Lothian Buses

Lothian Buses plc is the only municipal bus company in Scotland and the largest provider of bus services in Edinburgh, Scotland. City of Edinburgh Council own 91.01% of the company with the remainder being owned by East Lothian and Midlothian councils. As well as serving Edinburgh, Lothian Buses also serve parts of East Lothian and Midlothian. Lothian Buses are registered in Annandale Street, Edinburgh as company number SC096849.

Lothian Buses plc operates the majority of daytime bus services in Edinburgh, extending to outlying suburbs, towns and villages. The company also operates several limited stop express routes, an Airport service, Park and Ride services and a night bus network as well as several tourist services. The company has 4 travel shops (three in the city centre and one in Dalkeith), and operates buses from three depot locations; Longstone, Annandale Street (Central) and Marine. The company also maintains a driver training school and an engineering depot at Seafield.

Company history
The company can trace its history back to the Edinburgh Street Tramways Company of 1871, also involving at various times the tramway companies of Leith, Musselburgh and Edinburgh North. The City Council (Edinburgh Corporation Tramways Department) took over operation of the tramways in 1919, at which time most of the system was cable operated. Electrification of the tram network was completed in 1923, but the first motor buses had arrived in 1919. Tramway abandonment took place between 1950 and 1956, after which the operation became the Edinburgh Corporation Transport Department.

Strikes
In 2005 the drivers of Lothian Buses plc staged official and wildcat strikes over pay. In some cases this resulted in passengers being abandoned as buses were taken out of service by drivers.

Awards
Lothian Buses have won several awards for their services to Edinburgh and the Lothians including Bus Operator of the Year in the 2007 UK Bus Awards, and has subsequently been voted Public Transport Operator of the Year (Bus) at the 2008 National Transport Awards. when the company was cited for its substantial route development, 32 percent growth in passenger numbers since 1998 and £100 million investment in low-floor buses since 2000.

Lothian Buses was voted Best UK Bus Company in 2002 and 2003, and vehicles currently carry the wording Voted Scotland's Best Bus Company 2006 in a laurel wreath type logo near the fleetname. Its then-chief executive Neil Renilson was runner-up at the Passenger Transport Management Awards in 2008 for his work at the company.

In November 2011, the company won the Top City Operator of the Year award at the UK Bus Awards.

Fares
Lothian operates a flat-fare system, with a daytime adult singles for any journey costing £1.40 from 4 March 2012, £3 on Night Buses, although the Night Buses fare is halved to £1.50 if the passenger is the owner of a valid 'Ridacard'. Child fares, all-day tickets, pre-paid multiple singles and 'Ridacards' are also available, with senior citizens travelling on free travel passes in line with the rest of Scotland.

Cash payment is placed in a hopper, which automatically dumps into a vault that the driver has no access to. Change is not given, increasing security and allowing passengers to board more quickly.

The Lothian 'Ridacard' bus pass is a pre-paid plastic smart card giving unlimited travel on regular daytime services, and discounted night bus travel. It is purchased initially from a Lothian Travel Shop, where the owner's picture is incorporated on the card to prevent mis-use. Once purchased, the card can simply be placed on an on-board reader, which reads the RFID chip contained in the card. Cards can be credited for a weekly, 4 weekly or annual period. A warning is displayed on the last day of validity. The card can then be topped up at Lothian Travel Shops or Pay Point equipped retailers.

In 2011 Lothian Buses introduced the GO-edinburgh Ticket. This is a ticket valid for three days which gives unlimited travel on the daytime and night network buses, Airlink as well as a days access to the Edinburgh Bus Tours.

Daytime network


In conjunction with management changes and route branding, the route network has undergone considerable change with the removal of several apparently confusing aspects such as letter prefixed routes and clockwise/anticlockwise circular services. Some services have been transferred to and re-routed in Princes Street from the parallel George Street in New Town, after the banning of cars from most of Princes Street and the closing of certain access points.

The majority of the current network comprises through routes that pass through the city centre from opposing termini. Most services pass in part or in full along Princes Street, with Bristo Place and Leith Walk being the crossing points for the remaining cross town services. There also exists a northern and a southern semi-circle orbital routes, and a local loop in the Sighthill area.

Many routes are contained within the Edinburgh conurbation, whereas others, most notably the 'playing card' branded routes, extend into surrounding areas, such as Penicuik, Tranent, Mayfield, Balerno and the Airport.

Double deck buses show an intermediate points display, as well as a final destination, which is useful for the longer through services and many tourist passengers. In early mornings and late evenings, some services are curtailed to the centre or to early termini, in the transition to the night bus service. In such cases, 'Part Route' is displayed in the intermediate display. Certain routes have all day short working termini, and minor diversions which are often indicated through the use of internal or external 'tram boards'.

The most recent double-deck deliveries, from 2006 onwards, feature a "Route Diverted" intermediate display, used when road closures cause a service to be diverted from its normal route.

Night buses
Lothian also operates a nightbus network sponsored by the Edinburgh Dungeon, who also run discount offers on the back of Lothian bus tickets. All of the night services are detailed in a timetable and map pocket leaflet.

While an earlier night bus network did exist, ridership increased when the routes were re-numbered and re-routed to match daytime routes and increased in frequency. The operation of night buses provides a continuous 24 hour bus service to some areas of the city.

Infrastructure
Lothian operates buses from three garage locations, Longstone (55.9244°N, -3.26606°W), in the south west, Central in Annandale Street (55.96123°N, -3.18798°W), and Marine in Seafield Road, Portobello (55.95898°N, -3.12162°W). Located near Marine garage is Seafield engineering works (55.96188°N, -3.1263°W), where major work on buses is carried out.

The previous company headquarters and engineering works at Shrub Hill, Shrub Place Lane off Leith Walk, were sold in 1999 subject to planning permission, after Lothian occupancy dating back to tram operation in 1871. After repeated delays, controversies and a public inquiry,  the site was sold for £12m in 2004 to BL Developments to develop the site into flats and houses.

Lothian also maintains four Travel Shops. Three of these are in the city, at Waverley Bridge, Hanover Street and Shandwick Place (in the West End). A fourth Travel Shop opened at the Jarnac Court shopping mall in Dalkeith town centre on 4 February 2008.

A lost property office is located at the Central garage. This facility is to be moved in the near future to the travel shop in Hanover Street, the reasons given by the company are its more central location and general convenience to the public. All bus stops are detailed with the route number/s of calling services. Certain strategic bus stops are designated interchanges, with associated signage, such as Cameron Toll and Haymarket. Many bus stops are accompanied by real time tracking display, giving the time in minutes until the arrival of the next services, or an indication that a delay has occurred.

Unlike elsewhere in the country, Lothian operates a strict 'stacking' policy at bus stops, this is due to the large number of services calling at some stops. When multiple buses arrive for the same stop, they will queue one behind the other.

Lothian employs a fleet of vans fitted with amber roof lights on 'Traffic Patrol', to assist buses with problems, and to monitor the current service.

Tram network
Lothian Buses will be fully integrated with the forthcoming Edinburgh tram network, with both enterprises being owned by the council. Lothian services will interchange with the trams at various strategic locations. The now closed guided busway element of Fastlink will form part of phase 1a of the tram permanent way, replacing the busway. Early artists impressions of the trams show them in the same "harlequin" livery used on new Lothian buses. As a consequence of the trams, the fleet will be reduced in size by 19 buses.

Fleet history
Edinburgh Corporation and Lothian have historically employed a high degree of standardisation of their service bus fleet, to facilitate maintenance savings. Lothian have never employed minibuses on their services, although some midibuses were used for a time. Buses have generally been purchased new - very few secondhand vehicles have been operated.

Current vehicles
Lothian Buses has a modern fleet by national standards, with an average vehicle age of 5.6 years. As of 1 September 2009 the main service fleet is all low floor.

The majority of the current main service fleet comprises:
 * Single-deck
 * Dennis Dart SPD with Plaxton Pointer 2 bodies (Some badged as Transbus)
 * Volvo B7RLE with Wright Eclipse Urban bodies
 * Volvo B7RLE with Wright Eclipse 2 bodies
 * Optare Solo SR - in use on MacTours services 61 and 69
 * Double-deck
 * Dennis Trident 2 with Plaxton President bodies
 * Volvo B7TL with Plaxton President and Wright Eclipse Gemini  bodies
 * Volvo B9TL with Wright Eclipse Gemini bodies
 * Volvo B9TL with Wright Eclipse Gemini 2 bodies
 * Scania OmniCity
 * Alexander Dennis Enviro400H

Five Alexander ALX400-bodied Tridents were also operated in the main fleet (501-505), but all of these have now been converted to open top buses for The City Sightseeing Tour. Plaxton President-bodied 506-508 have also been converted.

All vehicles are fitted with internal and external CCTV cameras and cab radios, for passenger and driver safety, bus lane enforcement and assisting the police, although they have also been used in action against the company's own drivers.

At the end of 2009, Lothian Buses started replacing their ticket machines with the Wayfarer 200 ticket machines. These machines have been supplied by Transport Scotland as part of the National Concessionary Travel Scheme to improve free travel throughout Scotland.

Demonstrators
Lothian has from time to time had demonstration vehicles in service with the main fleet. Notable examples have included the following:


 * In the 1990s Lothian trialed a Volvo B10L / Saffle single-decker (156, L456 JCK) to evaluate low-floor buses. It was owned by Volvo but painted in LRT Lothian madder/white livery, with additional lettering advertising the low floor nature of the bus.


 * During 2005 Lothian trialed the bendy-bus concept using an articulated Hispano bodied Volvo B7LA (888, FJ53 LZZ) in red and grey colours with Harlequin diamond vinyls applied. No orders followed this trial, and the bus went elsewhere, but for 2008/9 a Scania ex-demonstrator artic was purchased for use on the X48 Park & Ride for use on a special roster on the X48. The Scania artic has since been withdrawn from service and has been transferred to Nottingham City Transport.


 * An East Lancs bodied Scania OmniDekka double decker (999, SN04 CPE) was delivered new to Lothian in the Harlequin livery, on loan from Scania. Although it was returned to its owners after its year on loan, the trial led to the purchase of Scania OmniCity double deckers for the Airlink service.

In September 2008 a Wright Meridian bodied MAN NL273F arrived on loan from MAN for evaluation alongside the many Wright Eclipse Urban bodied Volvo B7RLEs in the fleet. It has had harlequins and lettered branding applied for the 49 route during its stay.

Main fleet liveries & route branding
Traditionally, Edinburgh Corporation, Lothian Regional Transport (LRT) and Lothian Buses had a livery of madder (a dark red) and cream (white), with matching madder leatherette seating. Some coach-seated Leyland Olympian / Alexander RH-types and Volvo Olympian / Alexander Royales had been painted in the same scheme, but with red in place of the madder. These vehicles are not branded for, but were typically found only on, routes 15/15A.

While Lothian had traditionally maintained a uniform livery for all buses, deliveries of low floor vehicles has seen a new standard livery introduced. Low floor vehicles have also seen route branding come to be increasingly used by Lothian. Route branding highlights the route of certain services making the buses easier to be spotted throughout Edinburgh and the Lothians. Since May 2010 the Harlequin livery used to identify low floor buses has started to be phased out, as the company is now a full low floor operation, with a return to the traditional madder and white livery although the style has been altered slightly to suit the lines of modern buses. Each type of bus owned directly by Lothian Buses has had at least one of their type painted in the new livery.

In July 2011 Lothian Buses introduced 60 new double deck buses. These buses continued with the same madder red and white pattern on the outside of the bus but Lothian Buses changed the inside seats to a matching madder red colour. They also changed the entrance to the bus to a more wooden effect. Each bus features a Euro 5 Enhanced Environmentally Friendly Vehicle engine which means the new vehicles will produce less harmful emissions than the buses they replace. Services 4, 5, 19, 23 and 27 were the first buses to receive this branding. This led to service 5 being re-branded as 'Morningside Maisie' after the fictional kitten created by Aileen Paterson.

Eco branding
New branding was created to go with the reintroduction of the madder and white livery to Edinburgh. The buses used on their route 36 have/are being repainted to show their Eco qualities. On 11 September 2011, 15 new electric-diesel low-carbon hybrid 'ecobuses' added to the fleet began operating on the No.10 route between Western Harbour and Torphin.

Penicuik City Link
Buses for routes 37, 47 and X47 between Edinburgh and Penicuik were branded as "Penicuik City Link", with blue uppers and roofline, and the positions of the red and madder on the skirting transposed. One of the "Penicuik City Link" buses (bus 801) has recently been repainted into madder and white, with no roof colour. However, the other vehicles in "Penicuik City Link" colours are now to be repainted into the new madder and white livery with a turquoise mint coloured roof and the name "Pen-Y-Cog". This is to celebrate the history of the area as "Pen-Y-Cog" is the original name for Penicuik. The word Pen-Y-Cog is Old Brythonic meaning "Hill of the Cuckoo" and Penicuik's name is derived from this.

Playing cards theme


Four double decker routes using the low-floor scheme are, or have been, based on a playing card theme, with the symbol of the suit incorporating the route number;
 * Route 3/3A was, until September 2010, "Club Class - across the City and Midlothian" with extra yellow on the uppers and roofline and a black "club" symbol. Bus 720, formerly one of the "Club Class" branded buses, was repainted into the new madder and white livery with a yellow roof and "3 Connect" branding in spring 2010, and it was expected that this would replace the "Club Class" branding.  However, in September 2010, it was announced that the 3 and 3A would be rebranded, using the same livery style as trialled on 720, as "'The Lady Victoria'" to honour Midlothian's mining heritage as the routes pass the Scottish Mining Museum based in the former Lady Victoria Colliery in Newtongrange.
 * Route 26 was, until mid-2009, "East to West Through the Heart of the City" featuring red on the roofline, gold between the decks and a large "heart" with an arrow symbol.
 * Route 31 was "Ace of Spades - cutting across the city and Midlothian" with orange uppers and roofline, and a black spade symbol, which was worn by buses 751-768. However, these buses have been repainted into madder and white with no route branding.
 * Route 44 was "Service with a Sparkle" with black uppers and roofline and a yellow diamond symbol. This is now being superseded by a new branding, "The Mill Race", with pebble grey uppers and roofline.

Two single-deck routes also received branding based on the playing card theme, "The Best Deal" for route 29 (Volvos 136-150, red) and "Leader of the Pack" for route 49 (Volvos 151-160 and 170, blue). 151-160 have now been repainted into a new branding for route 49, "The Queen of Scots" with 136-138 and 170 now repainted into standard madder and white. As yet, the future of branding for route 29 is unknown.

"Connect" branding
Mid 2009 saw the introduction of 'Connect' branding, with the first example being red-based "26 Connect: Clerwood, City Centre, Seton Sands / Tranent." This supersedes the earlier playing card theme. The second example applies to new, buggy friendly vehicles on route 22, with the legend "22 Connect: Gyle + Edinburgh Park, City Centre, Ocean Terminal." The base colour here is pink. A third example was applied to bus 720 on route 3, with the legend "3 Connect". The base colour here is yellow, and was applied together with a new interpretation of the classic madder and white livery. The "3 Connect" branding was replaced by "The Lady Victoria" branding in October 2010.

"Zoom to the Zoo" advertising
June 2009 saw Lothian enter into a two-year deal with Edinburgh Zoo to create a fleet of ten vehicles wearing animal-themed advertising designs over Route 26 'Connect' branding. Five variations exist, on two vehicles each::
 * "Recognise Anyone?" - featuring the chimps
 * "Dive On" - penguins
 * "Have a Purrfect day Out" - tigers
 * "Go Faster Stripes" - zebras
 * "Take Off!" - rainbow lorikeets

History of tour operations
Lothian had operated city tours using white liveried coaches. Later, Atlanteans were employed in this same livery, with blinds for City Tour. These wore an updated version of the white livery with blue detailing after a short period. An Edinburgh Classic Tour was set up in 1989 using open top Atlanteans, and later Olympians, which competed with Guide Friday. This was as a result of Guide Friday introducing competition on the city centre to Airport route. The buses wore a blue and white livery, each carrying a name e.g.Scottish Star, Lothian Star and Highland Star. Lothian also operated open top tours in Oxford (in conjunction with local operator Tappins) and Cambridge under the Classic Tour identity.

Edinburgh Bus Tours
Lothian operates several open top double deck tour bus services, through its Edinburgh Bus Tours subsidiary under four distinct brands: City Sightseeing, Edinburgh Tours, Mac Tours and The Majestic Tour. The City Sightseeing tour is operated by Lothian as a franchise of the City Sightseeing brand.

City Sightseeing, Edinburgh Tours and Mac Tours visit the Old Town, New Town, Calton Hill, Holyrood Palace and Edinburgh Castle, albeit on slightly differing routes. The Majestic Tour operates a long loop from Holyrood and New Town, via the Botanic Gardens, to the coast at Ocean Terminal, the site of the former Royal Yacht Britannia.

The Mac Tours operation uses AEC Routemaster buses in a dark red and cream livery, with See Edinburgh By Vintage Bus branding. All other tours use Dennis Trident 2 with Plaxton President bodies. For the City Sightseeing is red, Edinburgh Tours is white and green, while Majestic Tours is orange and blue.

Forth Tours
As of 2007 Mac Tours has operated a bus for Forth Tours providing departues from Waverley Bridge for their various tours and cruises of the Firth of Forth. The bus used is Alexander Royale bodied Volvo Olympian 433 (P433 KSX) and not, as shown on the Forth Tours website, a Northern Counties bodied Olympian. It carries a special yellow and blue overall livery with the destination blind panelled over.

Bus 433 has a previous nautical connection, having previously been used on the now discontinued limited stop express service X50 to the Royal Yacht at Ocean Terminal, wearing a similar dedicated all over livery.

Attractions accessible by bus
As well as the central area attractions, several other popular tourist attractions in the suburbs of Edinburgh and beyond are accessible by Lothian bus:


 * Edinburgh Zoo: 12, X12, 26, 31, 100
 * Royal Yacht Britannia: 10, 11, 16, 22, 34, 35, 36
 * Botanic Gardens: 8, 23, 27
 * Rosslyn Chapel: 15
 * Lauriston Castle: 21, 41, 42
 * Midlothian Snowsports Centre: 4, 15/15A
 * Craigmillar Castle: 2, 8, 14, 18, 21, 24, 30, 33, 38, 42, 49

Airlink 100


The company operates a dedicated limited stop service, route 100, to the Airport from Waverley Bridge along Corstorphine Road. This service uses a dedicated fleet, special fares and its own web-site. An orange winged 'A' logo adorns the web site and the interior/exterior of the vehicles. Airlink 100 tickets can be bought from the driver, from an airport kiosk, or online (must be printed).

New Volvo B9TL double-deckers with Wright Eclipse Gemini 2 bodywork replaced the previous Scania OmniCity double deckers in March 2010. The new vehicles included "E-leather" upholstery (a type of manmade composition leather made from recycled waste leather offcuts), electric sockets for charging mobile phones, laptops etc., CCTV which enables passengers on the top deck to watch their luggage on the lower deck, LED lights and free wi-fi. The vehicles are priced at over £200,000 each, meaning that they cost £30,000 more than standard vehicles, and wear a unique two-tone blue and red livery. The previous buses carried a special livery of white and light/dark blue, with orange detailing. The service was previously operated by Olympians in an earlier Airline blue livery.

Park & Ride
Edinburgh has a network of existing and proposed Park and Ride sites. Lothian buses call at some of these sites:


 * Ingliston A8 (West) - X12 (Peak), 12 (Off-Peak), 35
 * Hermiston A71 (West) - 25, 34 (X25/45 Peak Times Only)
 * Newcraighall A1 (East) - 30 (Stops on the main road only)
 * Sheriffhall A7 (South) - 33, 49
 * Straiton A701 (South) - 47, X47, 67
 * Wallyford A199 (East) - 44, 44A

Driver training
Lothian maintains a driver training school with an associatied training fleet, made up of vehicles withdrawn or taken from the main fleet. The fleet wears an allover yellow livery with driver training signage and 'Drive a bus with us' logos. Destination boxes are usually blanked out on these vehicles.

Driver training vehicles have historically been drawn from withdrawn vehicles from the main fleet. While Olympian double deckers have been the recent mainstay of the fleet, recently there has been a move to the Super Pointer Dart single deckers. This is due to a recent legislation change requiring vehicles used for a PCV test to be fitted with ABS. In 2011 a Dennis Trident double decker from the main fleet underwent conversion in to a mobile classroom/training vehicle. This also introduced a revised driver training livery.

A small number of route markers exist to assist drivers at confusing points of the network, or when diversions are in place. Type training may occur when a new type of vehicle enters the fleet.

Lothian policy dictates drivers are liable for any fines incurred for driving offences successfully prosecuted, and the company employs a driving standards officer who can monitor bus speeds with a speed gun. The driving Standards officer is only allowed to monitor speeds on company premises, after being told by Lothian and Borders Police to cease using the gun in public.

In March 2010, Lothian opened the first three VOSA Authorised Testing Facilities (ATF) in Scotland, at Marine, Central and Longstone garages.

Vehicle tracking
Lothian Buses are active members of the Bustracker system and are responsible for the funding of it as well as being partly responsible for the operation of it. It operates by tracking the movements of buses, computers then relay this information to the designated bus tracker signs throughout the city giving real-time and more up-to-date information on when buses are due to the passengers.

In December 2009, it was announced that following the success of Bustracker, an application had been developed for the iPhone that is similar to the way Bustracker works. It allows people to download an application to their iPhone that enables them to see where their nearest bus stop is and when the bus is due. Although not developed by Lothian Buses or The City of Edinburgh Council, the application has now won the backing of both companies. My Bus Edinburgh is an application developed for the Android (operating system) platform which is similar in functionality to the iPhone application. Like the iPhone application, this application is developed by an independent developer, backed by Lothian Buses and The City of Edinburgh Council, and is available free of charge.

In August 2010, the company introduced an early running alarm system for drivers, which is linked into the automatic vehicle tracking system, and sounds an alarm and displays warning messages if the bus is running early. This was as a result of the company being fined £10,500 by the Traffic Commissioner for Scotland, having been found to be running buses early. After a customer complaint, Vehicle and Operator Services Agency (VOSA) monitored services 45, 27, 4 and 16 in February 2010, and found that of 303 instances, 44 buses were running early, despite starting the route on time, while 20 were running late. The company's defence was that they had built in some running time to cope with the delays due to tram works, but in some places, these works had ended early. The Commissioner accepted this defence, and chose not to take action against the company's operating licence (which authorizes a maximum of 700 vehicles), and imposed a fine as a "marker", set much lower than the legal maximum for the offence (calculated as £550 * 700 vehicles = £385,000), having not being willing to treat the offence with just a warning.

Preserved Vehicles
Many vehicles previously used by Lothian Buses and its predecessors have been preserved (or are awaiting preservation) by various groups and societies. Several of the vehicles regularly appear at events, rallies and running days around the country.

In Popular Culture
Since 2006, Lothian Buses Seafield depot has been used as the setting for the CBeebies programme Me Too! under the name of Riversea Buses. The companys staff also feature in the show. Of the companys participation in the series, the company's Chief Executive Neil Renilson said "It's a good opportunity to keep public transport in the eye of the next generation of customers."