll - Balgreen - Morningside - Cameron Toll, similar to the current day Lothian route) encouraged Eastern to directly compete against the eastern bit of the LRT 32/52 by calling their service the 38/58 and continuing beyond Cameron Toll to serve Niddrie - ASDA - Portobello - Lochend - Leith - Granton and back to Crewe Toll that way - with the 58 running clockwise). This was in an era before the new Infirmary/ Ocean Terminal, places which have massively improved the case for some “orbital” links, it felt strange - to me - that they’d choose to compete with the Outer Circle felt a strange decision to me

6. When did routes other than the C5/ C55 become minibus operated? From memory, the C5 was the only one of the C1-C9 to be minibus run, later supplemented by the parallel C55, but a few years later the C1/ C2/ C3 still existed (at at least one end of their 1986 route), and were minibus run. So was there a “second phase” of changes where dozens more minibuses flooded Princes Street (and the C4/ C6/ C7/ C8/ C9 were scrapped)? Or did it happen in phases?

7. Other than the aforementioned C55 and the C12 (City - South Gyle, contra- peak journeys, maybe run by vehicles that had run rush hour expresses from West Lothian and were otherwise running empty to the depot?), the C50 (C5s that served Barberton) which other “C” services were double digit numbers? I ask because the “big bus” routes tended to stay as regular numbers without any prefix

8. Was Lothian always guaranteed to win? Some days I tell myself that Eastern Scottish were bound to lose territory to the “city” operator. They were hamstrung by the costs of a city centre depot (New Street) and the separate bus station too, it was easy for LRT to extend frequent urban services beyond termini like Eastfield/ Gilmerton/burdiehouse into East Lothian/ Midlothian, Eastern were trying to compete for Edinburgh passengers on short distance journeys with “big” buses more suited to longer distance operation (I grew up loving a Leyland Leopard/ Tiger, but would Eastern have been better with a lot more Leyland Nationals instead, buses that felt a lot more “basic” but at least would have meant shorter dwells at bus stops when competing with the dual doored LRT fleet and their generally speedier “exact fare” policy). I know that First’s hubris after the millennium accelerated the demise (trying to replicate the Glasgow Overground in a city where they’d shears played second fiddle), and that a lot of the “bus war” was after the period that this thread relates to SMT being taken over by Grampian), but Eastern Scottish always felt like they were dealt a tough hand of cards, it was inevitable that the “madder” vehicles would take chunks out of traditional “green” territory. Or was it?

I hope that’s enough to get on with for now, I really wish I’d made more effort in the late 1980s to take the detour into the bus station to keep abreast of things (albeit I was probably too young an age to walk around there safely without supervision, it never felt a particularly welcome introduction to Edinburgh for any visitors!). It’s just that in a short space of time Eastern went from an ambitious attempt to win a share of the market in Edinburgh with some relatively innovative* services to struggling to defend their home turf

* - I say “innovative” because they did initially provide some brand new links, running into housing schemes that LRT ignored, giving some suburbs a direct Princes Street link (at a time when LRT has a lot more routes running via George Street/ The Mound/ Royal Mile, nice and diverse but not great when passengers wanted to go to the main shops/ Waverley etc)… much more interesting than the Edinburgh Overground fifteen years later, where First just flooded established Lothian corridors with cheap buses

 

[DunsBus]

To answer:

3 - The C6 lasted untill May 1987, when it was merged with the C38 and a new section added between Leith and Crewe Toll via Goldenacre, Pilton and Muirhouse to create the C38/C58 circle (C38 clockwise, C58 anticlockwise). This didn't last very long, 15 weeks before the service reverted to being the C38 with the eastern section of the circle abandoned.

4 - The C8 and C9 were abandoned very early on, in January 1987. The C6 ended that May, the C7 lasted until July that year and the C4 came off in November.

The C2 was converted to City Sprinter operation in June 1987. The service had been running at a loss and was due for withdrawal; the conversion to City Sprinters was seen as a last throw of the dice. It proved to be successful and also introduced City Sprinter operation on Sundays.
Further expansion that year saw the introduction of the C5 (August) and the conversion of the C1 to become the C1/C11 (November).

5 - That one is easy to answer. IMO it was the 23. Eastern had run evening and journeys under contract from deregulation with LRT operating the day service commercially, but when LRT gave notice that it wished to reinstate the full service on a commercial basis from late-September 1987, Eastern's contract was cancelled. However, Eastern carried on running what had been the contract journeys and added a daytime service a few weeks later.

 

[Siemens Trains]

7. Other than the aforementioned C55 and the C12 (City - South Gyle, contra- peak journeys, maybe run by vehicles that had run rush hour expresses from West Lothian and were otherwise running empty to the depot?), the C50 (C5s that served Barberton) which other “C” services were double digit numbers? I ask because the “big bus” routes tended to stay as regular numbers without any prefix

As mentioned above, there was the C38 and sometimes C58 when run as a circle. I think the reason for the C prefix was to avoid possible confusion with the regular 38 bus to Linlithgow.

8. Was Lothian always guaranteed to win?

Yes. Maybe not totally obvious at the time but looking back on that period this was certainly the most likely outcome. The depots that Eastern ran were never really long term prospects compared to LRT's premises. Brand loyalty was always strong on many of LRT's city routes but not so much on Eastern's rural ones, where passengers thought the fares were very expensive and service rather inferior in most respects (other than journey time). An alternative outcome might have been for another company such as Eastern/SMT/GRT/First to buy out LRT and become the only operator, however this wouldn't have been a helpful situation at any point after the early 1990s.

shorter dwells at bus stops

Boarding times with Eastern's "pay on entry" tickets seemed painfully slow, thereby throwing away journey time advantages on rural routes mentioned above, which shamelessly 'welcomed' city passengers according to their publicity. The Timtronic system (think that was its name) was apparently quite highly regarded. But as a passenger it appeared very primitive as nearly everyone used cash fares, so looked like a disaster from an operational point of view. I nearly always knew the necessary fare for my journey but had to go through the lengthy process of communicating my destination to the driver before a ticket could be issued. Only then to sometimes find that the origin hadn't been set correctly, so I'd been charged the wrong fare after all...
Suppose the alternative was to retain consistent crew operation, which they tried on a couple of routes but maybe found it too expensive.

Not sure if you already know, but City Sprinter routes that didn't have a C prefix included services 91 to 96. Might have been an experiment, however the Nite Bus network ran for a while using Sprinter vehicles in the early 1990s.

I nearly always knew the necessary fare for my journey but had to go through the lengthy process of communicating my destination to the driver before a ticket could be issued. Only then to sometimes find that the origin hadn't been set correctly, so I'd been charged the wrong fare after all...

Actually I often learned the fare stage numbers that the driver needed to key into the machine, which would save them the trouble of referring to the printed guide. However I didn't really like to appear overly smart and of course the signs all said 'please state your destination', so I felt obliged to comply.
But the ticket buying experience was quite poor for passengers and I thought it was a little unfair on the drivers who had to deal with it all day.

 

[DunsBus]

As I recall, from summer 1989 onwards the evening and Sunday journeys on city services C2, C3 and 23 were run by City Sprinters.

 

[tbtc]

3 - The C6 lasted untill May 1987, when it was merged with the C38 and a new section added between Leith and Crewe Toll via Goldenacre, Pilton and Muirhouse to create the C38/C58 circle (C38 clockwise, C58 anticlockwise). This didn't last very long, 15 weeks before the service reverted to being the C38 with the eastern section of the circle abandoned

Great, thanks - that’s the trouble with only picking up leaflets sporadically, you might have the one saying “new service introduced” but you don’t have one from a few weeks/ months/ years later to know how long it lasted - fifteen weeks must have been a failure then

4 - The C8 and C9 were abandoned very early on, in January 1987. The C6 ended that May, the C7 lasted until July that year and the C4 came off in November

The C2 was converted to City Sprinter operation in June 1987

My assumption was that the transformation of the C2 (East Pilton - City) and C3 (Brunstane - Bridges - Niddrie) into the C2 (East Pilton - City -Brunstane) and C3 Newhaven - Bridges - Niddrie) happened at the same time that the C7 came off (i.e. the C3 replaced it along Leith Walk) but it must have been slightly different in reality

Was there a “big bus” 16 at one stage on the rough Leith-Oxgangs corridor? Not to be confused with the Bathgate 16, of course

Further expansion that year saw the introduction of the C5 (August) and the conversion of the C1 to become the C1/C11 (November)

Ah, the C11, i wonder if anyone used to get between the Cameron Toll area and Morningside (given the long diversion via Princes Street!). One of those Eastern Scottish services that lives on today in the Lothian 8, since i don’t remember LRT running into Craigour/ Moredun before the CitySprinters had established it was lucrative territory.

Yes. Maybe not totally obvious at the time but looking back on that period this was certainly the most likely outcome. The depots that Eastern ran were never really long term prospects compared to LRT's premises. Brand loyalty was always strong on many of LRT's city routes but not so much on Eastern's rural ones, where passengers thought the fares were very expensive and service rather inferior in most respects (other than journey time)

It didn’t feel obvious to me back then, i thought that they must have handled it badly since LRT seemed to be winning with a fleet that mainly consisted of superannuated Atlanteans, but I’m hindsight Eastern had a lot to defend and struggled to attack (whilst also being duty bound to maintain services to places like Pencaitland that were so minor that they were competition free but couldn’t be dropped). The opening of the railway to Uphall/ Livingston North/ Bathgate shortly before deregulation must have hit profits on the once important West Lothian - A8 - Edinburgh corridor (serving a place designed like Livingston must have always been a struggle, but with the intermediate stations close to main roads it must have siphoned off a few previous bus passengers and a source of profit)

Boarding times with Eastern's "pay on entry" tickets seemed painfully slow, thereby throwing away journey time advantages on rural routes mentioned above, which shamelessly 'welcomed' city passengers according to their publicity

That’s how it always felt to me, you might see the 86 or 129 arrive first at your stop, but by the time everyone has struggled down/ up the steep Sneddon stairs, the dark red 26 has sailed along the road/ swiftly discharged and collected any passengers with its dual doors and simpler tickets (where you had to move down the bus to collect your ticket, so the passengers behind could begin their enquiry as you stepped away) and pulled off into the distance, making you wish you’d not taken a risk on the green machine

Suppose the alternative was to retain consistent crew operation, which they tried on a couple of routes but maybe found it too expensive

Do you remember which routes?

Not sure if you already know, but City Sprinter routes that didn't have a C prefix included services 91 to 96. Might have been an experiment, however the Nite Bus network ran for a while using Sprinter vehicles in the early 1990s

ah, I’d forgotten, but it’s coming back to me now, yes, thanks for filling in a gap in my memories with the 91-96!

 

[DunsBus]

My assumption was that the transformation of the C2 (East Pilton - City) and C3 (Brunstane - Bridges - Niddrie) into the C2 (East Pilton - City -Brunstane) and C3 Newhaven - Bridges - Niddrie) happened at the same time that the C7 came off (i.e. the C3 replaced it along Leith Walk) but it must have been slightly different in reality

Was there a “big bus” 16 at one stage on the rough Leith-Oxgangs corridor? Not to be confused with the Bathgate 16, of course



Ah, the C11, i wonder if anyone used to get between the Cameron Toll area and Morningside (given the long diversion via Princes Street!). One of those Eastern Scottish services that lives on today in the Lothian 8, since i don’t remember LRT running into Craigour/ Moredun before the CitySprinters had established it was lucrative territory.

The C1 started running to Brunstane in May 1987 - six months later, the C2 replaced it on this section with the C1 diverted to Oxgangs.
When the C11 started it was a variant of the C1. Both services ran the same route between Oxgangs and Crewe Toll, the C1 then running a loop from there via Ferry Road, Pennywell Road, a double run along Pennywell Gardens, Pennywell Road, West Granton Road and Crewe Road North. The C11 did this loop in the opposite direction. The C1/C11 at this end almost recreated the north circle of the old LRT 17/47 (a service that had finished at deregulation).
The C11 later became a service in its own right when it started serving Craigour. I believe though that the City Sprinters didn't hang about at the Craigour end - into Craigour Place, turning in the cul-de-sac there and then straight back out. It also didn't operate after 9pm.

The C7, as I recall, finished in July 1987.

 

[GusB]

With all due respect to @tbtc (I love threads that inspire discussion of the Scottish Bus Group), I think the period of time mentioned in the opening post is probably rather too wide.

My own experience of Eastern Scottish wasn't in the Lothians, but of those services that ran from Airdrie depot in the late 70s and early 80s. It was always a "Green Bus" that took me from my grannie's hoose tae ma ither grannie's hoose, but they lived in Coatbridge and Glasgow respectively.

To clarify, it was one green bus that took us up to Bank Street in Coatbridge and then another that took us from there to Glasgow. The former was usually allocated a Leyland National, while the latter was usually a Fleetline with a conductor. I can't be absolutely sure, but I'm fairly sure that we could catch another green bus to Provanmill? (My other grannie lived in Craigend).

The re-organisation of the SBG messed things up in the middle of the time period you've quoted; not least because the bus fleetbooks I had were largely rendered out of date.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

With all due respect to @tbtc (I love threads that inspire discussion of the Scottish Bus Group), I think the period of time mentioned in the opening post is probably rather too wide.

My own experience of Eastern Scottish wasn't in the Lothians, but of those services that ran from Airdrie depot in the late 70s and early 80s. It was always a "Green Bus" that took me from my grannie's hoose tae ma ither grannie's hoose, but they lived in Coatbridge and Glasgow respectively.

To clarify, it was one green bus that took us up to Bank Street in Coatbridge and then another that took us from there to Glasgow. The former was usually allocated a Leyland National, while the latter was usually a Fleetline with a conductor. I can't be absolutely sure, but I'm fairly sure that we could catch another green bus to Provanmill? (My other grannie lived in Craigend).

The re-organisation of the SBG messed things up in the middle of the time period you've quoted; not least because the bus fleetbooks I had were largely rendered out of date.

Never wishing to challenge the authority of moderators, but I think this is actually quite a good period as it spans the time from when the SBG was being prepared for deregulation and privatisation, up to the point when they were purchased by First.

My experience began not long before the SBG split and my sister living near Edinburgh. Eastern Scottish was one of those firms that, despite being Scottish, had a feeling of being quite English. Perhaps it was proximity to the Border, the Fleetlines with ECW bodies, but I think it really felt like one of those Tilling firms that had a bedrock of strong operations in West and Mid Lothian that underpinned a large hinterland of quite rural, marginal work at depots; depots like Kelso that would have an allocation of c.20 vehicles, would get a new bus every so often that would be there for life as a depot pet, as well as receiving cascades of older stuff that had been hammered on urban work elsewhere.

There was also the intriguing aspect that whilst Eastern Scottish had the Borders and Lothian, you had these long-standing, rather slow routes that extended like tendrils out from West Lothian to link up with the geographically distanced outposts at Baillieston and Clarkston.

I experienced the Mid Lothian routes where you would see these operations (62 and 95) passing through with some late T types on a Tiger chassis. Otherwise, the interest came from the mix of New Street deckers (Fleetlines and Olympians) vs Dalkeith's Ailsas amongst the usual mass of Y type Seddons. The other thing I remember is the awfulness of Dalkeith bus station but then that was closed to accommodate additional fleet in the post de-reg era. Even now, it is scarcely credible that this powerbase of the former ESOL business has been vacated by First but enough has been said about the mismanagement of that business.

 

[DunsBus]

I'd say that the decline of Eastern Scottish started with the SBG split in 1985. Half of its fleet lost overnight, along with the lucrative express work and its central workshops, and its territory carved up in the process. Then it had LRT expanding into its heartland post-deregulation. Although it managed to put up a fight with the Edinburgh city services, and repelled the LRT invasion in West Lothian, you have to wonder why the company itself was no more within eighteen months of the GRT takeover.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

I'd say that the decline of Eastern Scottish started with the SBG split in 1985. Half of its fleet lost overnight, along with the lucrative express work and its central workshops, and its territory carved up in the process. Then it had LRT expanding into its heartland post-deregulation. Although it managed to put up a fight with the Edinburgh city services, and repelled the LRT invasion in West Lothian, you have to wonder why the company itself was no more within eighteen months of the GRT takeover.

I'm not so certain that was the issue - it lost half its fleet but much of that was pretty marginal territory in the Borders, a smallish depot in Glasgow, the Airdrie ops and Linlithgow.

Perhaps simply deciding to keep the status quo in Edinburgh and respecting the existing boundaries might have been more prudent? Instead, they embarked on an expansionist phase needing to obtain a motley collection of Ailsas, a load of Ensign tat plus a load of minibuses. Had they done that, things might have been different.

 

[Siemens Trains]

Do you remember which routes?

Can't say I remember which routes had conductors by 1986 and it wasn't a big thing by that time. Think it depended on the particular vehicle as well. Did they have a few Kelvin Scottish transfers with rear doors? Vaguely remember these on an occasional Balerno run. Some conductors moved on to inspector duties from what I recall. But any advantage was lost when vehicle allocations weren't consistent or paint was the wrong colour to confuse the passengers. Was Kelvin some shade of red? Then if boarding at the front if the driver might have to explain to each passenger that there was actually a conductor to take fares.

 

[GusB]

Can't say I remember which routes had conductors by 1986 and it wasn't a big thing by that time. Think it depended on the particular vehicle as well. Did they have a few Kelvin Scottish transfers with rear doors? Vaguely remember these on an occasional Balerno run. Some conductors moved on to inspector duties from what I recall. But any advantage was lost when vehicle allocations weren't consistent or paint was the wrong colour to confuse the passengers. Was Kelvin some shade of red? Then if boarding at the front if the driver might have to explain to each passenger that there was actually a conductor to take fares.

Half cabs had gone when Kelvin was created, but made a comeback after deregulation.

When I was wee, I'm fairly sure that there were a few Lodekkas still kicking around, but they had forward entrances rather than being back loaders. I distinctly remember being on a red Lodekka (Central's, I assume) with my gran - I recall the three windows at the back, as well as the yellow mess dribbling down the window after someone threw an egg at it!

I think Eastern still had a few as well.

 

[DunsBus]

Can't say I remember which routes had conductors by 1986 and it wasn't a big thing by that time. Think it depended on the particular vehicle as well. Did they have a few Kelvin Scottish transfers with rear doors? Vaguely remember these on an occasional Balerno run. Some conductors moved on to inspector duties from what I recall. But any advantage was lost when vehicle allocations weren't consistent or paint was the wrong colour to confuse the passengers. Was Kelvin some shade of red? Then if boarding at the front if the driver might have to explain to each passenger that there was actually a conductor to take fares.

Eastern finished conductor operation in December 1982. The last halfcabs had gone six months earlier. It did make a brief comeback in 1989 when two Clydeside Routemasters were trialled on the Edinburgh city services.

 

[Siemens Trains]

Eastern finished conductor operation in December 1982. The last halfcabs had gone six months earlier. It did make a brief comeback in 1989 when two Clydeside Routemasters were trialled on the Edinburgh city services.

Well remembered. Not for the first time I've underestimated my age!
Clydeside Routemasters were indeed the vehicles I spotted making sporadic appearances. But too few to make any meaningful improvement to journey times and by 1989 looked very dated.

In addition to the City Sprinter Nite Bus 91 to 96 introduction, Eastern previously operated the 201 to 205 routes under contract to Lothian Regional Council. Was there some complication with the weekend services? For a while I believe these ran in parallel with similar LRT equivalents maybe called 101 to 105 - maybe on subtly different routes. Possibly LRT ran the equivalent of Monday to Friday 201 to 205 at weekends. All a bit confusing and I could be wrong after all this time.

Here are a couple of timetable images showing the routes, although these do nothing to jog my own very hazy memory:

 

[DunsBus]

Well remembered. Not for the first time I've underestimated my age!
Clydeside Routemasters were indeed the vehicles I spotted making sporadic appearances. But too few to make any meaningful improvement to journey times and by 1989 looked very dated.

In addition to the City Sprinter Nite Bus 91 to 96 introduction, Eastern previously operated the 201 to 205 routes under contract to Lothian Regional Council. Was there some complication with the weekend services? For a while I believe these ran in parallel with similar LRT equivalents maybe called 101 to 105 - maybe on subtly different routes. Possibly LRT ran the equivalent of Monday to Friday 201 to 205 at weekends. All a bit confusing and I could be wrong after all this time.

Here are a couple of timetable images showing the routes, although these do nothing to jog my own very hazy memory:

The 201-205 were previously run by LRT as services 101-105 up until deregulation. In June 1988 LRT restarted the night buses as services 101-106, running at weekends in conjunction with Alloa Breweries. The Eastern night buses then ran on weekdays until July 1989, when LRT won the contract; the weekday 2xx and weekend 1xx setup continued as there were subtle differences between the weekday and weekend equivalents on several of the routes.

The Nite Bus 91-96 were started up by Eastern in response to losing the night bus contracts to LRT. I seem to recall that they didn't last for very long. Your scan of the leaflet is the first time that I've seen it since 1989.

 

[Siemens Trains]

The Nite Bus 91-96 were started up by Eastern in response to losing the night bus contracts to LRT. I seem to recall that they didn't last for very long. Your scan of the leaflet is the first time that I've seen it since 1989

The thing I objected to about the Nite Bus publicity was saying Edinburgh's City Sprinters were famous. While I could see some advantages, as a passenger I wasn't especially keen on these vehicles and generally had a preference for larger buses. For example the sprinters were often full up or drivers wouldn't bother to wait in queues of buses to pick up passengers waiting at the stop. There didn't seem much of a discipline or convention about how they ran, which made everyting seem rather haphazard. Plus I wouldn't say I value personal space more than anyone else, but I found it could be difficult to avoid distinctive aromas from some fellow passengers in the confined space of a sprinter. Dedicated smoking areas of the larger buses could offer relief in this regard.
In fairness it wasn't a huge problem as journeys were seldom more than about 20 minutes, and I'm sure my own personal hygiene is very far from perfect. But I didn't feel Edinburgh travellers had any real affection for the City Sprinters as suggested by the Nite Bus adverts.

 

[tbtc]

The C1 started running to Brunstane in May 1987 - six months later, the C2 replaced it on this section with the C1 diverted to Oxgangs.
When the C11 started it was a variant of the C1. Both services ran the same route between Oxgangs and Crewe Toll, the C1 then running a loop from there via Ferry Road, Pennywell Road, a double run along Pennywell Gardens, Pennywell Road, West Granton Road and Crewe Road North. The C11 did this loop in the opposite direction. The C1/C11 at this end almost recreated the north circle of the old LRT 17/47 (a service that had finished at deregulation)

Ah, I had no memory of the C1 running to Brunstane or the C11 running to Muirhouse!

I remember that there was a fair bit of Brunstane competition (including the Edinburgh Transport 333), hence the changes to the LRT 4 that we discussed recently - maybe not an obvious corridor for that level of competition to anyone too young to remember the period

The C11 later became a service in its own right when it started serving Craigour. I believe though that the City Sprinters didn't hang about at the Craigour end - into Craigour Place, turning in the cul-de-sac there and then straight back out. It also didn't operate after 9pm.

Can’t imagine why, it’s such a lovely neighbourhood!

With all due respect to @tbtc (I love threads that inspire discussion of the Scottish Bus Group), I think the period of time mentioned in the opening post is probably rather too wide.

It was tricky to know what timescale to discuss, since there are a number of things that I’ve not seen discussed and that relate to each other (or at least might send the conversation in those directions)

I thought it fairest to “end” the conversation at the Grampian takeover, since it was never the same company again (but just one division of a UK-wide conglomerate)

But the start date was a lot harder, given that there was less than a decade between deregulation in October 1986 and Eastern’s takeover, and that’d be mainly dominated by the Edinburgh bus wars - but there were other things going on, including the repercussions from the big change of depots/ boundaries earlier in the decade and the general (inevitable?) retrenchment/ losses (and the preparation for deregulation - how do you keep focused on the day-to-day work whilst preparing plans for expansion/ defence, anticipating how your rival will behave, how ambitious to be with the proposed minibus network etc… must have been an uncertain and uncomfortable time for many)

For such a big company, there doesn’t seem to be much discussion/ not many books or web sites about the “modern” history

. Eastern Scottish was one of those firms that, despite being Scottish, had a feeling of being quite English. Perhaps it was proximity to the Border, the Fleetlines with ECW bodies, but I think it really felt like one of those Tilling firms that had a bedrock of strong operations in West and Mid Lothian that underpinned a large hinterland of quite rural, marginal work at depots; depots like Kelso that would have an allocation of c.20 vehicles, would get a new bus every so often that would be there for life as a depot pet, as well as receiving cascades of older stuff that had been hammered on urban work elsewhere

That’s a really interesting comparison, I nodded along at the “depot pet” reference, I know exactly what you mean (although I suppose that happens a lot less these days since the kind of depots where they take a pride in having one modern vehicle have been closed/ merged in the twenty first century)

The “Old” Eastern was like the SBG in miniature, the attempts at urban work (and struggles with the layout of the New Town of Livingston being replicated elsewhere in the country with Glenrothes/ Cumbernauld/ East Kilbride/ Irvine etc), the rural routes that were only sustained by the monies from bigger towns/ cities elsewhere…

Even now, it is scarcely credible that this powerbase of the former ESOL business has been vacated by First but enough has been said about the mismanagement of that business.

Yeah, that’s a much more black/white era, but there were lots of shades of grey in the final decade or so of Eastern Scottish

Was Kelvin some shade of red?

I think it’d be quicker to list the colours that Kelvin didn’t have at some point!

They started off with a two tone blue livery (the kind of drab combination that few operators have used over the years, other than First’s Bradford depot), that was replaced by a more attractive version with a yellow front that swooped down on the sides (with the “Express” version being the same colours reversed)… Then a red/cream livery when merged with Central to become KCB (Two sinking firms, each hoping that the other would be its lifebelt!)

But Kelvin started off with fleets from Midland/ Central, so had buses in those colours for a period, then bought out a few local independents, and did a lot of trading of second hand buses, so had many more colours at different times - things got so messy that they adopted a policy of painting the front of inherited buses yellow so that at least passengers waiting at bus stops could identify the approaching bus as being a Kelvin one (even if some vehicles looked strange with the yellow front bearing no relation to the rest of the colours on the side)

In addition to the City Sprinter Nite Bus 91 to 96 introduction, Eastern previously operated the 201 to 205 routes under contract to Lothian Regional Council. Was there some complication with the weekend services? For a while I believe these ran in parallel with similar LRT equivalents maybe called 101 to 105 - maybe on subtly different routes. Possibly LRT ran the equivalent of Monday to Friday 201 to 205 at weekends. All a bit confusing and I could be wrong after all this time.

Here are a couple of timetable images showing the routes, although these do nothing to jog my own very hazy memory:

Thanks for the images - brilliant - I vaguely remember them - the 91-96 were much simpler than the Lothian routes (e.g. Portobello had a bus every few minutes from the city centre during the daytime but the LRT night bus went via Leith/ Brunstane/ A1/ tour of East Lothian before eventually coming into Portobello from the Eastfield side - I think it’d have been quicker to stagger home than take such a magical mystery tour!

The passenger numbers seem to have been a lot better now that Lothian’s Night services are identical/ similar to the Day services

The thing I objected to about the Nite Bus publicity was saying Edinburgh's City Sprinters were famous

I’d see that as over-zealous PR, in the way that you might find a pub recommending that you “Try our famous fish and chips” (and you think “mate, I’ve never even heard of your pub, why do you think your halibut is internationally renown?)

“Notorious” might have been a better word for those minibuses!

(ETA - various unfinished quotes as machine crashed part way though!)

 

[DunsBus]

If I'm correct Kelvin was made up of parts of three companies - Central, Midland and what had been Eastern's operations in the east end of Glasgow.

The Eastern depot at Baillieston was closed in March 1985, three months before the SBG shake-up. The vehicles based there moved to Midland's depot at Stepps - retaining Eastern livery and fleetnumbers but with Midland Scottish fleetnames - then passed to Kelvin on Its formation.
Some of the Seddons which had been based at Baillieston had very short lives with Kelvin; two inherited GSX-T examples were taken out of service that autumn when just seven years old, never to run again and were both sold for scrap. The same fate befell two CSG-S Plaxton-bodied examples early the following year. A waste when you consider that their contemporaries which passed to Lowland clocked up nearly 20 years' service.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

If I'm correct Kelvin was made up of parts of three companies - Central, Midland and what had been Eastern's operations in the east end of Glasgow.

The Eastern depot at Baillieston was closed in March 1985, three months before the SBG shake-up. The vehicles based there moved to Midland's depot at Stepps - retaining Eastern livery and fleetnumbers but with Midland Scottish fleetnames - then passed to Kelvin on Its formation.
Some of the Seddons which had been based at Baillieston had very short lives with Kelvin; two inherited GSX-T examples were taken out of service that autumn when just seven years old, never to run again and were both sold for scrap. The same fate befell two CSG-S Plaxton-bodied examples early the following year. A waste when you consider that their contemporaries which passed to Lowland clocked up nearly 20 years' service.

I think you're correct.

Baillieston depot closed (the building might still be standing) and was amalgamated into Midland's Stepps depot, and then a few months later, Midland's depots at Stepps, Cumbernauld, Kirkintilloch, Milngavie and Kilsyth plus the rather random Central SMT depot at Old Kilpatrick became Kelvin with a rather muted two tone blue livery.... and then a few months later, they added the yellow slash.

Eastern's other Strathclyde depot at Clarkston went to Central IIRC

 

[EdinRH]

Was there a “big bus” 16 at one stage on the rough Leith-Oxgangs corridor? Not to be confused with the Bathgate 16, of course

Yes, it was called the C16, because it was a city route. In spite of the C-prefix, I'm only aware of double-deckers being used as opposed to City Sprinters. It ran from somewhere in the Colinton/Oxgangs area to Newhaven. Initially, it ran via North Junction Street and Lindsay Road but later ran via Ferry Road and Newhaven Road. The C16 was withdrawn in 1994 IIRC, perhaps as part of the unwritten agreement that saw SMT reduce city services while Lothian withdrew from South Queensferry and West Lothian.

 

[DunsBus]

Yes, it was called the C16, because it was a city route. In spite of the C-prefix, I'm only aware of double-deckers being used as opposed to City Sprinters. It ran from somewhere in the Colinton/Oxgangs area to Newhaven. Initially, it ran via North Junction Street and Lindsay Road but later ran via Ferry Road and Newhaven Road. The C16 was withdrawn in 1994 IIRC, perhaps as part of the unwritten agreement that saw SMT reduce city services while Lothian withdrew from South Queensferry and West Lothian.

The C16 had gone by 1994. The city services which came off as part of the "unofficial agreement" with LRT were the C1 (Muirhouse - Hunters Tryst) C11 (Craigour - Hunters Tryst), C23 (St Andrew Square - East Pilton - Morningside) and C27 (Leith - Hunters Tryst).

 

[tbtc]

Was the 1994 “truce” before the Grampian take over (which took place the same year)?

I’m just wondering whether (if so) it was the thing necessary to make the company more attractive to takeovers (since Grampian or anyone else would be purchasing a stable company which had no major conflicts)…

(I’d forgotten just how busy the Canonmills - Mound - Bruntsfield corridor got in the final days of Eastern/ SMT!)

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Was the 1994 “truce” before the Grampian take over (which took place the same year)?

I’m just wondering whether (if so) it was the thing necessary to make the company more attractive to takeovers (since Grampian or anyone else would be purchasing a stable company which had no major conflicts)…

(I’d forgotten just how busy the Canonmills - Mound - Bruntsfield corridor got in the final days of Eastern/ SMT!)

I'd suspect that @DunsBus will know chapter and verse. However, when Eastern Scottish was sold to its management in 1990, it was possibly the most profitable SBG firm with an operating profit of £1.07m (1989). The sale price was £9.5m (the most expensive subsidiary in the sell-off) yet when it was sold in October 1994 to the GRT Group it went for only a shade more at £10.3m.

I seem to recall that the financial position of the business had declined in that period together with a rapidly ageing fleet; I think they had made a start with a few batches of Metroriders and some B10Bs to address that. However, there was still a reliance on Seddons and Ailsas/Olympians/Fleetlines and so a peace dividend and some ability to slim the fleet was probably welcome. I think the Dodge S56s were still going and they weren't great when new (IMHO) so after 8 years of pounding the streets, they were knackered.

Probably made sense all round.

 

[DunsBus]

I'd suspect that @DunsBus will know chapter and verse. However, when Eastern Scottish was sold to its management in 1990, it was possibly the most profitable SBG firm with an operating profit of £1.07m (1989). The sale price was £9.5m (the most expensive subsidiary in the sell-off) yet when it was sold in October 1994 to the GRT Group it went for only a shade more at £10.3m.

I seem to recall that the financial position of the business had declined in that period together with a rapidly ageing fleet; I think they had made a start with a few batches of Metroriders and some B10Bs to address that. However, there was still a reliance on Seddons and Ailsas/Olympians/Fleetlines and so a peace dividend and some ability to slim the fleet was probably welcome. I think the Dodge S56s were still going and they weren't great when new (IMHO) so after 8 years of pounding the streets, they were knackered.

Probably made sense all round.

The LRT/SMT truce came soon after the takeover. As a footnote, when Lowland was taken over by Grampian around the same time, there was another truce called that saw Lowland pull out of Berwick and take over Northumbria's contracts in the Borders. Lowland also took over the sorry remains of what had been Edinburgh Transport, run into the ground by British Bus.

The Dodges may have been knackered by the time the LRT/SMT truce was called but they had definitely earned their keep. Their intended service life was four years so for them to last twice as long in testing traffic conditions and a schedule that saw them run for up to eighteen hours a day, seven days a week, was a remarkable achievement. One of them, MR428 from the first batch, then went on to serve for a further nine years with Oban & District. It was saved from being crushed in 2004 and is now nearing the end of a very thorough restoration at the SVBM at Lathalmond as the only survivor of SMT's Dodges.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

The LRT/SMT truce came soon after the takeover. As a footnote, when Lowland was taken over by Grampian around the same time, there was another truce called that saw Lowland pull out of Berwick and take over Northumbria's contracts in the Borders. Lowland also took over the sorry remains of what had been Edinburgh Transport, run into the ground by British Bus.

The Dodges may have been knackered by the time the LRT/SMT truce was called but they had definitely earned their keep. Their intended service life was four years so for them to last twice as long in testing traffic conditions and a schedule that saw them run for up to eighteen hours a day, seven days a week, was a remarkable achievement. One of them, MR428 from the first batch, then went on to serve for a further nine years with Oban & District. It was saved from being crushed in 2004 and is now nearing the end of a very thorough restoration at the SVBM at Lathalmond as the only survivor of SMT's Dodges.

I recall the Berwick bus war ending. The creation of the shared bus shop in Marygate and later, the shared outstations in the VOSA centre and then Scremerston, were all at odds to the very protracted bus war since 1987!

Some of my earliest memories involved intensely rural feel of the Eastern's Borders - places like Kelso bus station that seemed almost timeless even into First days. Invariably, we would stop at Jedburgh on the way to Edinburgh (c.1984/5) and see a selection of Y type Seddons (I believe Jedburgh got the final new Seddon) with their sparse loadings heading to Hawick or Edinburgh.

A visit into the city usually meant that I would be permitted to have an hour in St Andrews Square, traversing the subways, and enjoying these alien types like Ailsas or Citybuses with the dark green punctured by the red of Fife and, to lesser extents, the blue of Midland and a rare Western vehicle plus the relatively recently introduced Scottish Citylink identity. That, and the seemingly baffling fleetnumbers - who knew ZL312A would signify an Alexander T type DP bodied Leyland Leopard Tiger allocated to Airdrie Edinburgh whilst VV88G would be a Volvo Ailsa allocated to Galashiels Dalkeith?

I don't know if this is at all accurate, but it felt that SBG firms were quite conservative in their approach, even into the 1980s. They didn't seem quite prepared for deregulation but with it coming, it seemed some firms rushed headlong into seizing the "benefits" of competition in Glasgow and Edinburgh when oddly, a more conservative approach of fiercely protecting what they had, might have been better.

ps I'd forgotten but there is a ghost of the old Eastern Scottish (or was last year when the Google car went past) - the Border Buses Hawick drivers welfare (old travel office) in Hawick

 

[DunsBus]

I recall the Berwick bus war ending. The creation of the shared bus shop in Marygate and later, the shared outstations in the VOSA centre and then Scremerston, were all at odds to the very protracted bus war since 1987!

Some of my earliest memories involved intensely rural feel of the Eastern's Borders - places like Kelso bus station that seemed almost timeless even into First days. Invariably, we would stop at Jedburgh on the way to Edinburgh (c.1984/5) and see a selection of Y type Seddons (I believe Jedburgh got the final new Seddon) with their sparse loadings heading to Hawick or Edinburgh.

A visit into the city usually meant that I would be permitted to have an hour in St Andrews Square, traversing the subways, and enjoying these alien types like Ailsas or Citybuses with the dark green punctured by the red of Fife and, to lesser extents, the blue of Midland and a rare Western vehicle plus the relatively recently introduced Scottish Citylink identity. That, and the seemingly baffling fleetnumbers - who knew ZL312A would signify an Alexander T type DP bodied Leyland Leopard Tiger allocated to Airdrie Edinburgh whilst VV88G would be a Volvo Ailsa allocated to Galashiels Dalkeith?

I don't know if this is at all accurate, but it felt that SBG firms were quite conservative in their approach, even into the 1980s. They didn't seem quite prepared for deregulation but with it coming, it seemed some firms rushed headlong into seizing the "benefits" of competition in Glasgow and Edinburgh when oddly, a more conservative approach of fiercely protecting what they had, might have been better.

ps I'd forgotten but there is a ghost of the old Eastern Scottish (or was last year when the Google car went past) - the Border Buses Hawick drivers welfare (old travel office) in Hawick

View attachment 124181

If I'm right the only one of the four main (at the time) Scottish cities not to see a bus war was Dundee as Strathtay and Tayside kept to their traditional areas. The Glasgow bus war certainly didn't do Clydeside or Kelvin any favours, whilst Central lost East Kilbride to Strathclyde's Buses - it was to be 1993 before a truce was called. The battle between Grampian and Bluebird Northern in Aberdeen lasted until 1991, when both operators agreed to revert to their traditional areas following the purchase of Bluebird Northern by Stagecoach. Edinburgh was the exception as both Eastern and LRT were going at each other, hammer and tongs, in a battle that lasted for nearly a decade; it was only after Eastern changed ownership that things became a lot calmer - though when you consider that it was then dismembered within eighteen months of the Grampian takeover, you do wonder if the battle left Eastern mortally wounded.

I too remember the Berwick bus war ending. Of course, prior to deregulation Lowland and Northumbria - and Eastern and United before them - had lived in peace and harmony in Berwick so the shared bus shop and the shared garaging facilities could have been seen as an old pals act.

That Eastern Scottish sign in Hawick, by the way, is a real blast from the past.

 

[tbtc]

Berwick: the bus war seems even stranger in the context of how threadbare the “Town” services now are - I can’t reminder which Lowland Scottish service was the 37 or 38 but they certainly ran a ten minute service to Prior Park to compete with Northumbria’s ten minute B2 - the token “HOPP” Service tries to replace several different routes feels like a rather pathetic consolation prize… The B1 has at least bounced back to half hourly but still not much compared to the combined B1/B6 and whichever of the 37/38 served Highcliffe (once eighteen buses an hour across the Tweed)

Aberdeen : i know that Stagecoach still operate one cross city service with the Aberdeen boundaries (Northfield - Balnagask), as well as some services along many of the main roads into the city, but did Grampian retain any “out of town” presence when the truce happened? Or did Northern/ Bluebird/ Stagecoach essentially “win” (because their territory was greater than in 1986, whilst Grampian/ First retrenched to their traditional boundaries)? That would make it a rare “win” for the ex- SBG companies, compared to how they got on in Inverness/ Perth/ Edinburgh/ Glasgow/ Monklands/ Inverclyde… in fact, did the ex-SBG “win” many battles? They certainly lost a few…

Glasgow: In hindsight, would it have been better if the pre-deregulation changes has meant one SBG company taking the various “Greater Glasgow” depots, and given more focus/ coordination in the skirmishes with Strathclyde? Rather than what we ended up with, operators uncertain whether to expand or defend, extending long established routes into Glasgow into cross city services to try to compete, losing “traditional” territory to the “breadvan bandits” yet not gaining ground in the big city. Meanwhile, Strathclyde were run at one company and able to plan their strategy better

 

[overthewater]

In hindsight they should have given Musselburgh to Lowland, revised Midland to be Stirling Falkirk, Airdrie and Livingston. plus news street, give Kelvin Oban and Balfron. Why did Eastern lose so much? It's clear they wanted competition within SBG and not for the good of passengers.

 

[GB71]

Glasgow: In hindsight, would it have been better if the pre-deregulation changes has meant one SBG company taking the various “Greater Glasgow” depots, and given more focus/ coordination in the skirmishes with Strathclyde? Rather than what we ended up with, operators uncertain whether to expand or defend, extending long established routes into Glasgow into cross city services to try to compete, losing “traditional” territory to the “breadvan bandits” yet not gaining ground in the big city. Meanwhile, Strathclyde were run at one company and able to plan their strategy better

I lived in Scotland 1986 -94 and as a student worked with Strathtay and was very close to the Dundee depot manager and the then Commercial Manager for Strathtay - their views on SBG management were very interesting to say the least and the lethargy they showed.

With regard to Glasgow I read George Watson's book (he was the GM of Clydeside Scottish) and some of his comments about not wanting Clydeside associated with Kelvin in particular and Central to a lesser extent certainly made me wonder at the lack of any sort of co-operation in Glasgow.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Glasgow: In hindsight, would it have been better if the pre-deregulation changes has meant one SBG company taking the various “Greater Glasgow” depots, and given more focus/ coordination in the skirmishes with Strathclyde? Rather than what we ended up with, operators uncertain whether to expand or defend, extending long established routes into Glasgow into cross city services to try to compete, losing “traditional” territory to the “breadvan bandits” yet not gaining ground in the big city. Meanwhile, Strathclyde were run at one company and able to plan their strategy better

I lived in Scotland 1986 -94 and as a student worked with Strathtay and was very close to the Dundee depot manager and the then Commercial Manager for Strathtay - their views on SBG management were very interesting to say the least and the lethargy they showed.

With regard to Glasgow I read George Watson's book (he was the GM of Clydeside Scottish) and some of his comments about not wanting Clydeside associated with Kelvin in particular and Central to a lesser extent certainly made me wonder at the lack of any sort of co-operation in Glasgow.

I confess my lack of knowledge on the SBG in Glasgow. However, it seemed that there was a lack of preparedness with the Scottish Bus Group as a whole.

Whilst the National Bus Co had been busy introducing minibuses on its existing local networks in 1984/5 (e.g. Exeter, Worcester, Weston) as a defensive measure (and to grow patronage), I don't think the SBG did much of that if at all. When they did, it seemed that they introduced competitive services against Strathclyde/Lothian rather than defending their own back door. Instead, you had local services in places like Gala, where local services would've suited minis, getting Nationals whilst other places still persisted with Y types on intensive urban work - mind you, I'm from the North East where we had Bristol LHs on intensive routes so I can't stand in too much judgement