Sunday, 26 February 2012

1 Year on Stageacoach Takeover By Lhuan

This is a post deicated about how one year has passed on from the Stagecoach takeover of ELBG run by an Australian Bank named Macquarie bank PLC.
Stagecoach East London and Selkent ran bus services from the start of bus company privatization in the 90s until till summer of 2006 when it was annouced they had been sold to Macquarie bank PLC of Australia who then changed the name to ELBG.

The buses that Stagecoach ran upto 2006 had the classing Stagecoach "swirls".but when ELBG came to power they changed to an allover red livery which TFL was in favour for. ELBG also changed the moquette to fully blue and ELBG written all over it. Stagecoach had 2 moquettes before this and the newer one is what they use on all Stagecoach services.

The original Stagecoach Moquette

The newer Stagecoach Moquette

The ELBG Moquette

ELBG had a good year in 2008/2009 winning 51,248,323,372 and 488 and retaining 96,106 and 177 all with new buses: Scania Omnicites and Enviro 200's. In my opinion the interior on these buses were quite dull.
In 2009 and 10: ELBG didnt win anything but retained 3 very important routes 48,55 and 56. 48 and 56 with new buses which were Scania Omncities those were the last of omnicities for ELBG. They also lost the 300 to Go Ahead London at their Silvertown Garage and 325 to Arriva London at their Barking Garage. They also lost the 54 and 75 to Metrobus.

It was annouced in 2010 that they had lost a heap of important routes which were the 25,26,30,276 and 376.
25,26,30 to First at Lea intercange Garage on the 25 of June 2011 and 276 and 376 to Go Ahead London 276 at Silvertown Garage and 376 at Rainham Garage. ELBG was going Downhill, but they had retained the whole Barking bus garage and 99,53 and 174 and 496 except from 5 with existing buses. When Stagecoach took over they decided to buy new E400'S for them.

On the 15 of October 2010 it was annouced that Stagecoach bought back ELBG for £52M they made a great profit because they sold it for £263.6M and bought it back for more than half of that. Stagecoach Branding started the next month.

In 2011 all the buses in Stagecoach London fleet started to get refubished. In Late 2011 Stagecoach retained the 104,124,136,158,199,208,227 and gained 275. They would use E400 for 104,136,158,199,208 and 275 and E20D for 124 and Citaros for 227.

Stagecoach London 19000(LX55 HGC)

Stagecoach London 18275 (LX05 BWH)

Stagecoach London Scania Interior

Thank You for Reading Hope you Enjoyed

Saturday, 25 February 2012

Route: W14 the time has come By George & Naeem

Today was the turn of route: W14 which runs between Woodford Bridge and Leyton Superstores (formerly known as Leyton ASDA ) via South Woodford and Wanstead.

It was announced in 2011 that Arriva London North had lost alot of work from their Edmonton garage (EC) based around the corner from Arriva's Lea Valley Base (LV) in which we visited earlier this month (post can be found here).
Edmonton (EC) is expeced to be mothballed sometime in march due to routes: W14,W15,W16 al being lost to first and route: 20 being lost to Blue Triangle, next month.

We had made the long journey from New Southgate where Naeem Caleb and I met to Walthamstow Central in which we later boarded the central line rail replacement service A To south woodford to look around then service A again to woodford station and a 275 to Woodford Bridge which was a nice and quick route actually.
We had "loitered" around Woodford Bridge until we saw this bright red First E20D hurling around the green in Woodford Bridge, this signalled our journey had just begun!

W14 First Capital East (LI) DM44265 YX61 FZH Woodford Bridge

Interior of DM44265

W14 First Capital East (LI) DM44265 YX61 FZH Leytonstone (Green Man Roundabout)

Two things I thought we should Mention below.

First Needed drivers for the W14 so what they did is they tuped over Arriva's drivers that used to be on the W14 rota and moved them over to First's Lea Interchange garage for work on the W14 W15 and W16 once they have all transferred over to first.
Its seems that ADL have not programmed these new buses' IBUS systems correctly as when the IBUS Destination appears (W14 to Leyton, Superstores) the route number sound is acctually the W13 misleading passengers that they are on the wrong service (VIDEO BELOW)

Our Very Nice First or Arriva driver we are still unsure driving a First bus in His Arriva uniform Tut Tut Tut
Altough the simple explaination is he has not recived his First uniform yet

The Ibus on the W14 DM44265 YX61 FZH

Thank You For Reading Be Sure To Comment And Rate Below

Wednesday, 15 February 2012

Odds and Observations 13th February 2012 By George

while checking out the route: 3 i got some photos from the local area

88 London General (SW) E105 LX09 FAJ Oxford Circus

15 Stagecoach London (BW) 17783 LX03 BVV Oxford Circus

94 London United (S) SP120 YR59 YZB Oxford Circus

453 London General (MW) E168 SN61 BGX OXford Circus

28 First Centrewest (AS) TN33188 LT52 WVD Kensal Rise

Arriva Lea Valley Garage (LV) 15th February 2012 The new T's By George and Naeem

Today it was confirmed that Naeem,Neil and I would meet to visit Lea Valley (LV) in the Angel Road area.

Just to inform you We had prearranged this visit and we were wearing the appropriate clothing such as HI-VI Jackets E.C.T.!

We had all met up and signed in, and had a few chats with the lovely staff. then I had got out my camera and was greeted by a "Big Red Cross" over my battery bar so we had to rely on My phone and Naeem's Ipod to provide today's photos

Key Facts about Lea Valley:

This Garage Roughly holds about 99 buses
It Runs Routes: 192, W3, W6, 341, school routes 628, 653, 683 and 688
It Was Opened in 2005 to house the Bendy buses (MAs) for route 149 and then later the MAs for Route 73 which had just converted back then
On 15 October 2011, route: W3 was transferred to this garage from Wood Green (WN)
Route 397 will be transferred to this garage from 25 February 2012

Arriva Lea Valley Placard outside the Reception

Arriva London (LV) T202 LJ61 CHF Lea Valley

Rear View of T202 LJ61 CHF

Arriva London (LV) T203 LJ61 CHG Lea Valley

blinded for the 341 to Waterloo

An Ex Norwood Garage DLA (no fleetnumber)

Which is being used on the W3

Arriva London (LV) PDL 108 LJ54 LHH Lea Valley

blinded for W6 to Southgate

Nearside Of T22 LJ61 CHW

Arriva London (LV) T220 LJ61 CHC Lea Valley]

blinded for 34 to Barnet Church

Arriva London (LV) T223 LJ61 CFO Lea Valley

Arriva London (LV) DLA 196 W369 VGT

Lea Valley Blinded for the W3

(the bus that we changed the blinds on)

Lea Valley has enough space to house all it's buses and still have room for a Driver training course and this is displayed by the vehicles and the track of cones below

Various Driver Training buses

DWL 40 Good luck to this trainee driver Who gave us a nice wave

DLA143 (this bus seems to have faulty Doors)

Arriva London (LV) T202 LJ61 CHF Lea Valley

General View Of the Yard

Naeem's video of me changing the blinds on DLA 196

Thank you for Reading and Remember when visiting Garages Be Safe and wear a HI-VI

Be sure to comment and rate below

Tuesday, 14 February 2012

Victoria and South Kensington Obs

Today I decided to visit Central London

First I took pictures in South Kensington.

Saturday, 11 February 2012

Odds and Observations 11th Februrary 2012 By George

Today While going to see the W3 i also took some shot of the rail replacements on the northern line operated by Sullivan buses and Metroline and some general pictures in Archway shots below: