London Country Bus Services



London Country Bus Services was a bus company that operated in South East England from 1969 until split up and sold in 1986 under Margaret Thatcher's government's bus deregulation scheme.

Creation
London Country Bus Services Ltd, which used the trading name London Country, was set up in response to the Transport Act 1969, when London Transport's (LT) Country Area green buses were transferred to the National Bus Company (NBC), at the same time as London Transport's Central Area red buses passed from the London Transport Board to the Greater London Council. The new arrangements came into force on 1 January 1970. Staff who were in service before 1 January 1970 retained free travel throughout the original London Transport area however, their passes carrying appropriate wording. This arrangement continues today, although the wording has now changed to account for bus deregulation. London Country's territory was likened to a circle around London with a hole in the middle. London Country also gained responsibility for the Green Line cross-London express coaches.



The company as a whole was NBC's biggest subsidiary. It started life with 1,267 buses and coaches. The average fleet age was very elderly, containing mainly RT-class AEC Regent double-deckers and RF-class AEC Regal single-deckers. 484 RTs and 413 RFs were owned in all, with eight Daimler Fleetlines, three Leyland Atlanteans, 209 AEC Routemasters, 14 AEC Reliances and 109 AEC Merlins completing the fleet. The older vehicles outnumbered new by far, so steps were taken to reduce the age profile.

New vehicles
NBC quickly ordered 90 Leyland Atlanteans, which were delivered in 1972. In 1970-71 London Transport's last Country order, for 138 AEC Swifts, was delivered. The Atlantean soon became London Country's standard bus, and by 1980 there were 293 in the fleet. Most were bodied by Park Royal, but some were built by Roe to the same design and 30 Metro-Cammell bodied Atlanteans, which were diverted from a Midland Red order. There were also 11 Leyland engined, Godstone-based Daimler Fleetlines which were diverted from Western Welsh, becoming the first NBC ordered buses in the fleet, just before the Atlanteans. The only other London Country double decker in the 1970s was the Bristol VRT, which were fifteen rare highbridge Eastern Coach Works bodied examples. These were allocated to Grays Garage in 1977 but were quickly moved on.

There was also activity in the single decker fleet. Some of the 413 aforementioned RFs were refurbished in the 1960s, with twin headlights, curved windscreens, new side mouldings and improved interiors. These were mainly ones allocated to the long Green Line services. There were 14 Willowbrook-bodied AEC Reliances at Hertford Garage, that had been bought by London Transport in 1965, by 1975 they were still there on bus work, which some thought was idiosyncratic when vehicles twice as old were still on Green Line work.

The Green Line services were largely operated by Routemaster coaches and RFs. NBC ordered 90 AEC Reliances with 45 seat Park Royal bodies, which were originally put into service in Green Line two-tone green, but were quickly repainted in NBC local coach livery. For the orbital 725 service, running between Windsor and Gravesend, 15 AEC Swift buses with Alexander W-type bodies were purchased, but in a further swap, were soon demoted to Gravesend local services.



Standard fleets
In 1972, as part of NBC and British Leyland's joint project, the Leyland National, became the standard in most NBC fleets. London Country, bought over 500 examples and operated the world's largest fleet of the type. They mainly replaced the RFs, RTs and Routemasters. Some RFs were kept in areas where smaller, lighter vehicles were needed, until NBC decided on its smaller bus standard the Bristol LH. London Country bought their first examples of the type in 1973, with more batches bought up until 1977.

Throughout the 1980s NBC had also had large numbers of double decker Leyland Olympians delivered. From 1982 until 1984 these were purchased with Roe bodies, but from 1985 they had ECW bodies to the same style. London Country operated 75 in total.

The end
As part of the 1985 Transport Act, bus deregulation caused the company to be divided up and sold off in smaller divisions, as part of Margaret Thatcher and Transport Minister Nicholas Ridley's scheme.

London Country was split into quarters on September 7, 1986, geographically named as London Country North West, London Country North East, London Country South East and London Country South West. The central workshops were sold as "Gatwick engineering".

The successor companies were privatised during 1988, among the last of the bus privatisations. The purchasers were
 * London Country North West: Luton & District Transport, now Arriva the Shires, part of Arriva Shires & Essex.
 * London Country North East: AJS Group, which split the company into two, County Bus and Coach and Sovereign Bus and Coach.  County was sold to its management in 1990 and eventually became Arriva East Herts & Essex, part of Arriva Shires & Essex.  The Grays depot was transferred to Arriva Southern Counties in 2002.  Sovereign was sold to the Blazefield Group in 1991.  These operations are also now part of Arriva Shires & Essex, except for the St Albans depot which was sold to Centrebus but then passed to Uno, with the operation transferred to Hatfield.
 * London Country South West: Sold to Drawlane Ltd, which became the British Bus group (sold to Cowie - now Arriva - in 1996), and now part of Arriva Guildford & West Surrey, although many routes have been ceded under Arriva ownership to other companies, notably Metrobus and what is now Abellio Surrey.
 * London Country South East, renamed Kentish Bus: Northumbria Motor Services (through its parent company Proudmutual Ltd), itself sold to British Bus Group in 1992 and now part of Arriva Southern Counties.
 * In May 2010, the whole of Arriva was acquired by Deutsche Bahn AG, the German national railway business.