Let's show our pride!

[Tony]

Sorry Tony but Bilston is part of Wolverhampton, Willenhall is part of Walsall. Stourbridge is not part of West Midlands so that name already has no relevance to that town and Coventry uses the District Name already so what about transfers/loans from that depot now? Why are people so opposed to change. It might just give people more ownership of the major provider of public transport in the region which can only be of benefit to NX. Seems some opposition is based purely on the view of a certain bus company and nothing to do with the suggestion itself.

Check you history, until 1974 Bilston & Willenhall were seperate towns in their own right, and in fact up until 1st May 1900 Bilston even had its own company - Bilston & District Tramways! They were only merged into Wolverhampton and Walsall 'for political convenience' which is why you are so opposed to the name West Midlands!

Here is an extract from the history of Wolverhampton Tramways
'On the 17th December 1900, the Wolverhampton District Electric Tramways Company Limited was registered to purchase the assets of the 'Bilston & District Tramways' from the BET. The Bilston Tramway was acquired on the 1st May 1900 and was previously that part of the Wolverhampton Tramways Company's horse-tramway that lay outside the Wolverhampton town boundary'

Note the comment The Bilston Tramway......that lay outside the Wolverhampton town boundary

Sandwell which you suggested putting on the side of buses didn't even exist when I was first interested in buses. The six towns of Sandwell Oldbury, Rowley Regis, Smethwick, Tipton, Wednesbury and West Bromwich all had their own councils and were independant of each other. They were also merged for 'politcal convenience' Perhaps we ought to have National Express Rowley Regis?

[Mike K]

What about National Express Birmingham & The Black Country?

Again, some services cross over and it would kind of be pointless. As has been said, taking it ad extremis, where do you stop? Network Harborne anyone when many of the buses went to many different places besides Harborne. I think West Midlands is perfectly fine.

Yes, West Midlands Buses and then Yardley Wood for instance. A 90s experiment that clearly didn't work

Network Harborne was something very different, it was route branding of around 55 buses, not local identity naming. The buses still carried TWM fleetnames. It just so happened all routes served Harborne and in many respects it was no different to the Sutton Lines branding.

[Liverpool Street]

National Express Buses

Need I say more?

[Russ Smith]

Up here in Leeds we have very few buses which cross boundaries into another town/city, and when these do, they don't carry the LEEDS or BRADFORD etc logo down the side of the bus - they're blank. With so many routes crossing boundaries in an area as dense as the West Midlands, this would result in most buses being unbranded, with just a few which remain wholly in a town branded, which would look pretty weird

[PM]

Exactly as has been said-this works well in somewhere with clearly defined city boundaries like Preston Bus, Network Warrington with services mostly run within the city boundary. This wouldn't be the case in the west midlands...

[4006]

Spending the weekend in Leeds and struck by the new First Group livery in that it includes the name of the area that vehicles operate in such as  Leeds, Bradford, York etc. Shows a degree of pride in being part of the infrastructure of those areas. Why don't NX adopt a similar approach? Coventry is allowed to incorporate the City's name (and even the local football teams colours) and so is Dundee but the rest of us have to be grouped together under 'West Midlands' a name created purely for local government purposes and not even used by the majority of residents and businesses as part of its postal address. So why can't we have 'national express BIRMINGHAM & SOLIHULL, SANDWELL & DUDLEY, WALSALL and WOLVERHAMPTON'. Why can't NX share the pride we have in the names of our towns and cities? We are not embarrassed by our roots. Are NX? No, then prove it.

As with most company's in life now It's not about pride anymore its about profit! & other things I darn't mention. NX days with buses are numbered...it's just a matter of time
In the future, blow this back in my face if you are able to :) :) :)

[Stuharris 6360]

National Express Buses

Need I say more?

Exactly LS with one standard livery, then when buses transfer between Coventry, Dundee & the West Midlands, no repaints.

[arrifirststage]

This,to some extent,has already been tried once.......WMPTE buses had fleetnames that included the garage names for a short while.....only succeeded in making the fleetnames absurdly long and certainly meant nothing to the passengers.
Why cannot we get back to running buses,not treating the whole thing as some silly PR gimmick?
While we are at it ,PLEASE STOP this daft branding and naming stunt...............just typical of modern day shallowness and frivolity
BAH HUMBUG

[Sh4318]

If it ain't broke, don't fix it

[JoNi]

It's amazing how many times things go round in circles.
London's buses are all red again, how long before that changes again. Keeps faceless people in jobs, with the exception of Best Impressions, whose liveries are imaginative and first class.

[Stu]

I'm happy to be a resident of the West Midlands, and have lived here all my life and always known it as the West Midlands.

Okay, I might think slightly differently now I live in Birmingham (and have been for the last five years), so I miss out West Midlands in my postal address, but it's not a big deal. Birmingham is part of the West Midlands, I understand that.

On the other hand, while I was born in Dudley, I grew up and spent much of my life living in Oldbury. Now on the other hand, I never accepted 'Sandwell' as the place I lived in, and always put my postal address as 'Oldbury, West Midlands'. (And when people if I asked me if I was from Birmingham... grr!)

To be honest, National Express is just continuing a trend that has gone back years: West Midlands Passenger Transport Executive (WMPTE), West Midlands Travel (WMT), Travel West Midlands (TWM), and now National Express West Midlands (NXWM). 'West Midlands' has always historically been part of the 'brand name' of our main local bus company, so let's be proud of that fact.

[Bob]

Cannock and Hednesford were supposed to become part of the west midlands in 1974 but oddly were swapped  late in the day to put Coventry in...as far as transport gos it was daft as far more bus routes from places like cannock entered the wm than did and still do from Coventry

[richie]

I think it looks very odd when a WN B7 runs on the 255E to blaze park and above the doors it states that the bus operator is proud to carry the people of wolverhampton. Why arnt they proad to carry the people of Bromley?

[Trident 4609]

I think it looks very odd when a WN B7 runs on the 255E to blaze park and above the doors it states that the bus operator is proud to carry the people of wolverhampton. Why arnt they proad to carry the people of Bromley?

Because they aren't the usual allocation. Just allocated on Sundays. I suppose you can apply the same thing to any other area a WN B7 goes through?

[Westy]

Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't Wmpte have some involvement with the old Midland Red Chaserider brand in the early 80's?

Sure I read it somewhere.