London Buses route A10

Route A10 is a Transport for London contracted route. The service is currently contracted to First Centrewest.

History
The route was inaugurated in 1996 to link Uxbridge and Heathrow Airport, halving the time it took to travel between them. It also serves the Stockley Park business estate. London Buslines had in fact won the original contract for the route, but was absorbed by Centrewest between this time and the start of operations. Centrewest thus inherited Plaxton-bodied Darts, among the first low-floor Darts in London, which sported a blue and yellow livery, with a diagonal red stripe. The buses, numbered simply L1-L7, bore the slogan "Heathrow fast...and it is". Centrewest was bought out by First Group, and as a result their logo was added to the livery.

The new contract tender in 2008 specified standard (red) London buses to be introduced with First opting for Alexander Dennis Enviro200 Darts.

Current route

 * Uxbridge Station
 * Bakers Road
 * Belmont Road
 * York Road
 * Chippendale Way
 * Park Road
 * Hillingdon Road
 * Hillingdon Hill
 * Harlington Road
 * Dawley Road
 * Bolingbroke Way
 * The Square
 * Furzeground Way
 * Longwalk Road
 * Stockley Park
 * Bennets Field Road
 * Horton Road
 * Stockley Road
 * M4 Spur Road
 * Tunnel Road East
 * Vehicle Tunnel
 * Inner Ring East
 * Heathrow Airport Central Bus Station

Former routes
In 1981 two Airbus routes, routes A1 and A2, were introduced. Route A1 ran to Victoria and route A2 to Kings Cross via Marble Arch. An attempt was made to launch a route A3, running from central London to Stansted Airport, but this was quickly abandoned, as was a second attempt in 1992. The routes were operated by 16 new MCW Metrobuses, later increasing to 24. They were taken over by London United when London Buses was split into subsidiaries in 1991. London United were reportedly unhappy with their profitability, and considered transferring the routes to the London Coaches operation which was then up for sale, but this did not take place. In 1995 the 36 Metrobuses were partially replaced by 12 new Volvo Olympians fitted with air conditioning.

Also in 1995, a new route called Airbus Direct was launched. This linked Heathrow to nearby hotels, operating on request to a hotel on any reasonable route using 16 early Dennis Darts displaced from other routes.

Following the introduction of the Heathrow Express train service in 1999 the routes' popularity fell, and route A1 was withdrawn. The surviving routes A2 and Airbus Direct was sold to National Express Group in the same year. The A2 was rebranded as a National Express Airport service in 2002, but withdrawn in late 2004 as passenger numbers fell once more. Airbus Direct continued, and was rebranded Hotelink and later Dot2Dot, but was sold to Corot PLC in early 2009 and finally withdrawn later in the year.