Nottingham City Transport
[Companies House extract company no 2004967]
Nottingham City Transport Limited (NCT) is the major bus operator of the city of
Nottingham
Nottingham ( , East Midlands English, locally ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located north-west of London, south-east ...
, England. NCT operates extensively within Nottingham as well beyond the city boundaries into
Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated Notts.) is a landlocked county in the East Midlands region of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. The traditi ...
county.
Publicly-owned, it is today the second largest
municipal bus company
A municipal bus company is an operator of bus services owned by the local government authority. This article lists all current municipal bus companies in the United Kingdom.
Most municipal bus companies disappeared between 1968 and 1974 before (o ...
in the United Kingdom after
Lothian Buses
Lothian Buses is a major bus operator based in Edinburgh, Scotland. It is the largest municipal bus company in the United Kingdom: the City of Edinburgh Council (through Transport for Edinburgh) owns 91%, Midlothian Council 5%, East Lothian ...
in Edinburgh, Scotland.
History
![British Trolleybuses - Nottingham (geograph 561945)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e3/British_Trolleybuses_-_Nottingham_%28geograph_561945%29.jpg)
Horse-drawn buses operated in
Nottingham
Nottingham ( , East Midlands English, locally ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located north-west of London, south-east ...
from 1848. The
Nottingham and District Tramways Company Limited
Nottingham and District Tramways Company Limited was a tramway operator from 1875 to 1897 based in Nottingham in the United Kingdom.
Nottingham Tramways Company 1872-1875
Plans for tramways in the town of Nottingham started at least as early ...
opened its first routes in 1878 with horse-drawn trams, and experimented with steam traction a few years later. The company was taken over by
Nottingham Corporation Tramways
Nottingham Corporation Tramways was formed when Nottingham Corporation took over the Nottingham and District Tramways Company Limited, which had operated a horse and steam tram service from 1877.
Nottingham Corporation Tramways 1898 – Plan ...
in 1898. Electrification followed, with the first electric trams operating in January 1901 and within two years over 100 trams were in service on eight lines. The first motorbuses were introduced in 1906.
The
Nottingham trolleybus system was inaugurated in 1927. By 1930 a number of routes had been converted from trams to trolleybuses. A new bus depot was opened on Parliament Street in June 1929 and is still in use today.
By 1935 the trolleybus fleet had reached its peak at 106 vehicles, making it the largest fleet in the country. The last tram ran in September 1936.
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
brought reduced services, economy measures (including diluting diesel with
creosote
Creosote is a category of carbonaceous chemicals formed by the distillation of various tars and pyrolysis of plant-derived material, such as wood or fossil fuel. They are typically used as preservatives or antiseptics.
Some creosote types were ...
) and blackout screens on vehicles. Before the war some diesel-engined buses were introduced, although large scale deliveries of buses did not take place until after the war. The advent of diesel services enabled the last petrol-engined buses to be withdrawn.
![NottinghamCityTransportAtlanteanAndVolvo](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0b/NottinghamCityTransportAtlanteanAndVolvo.jpg)
By the end of the 1950s, trolleybuses were in decline, the last new trolleybus joining the fleet in 1952 reaching a maximum fleet of 155 vehicles. The first one-man operated bus appeared in 1951. Trolleybuses were withdrawn between April 1965 and July 1966, and the
West Bridgford
West Bridgford is a town and the administrative centre of the Borough of Rushcliffe in the county of Nottinghamshire, England. It lies immediately south of the city of Nottingham, from which the River Trent divides it. Forming part of the Nott ...
UDC Transport undertaking came under Nottingham's control in 1968. One-man operation started to come into force in January 1970 and by 1977 nearly all services were one-man operated. In 1974 it was renamed ''City of Nottingham Transport'' and by 1976 an all-time peak of 494 operated vehicles was reached.
To comply with the
Transport Act 1985
The Transport Act 1985 was an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom. It introduced privatised and deregulated bus services throughout Great Britain and came into effect in October of 1986.
The Act was created as a response to growing concern ...
, in 1986 the assets were transferred to a new legal entity.
However the company effectively remained in public ownership as Nottingham City Council held full equity of the new entity. In 1988 Stevenson's Bus Services,
Ilkeston
Ilkeston is a town in the Borough of Erewash, Derbyshire, England, on the River Erewash, from which the borough takes its name, with a population at the 2011 census of 38,640. Its major industries, coal mining, iron working and lace making/texti ...
was purchased and formed a subsidiary company. Erewash Valley Services Limited. These services were integrated with the main company in 1990.
In 1991
South Notts Bus Company
South Notts Bus Company was a bus company operating in Nottinghamshire from 1926 until 1991 when sold to Nottingham City Transport who continue to use the brand name today.
History
In March 1926, Christopher Dabell commenced operating a ser ...
was purchased for £1, giving NCT a route from Nottingham to
Loughborough
Loughborough ( ) is a market town in the Charnwood borough of Leicestershire, England, the seat of Charnwood Borough Council and Loughborough University. At the 2011 census the town's built-up area had a population of 59,932 , the second larg ...
and a garage at
Gotham. In 1997 Pathfinder (Newark) Limited was purchased, giving NCT a presence in the north of the county. Fleet names are retained within the company but both South Notts and Pathfinder liveries are now extinct, although routes into Clifton and into South Nottinghamshire have navy line branding, taken from the navy blue livery of South Notts.
Despite many offers to buy,
Nottingham City Council
Nottingham City Council is the local authority for the unitary authority of Nottingham in Nottinghamshire, England. It consists of 55 councillors, representing a total of 20 wards, elected every four years. The council is led by David Mellen, of ...
retained 100% ownership in NCT until May 2001, when 5% of the shares were issued to
Transdev
Transdev, formerly Veolia Transdev, is a French-based international private-sector company which operates public transport. It has operations in 17 countries and territories as of November 2020.
History
The group was formed by the merger of V ...
. This was related to the
Nottingham Express Transit
Nottingham Express Transit (NET) is a tram system in Nottingham, England. The system opened to the public on 9 March 2004 and a second phase, that more than doubled the size of the total system, opened on 25 August 2015, having been initially ...
operating contract being awarded to Arrow Light Rail, a consortium between
Transdev
Transdev, formerly Veolia Transdev, is a French-based international private-sector company which operates public transport. It has operations in 17 countries and territories as of November 2020.
History
The group was formed by the merger of V ...
(later
Veolia Transdev
Transdev, formerly Veolia Transdev, is a French-based international private-sector company which operates public transport. It has operations in 17 countries and territories as of November 2020.
History
The group was formed by the merger of V ...
), Nottingham City Transport, Bombardier, Carillion, Galaxy and Innisfree. The consortium was contracted to build and operate the light rail for 30.5 years since 9 March 2004, but the contract was ripped up in 2011 when Tramlink Nottingham was selected as the preferred bidder for the construction of Phase 2 of the light rail. The last day of operations of Arrow Light Rail was 16 December 2011.
Another change early in the 2000s was the introduction of 'Go2' and 'Network'. This was a concept whereby every bus route was assigned a colour, and all the routes exiting the city via the same route (or went in the same general direction) had the same colour (e.g. every route using Derby Road to leave the city were coloured orange). This led to the coloured lines system which is still in use. Go2 buses had a colour coded front with white rear, and Network buses had a colour coded area round the front windows and a stripe to the back, on a two-tone dark green base. Buses with no colour coding (used when a correctly coloured one is not available) were plain green or white. The livery went through a change about 10 years after the start of the colour system where Go2 had colour coding on both ends of the bus with a silver centre, and Network the same but with a green centre. The Network brand started to fade away in 2015 as these buses also began having silver centres, and the Network name dropped when a bus was repainted.
Ecolink ethanol buses
In 2007, Nottingham City Transport became the first company in the UK to introduce
Ethanol
Ethanol (abbr. EtOH; also called ethyl alcohol, grain alcohol, drinking alcohol, or simply alcohol) is an organic compound. It is an Alcohol (chemistry), alcohol with the chemical formula . Its formula can be also written as or (an ethyl ...
powered "Eco" buses. Named "Ecolink 30", the service used a combination of standard diesel powered
Scania OmniCity
The Scania OmniCity is an integrally constructed transverse-engined low floor city bus that was available from Scania on the European market between 1997 and 2012.
The OmniCity was introduced in September 1996 as the first product based on t ...
buses and 3 specially converted ethanol
Scania OmniLink
The Scania OmniLink is a series of integrally constructed rear longitudinal-engined low-entry city buses available on the European market. It is a complete product built by Scania of Sweden.
The OmniLink was launched in 1998 with an inclined ...
buses on its Pink Line 30 route.
The ethanol powered buses were painted in a special "Ecolink" livery which used flowers and leaves along the side of the bus to symbolise the "green-ness" of the buses. They also used the slogan "Go Green", combined with the information that they reduced CO
2 emissions by around 30 tonnes.
The ethanol buses were equipped with a colour LED destination display, an LCD screen onboard which allowed advertisements &/or CCTV footage to be played, a Star Trak GPS locating system which allowed for real time ETA's to be displayed at electronic bus stop timetable displays and also allowed for the next stop to be displayed on the buses onboard electronic display (Above the "Bus Stopping" sign). The buses also had a low floor to allow for wheelchair/buggy access and were equipped with an extendable ramp to allow wheelchair users to board the bus when there is a gap between the bus door and the pavement.
The buses were purchased by
Nottingham City Council
Nottingham City Council is the local authority for the unitary authority of Nottingham in Nottinghamshire, England. It consists of 55 councillors, representing a total of 20 wards, elected every four years. The council is led by David Mellen, of ...
using funding from the East Midlands Development Agency which allowed them to purchase three ethanol powered buses and construct an ethanol fuelling station. The buses are operated and maintained by Nottingham City Transport.
This trial ended in March 2013, when it was no longer viable to source ethanol. The three buses were converted to diesel and were branded for the Pathfinder service to Southwell. They were re-branded again later in a generic silver livery, to be used on any route.
To replace them, three standard Scania OmniCity vehicles from another route were refurbished, and repainted in to green 'Nottingham Network' livery with pink ends to denote the service being part of the pink line. The said formerly ethanol-powered buses were sold in 2019 following the purchase of new Alexander- Dennis Enviro200 MMCs.
Fleet
![Scania N94 East Lancs OmniTown](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/Scania_N94_East_Lancs_OmniTown.jpg)
As of August 2020, the fleet consisted of 310 buses, including several training buses.
![NCTX YP17 UFL](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/72/NCTX_YP17_UFL.jpg)
In 2017, Nottingham City Transport won funding from the Office of Low-Emission Vehicles to purchase a fleet of 53 biogas-powered Alexander-Dennis Enviro400 City double decker buses, which were rolled out over 2017 and 2018. By 2018, Nottingham City Transport were running the largest fleet of biogas-powered buses in the world.
In 2019, Nottingham City Transport again successfully bidded for funding from the OLEV to expand the gas refuelling station at its Parliament Street depot, and ordered 67 more gas buses, more than doubling the fleet. One of these was a demonstrator previously in service with National Express West Midlands.
In February 2022, Nottingham City Transport announced that they were ordering 23 more gas buses, which are due in the spring of 2022, bringing the total number of gas buses to 143. (This is partially due to the restructuring of some route-branding of buses that took place in February.) The operator also announced that they and Nottingham City Council had submitted a business case as part of a bid to the UK government's Zero Emission Bus Regional Areas (ZEBRA) Fund for funding the purchase of 78 electric single-decker buses, and the following month they announced that their bid had been successful. The new electric buses, which will replace Nottingham City Transport's entire single-decker fleet, are expected to be introduced between 2023 and 2024; the first 12 of these will be
Yutong E12
The Yutong E10, also sold as the longer Yutong E12, is a battery electric single-decker bus manufactured by Yutong in Zhengzhou since 2016 for both Chinese and international bus operators.
The Yutong E10 debuted in China in 2016, transporting ...
s, with tenders for the remaining 66 buses to be announced in 2023.
Depots
NCT operate two depots in Parliament Street, and Trent Bridge.
Milestones
Nottingham City Transport have introduced many new bus models and transport concepts over the years, including:
*Converting the first
Scania OmniCity
The Scania OmniCity is an integrally constructed transverse-engined low floor city bus that was available from Scania on the European market between 1997 and 2012.
The OmniCity was introduced in September 1996 as the first product based on t ...
for right-hand drive operation
*Converting the first
Scania OmniLink
The Scania OmniLink is a series of integrally constructed rear longitudinal-engined low-entry city buses available on the European market. It is a complete product built by Scania of Sweden.
The OmniLink was launched in 1998 with an inclined ...
for right-hand drive operation
*Introduction of
EasyRider
The easyrider Citycard, (known formally as EasyRider and locally as RealRider), is a contactless smartcard introduced in 2000 in Nottingham, England, for use on Nottingham City Transport Services. It was originally named 'BusCard'. The name ''Easy ...
contactless smartcard, the first in the UK
*Introduction of Ethanol powered
Scania OmniLink
The Scania OmniLink is a series of integrally constructed rear longitudinal-engined low-entry city buses available on the European market. It is a complete product built by Scania of Sweden.
The OmniLink was launched in 1998 with an inclined ...
buses (First in the UK)
*First Genuine batch of
Scania OmniTown
The East Lancs OmniTown was a low-floor midibus body sold in the United Kingdom by East Lancs and Scania. It used the Scania N94UB chassis, which is the single-decker version of the N94UD double-decker chassis, with East Lancashire Coachbuil ...
buses
*First full height Alexander Dennis Enviro 400 Scanias in the UK
*First Biogas Alexander Dennis Enviro 400 CBG City.
*World's largest fleet of gas-powered buses.
*First company to win UK Bus Operator of the Year award 5 times.
Competitors
Stagecoach in Mansfield
Stagecoach in Mansfield is a bus operator providing bus services in Mansfield and surrounding areas. It is a subsidiary of Stagecoach East Midlands, a subdivision of the Stagecoach Group.
They have around 60 buses and 200 employees who carry m ...
also serve
Nottingham
Nottingham ( , East Midlands English, locally ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located north-west of London, south-east ...
, operating the
Pronto
Pronto, stylized as PRONTO, is the second-generation contactless payment system for automated fare collection on public transit services in San Diego County, California. The system is managed by the San Diego Association of Governments, operat ...
service (formerly in partnership with
TrentBarton
Trentbarton operates both local and regional bus services in Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and Staffordshire, England. It is a subsidiary of the Wellglade Group.
History
In October 1913, Trent Motor Traction Company was foun ...
) between
Chesterfield
Chesterfield may refer to:
Places Canada
* Rural Municipality of Chesterfield No. 261, Saskatchewan
* Chesterfield Inlet, Nunavut United Kingdom
* Chesterfield, Derbyshire, a market town in England
** Chesterfield (UK Parliament constitue ...
,
Mansfield
Mansfield is a market town and the administrative centre of Mansfield District in Nottinghamshire, England. It is the largest town in the wider Mansfield Urban Area (followed by Sutton-in-Ashfield). It gained the Royal Charter of a market tow ...
and
Nottingham
Nottingham ( , East Midlands English, locally ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located north-west of London, south-east ...
, and
Stagecoach in Worksop operate the Sherwood Arrow to
Worksop
Worksop ( ) is a market town in the Bassetlaw District in Nottinghamshire, England. It is located east-south-east of Sheffield, close to Nottinghamshire's borders with South Yorkshire and Derbyshire, on the River Ryton and not far from the nor ...
via Ollerton, Edwinstowe and White Post Farm. These services both compete with NCT between the Victoria Bus Station and the Redhill area of Nottingham.
YourBus competed directly against NCT with their routes Y28 and Y36 on GO2 Pink 28 to
Bilborough
Bilborough is a suburb of the city of Nottingham, England. The population of the City of Nottingham ward at the 2011 census was 16,792.
St Martin of Tours' Church, Bilborough is a Grade II listed building. In the chancel is an Annunciation by ...
and GO2 Orange 36 route to
Beeston and
Chilwell
Chilwell is a village and residential suburb of Nottingham, in the borough of Broxtowe of Nottinghamshire, west of Nottingham city. Until 1974 it was part of Beeston and Stapleford Urban District, having been in Stapleford Rural District until ...
. However, in August 2016 the Y28 route ceased operation, and at the same time the Y36 stopped serving
Chilwell
Chilwell is a village and residential suburb of Nottingham, in the borough of Broxtowe of Nottinghamshire, west of Nottingham city. Until 1974 it was part of Beeston and Stapleford Urban District, having been in Stapleford Rural District until ...
, and therefore only served between
Beeston and Nottingham City Centre and in November 2016 the Y36 was cut further with last buses operating between 6PM and 7PM. The Y36 service ceased operating completely with its last day on 11 February 2017. The Yourbus operation ceased permanently on Friday, 4 October 2019.
TrentBarton
Trentbarton operates both local and regional bus services in Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and Staffordshire, England. It is a subsidiary of the Wellglade Group.
History
In October 1913, Trent Motor Traction Company was foun ...
is also competitor operating services across the East Midlands.
See also
*
List of bus operators of the United Kingdom
:''This list is an alphabetically ordered index of current and past operators. For a structured list of current operators, see List of current bus operators of the United Kingdom''
This is a list of bus and coach operators of the United Kingdo ...
References
External links
Nottingham City Transport official website
{{authority control
Bus operators in Nottinghamshire
Companies based in Nottinghamshire
Companies owned by municipalities of England
Transdev
Transport in Nottingham