West Bromwich Garage

[4504]

At one time nearly all the WB mercs were branded and it was very very rare to find them on different routes and still to this day must buses stay on the correct services if branded for them

Yeah, I remember the 74, 79, 120, 404 and 451 were all branded.
Nowadays, you can see 74/75 branded buses on the 80, and 14 branded buses on the 60

[BU07 LGO]

WB had 4530 out on the 406 today!

[Ash]

Another b6le has been withdrawn 624, double deckers are now not uncommon to see on the 405/6 there is often one on there each day, the mercs and b6le buses seem to be getting withdrawn and being replaced by gemini's in most cases although a b6le 569 has come from Walsall

[fleetline6477]

I was suprised to see a alx400 from WB on a school service by the new invention (4274 was the bus) is this a regular working from WB as im sure WA would be more suited from running the school service

Yes Ash, it has been since September. A WB running board operates the 702 (am) and 703 (pm) and I assume goes onto the 75 / 75E / 74E as the vehicle is often a Birmingham - West Bromwich branded bus.

[Ash]

I know the 775 on an afternoon once finishes works the 80 service into Birmingham before all the changes last July it used to be a 451 branded president so im guessing used to work a peak 451

[4006]

I was suprised to see a alx400 from WB on a school service by the new invention (4274 was the bus) is this a regular working from WB as im sure WA would be more suited from running the school service

Yes Ash, it has been since September. A WB running board operates the 702 (am) and 703 (pm) and I assume goes onto the 75 / 75E / 74E as the vehicle is often a Birmingham - West Bromwich branded bus.

I have seen this many times round the Ashmore Park/New Invention area what school does it serve and where does it go?

[Stu]

The 702 operates between St Thomas More School and Bentley:
http://nxbus.co.uk/routes/west-midlands/B702/

The 703 operates between St Thomas More School and New Invention:
http://nxbus.co.uk/routes/west-midlands/B703/

[4006]

Cheers would make better sence to operate from Wolves though surely?

[D10]

Cheers would make better sence to operate from Wolves though surely?

Not necessarily, as mentioned above the vehicles that WB use come in from other routes. if WN couldn't do this, then it would need an extra bus to operate these school trips.

[Discodave]

I agree with relocating WB to an area like Kenrick Way or an area around Oldbury plenty of redevelopment ground or units to refurb plus no noise problems with 79 being put back to Wolves it was cut due to reliability issues Soho road was one reason I can think of plus WBA at home would be stupid to alter it back I would not think VOAS would be happy too as theyare clampng down a lot on buses running to time would NXWM want that I think not.

[Ash]

At one time west brom seem to operate alot more services than it does now maybe due to PVR increases and needing extra vehicles it has ment routes to transfer to other garages but when the 79 used to be operated by WB they also had the 238,404 and the mini link services i dont know wether they had the dudley road and 128/9 services back then but also have operated the 16 in 2005 when Hockley shut.

[MW]

At one time west brom seem to operate alot more services than it does now maybe due to PVR increases and needing extra vehicles it has ment routes to transfer to other garages but when the 79 used to be operated by WB they also had the 238,404 and the mini link services i dont know wether they had the dudley road and 128/9 services back then but also have operated the 16 in 2005 when Hockley shut.

The Dudley Road services were operated by Hockley I think.

[Ash]

So they transferred when Hockley closed?

[Ash]

So WB then must have had a high vehicle allocation i have the fleet list for 2000 before the changes

[Ash]

Yeah and strange enough the buses for the 16 returned to WB around 2/3 years later for the 74 when the omnilinks were suppose to be used on the 16