Stagecoach in Oxfordshire

History

In the 1990s Stagecoach South Midlands was formed from Midland Red (South) and Thames Transit were both purchased by Stagecoach.

Stagecoach South Midlands operated under four different brands:

In July 2002, the Banbury and Oxford brands were merged under the Stagecoach in Oxfordshire brand. In March 2004 Stagecoach in Oxfordshire and Stagecoach in Warwickshire were split to into two separate divisions with those names.

Buses in Oxford operate in competition with local buses operated by the Oxford Bus Company. Oxford is one of the few UK cities where such free and unsubsidised competition, as envisaged by the architects of bus deregulation in the 1980s, still exists.

Similarly the Oxford Tube services competes with the Oxford Bus Company's X90 Oxford-London service. This unusual level of both service and competition is facilitated by Oxford's status as a university city, lack of car parking spaces in the city centre, and the consequent large numbers of young, affluent but car-less residents.

In 2010 it was announced that a quality partnership had been agreed between the two principal bus operators and Oxfordshire County Council leading to coordinated timetabling on four key corridors and improved multi-operator ticketing across the City. On 15 July 2010, Stagecoach in Oxfordshire introduced a fleet of twenty-six hybrid buses on Routes 1 (Blackbird Leys) and 7A/7B (Kidlington). Double deckers were selected over single deckers as a result of the co-ordinated timetables and reduced frequencies to be introduced under the quality partnership.

In October 2016, Stagecoach announced that they would be doing a company wide rollout of new state of the art ticket machines that will allow passengers to pay for travel using their contactless payment card or on their smartphone using Apple Pay or Android Pay. Stagecoach in Oxfordshire was the first Stagecoach division to receive these new machines for both local services and the Oxford Tube, making Stagecoach in Oxfordshire the first major operator to accept contactless payments outside London.

Oxford Tube

The Oxford Tube currently operates a fleet of 26 Van Hool Astromega double decker coaches on limited stops services from Oxford to London Victoria.

On 3 March 2014 Stagecoach Group announced that they had just made their biggest vehicle order to date. Costing Stagecoach over £100 million in total, the order included 26 brand new VanHool TX Astromega coaches to operate the Oxford Tube service. The first of the new coaches entered service on 16 July 2014 with the entire fleet following shortly after. The new coaches add extra comfort and facilities for the passengers including more leg room, high speed 4G WiFi, power sockets and USB ports in selected seats as well as a brand new audio system providing passengers with departure and arrival information and the top deck also features a panoramic glass sun roof allowing more natural light into the coach.

Stagecoach Gold

In 2009 Stagecoach in Oxfordshire launched the S-Series which was intended to be a more superior service. Several routes connecting towns/villages with Oxford joined this series which saw free WiFi being added to the vehicles as well as some routes receiving brand new vehicles. The first routes to join the S-Series were routes 100 and 200 from Carterton and Witney to Oxford, these routes were then renumbered as S1 and S2. Routes connecting Oxford with Chipping Norton/Charlbury (S3) and Oxford with Bicester (S5) also joined the series.

In 2010 Stagecoach upgraded routes S1 and S2 to Stagecoach Gold routes which saw brand new luxury buses with free WiFi and hand stitched Italian leather seats introduced on the services. The Stagecoach Gold brand was also later applied to routes S3 and S5 in 2012.

In September 2011 Stagecoach created route S4 which saw routes 59/59A/59B join the S-Series. Stagecoach in Oxfordshire confirmed in May 2015 that route S4 will be receiving the Stagecoach Gold with the upgraded service launched in September 2015.

In July 2014 Stagecoach launched route S7 between Carterton and Headington which was intended to connect West Oxfordshire with the John Radcliffe Hospital in Headington. The S7 service has since been revised and now starts in Witney and no longer serves Carterton or Minster Lovell.

In October 2014 Stagecoach launched route SW1 linking Carterton and Witney with London on weekends and certain bank holidays. On 17 April 2015 Stagecoach Oxfordshire confirmed that they would be ending the SW1 service due to low passenger numbers.

Ten brand new Stagecoach Gold ADL Enviro 400 MMCs were delivered to Oxford depot in December 2016. These new buses are currently in service on the new 7 service between Woodstock and Oxford, as well as routes X30 and 31 between Wantage and Oxford.

At present, Stagecoach in Oxfordshire is the largest Stagecoach Gold operator with a total of nine Stagecoach Gold routes and 57 Gold specification vehicles in the fleet.

National Express

Stagecoach Oxfordshire operated route 737 from Oxford to Stansted Airport under contract to National Express from March 2007 until June 2013.

Fleet

As of December 2016, Stagecoach Oxfordshire operates and maintains a fleet of 176 buses. The fleet consists of:

Stagecoach Oxfordshire has a fairly new fleet with most vehicles being under 5 years old, this is partly due to a Low Emission Zone in Oxford which only allows buses with Euro V engines or higher to operate within the city. As a result, Stagecoach Oxfordshire have replaced most of the fleet to meet these requirements.

Depots

Oxford depot also has three out-stations which are located at Bicester, Chipping Norton and Harwell. Chipping Norton out-station is also used by Witney depot. Harwell out-station is currently used to house the Wantage fleet but previously it also used to house the Didcot fleet however this is no longer the case as Stagecoach no longer operate in Didcot.

Incidents