GHA Group (Bryn Melyn, Vale Travel + Others)

[knutstransport]

RE: GHA Group (Bryn Melyn, Vale Travel + Others)

(20/07/2016 19:27)DLG817 Wrote:  Vehicles owned by the local authorities have left. Three of the Optare Versas and the three Solos. Denbighshire CC drivers took them on behalf of Flintshire CC last week and they are currently being stored until their future is decided. There is no immediate plan to place these with another operator and it could be that they may be subsequently auctioned. Despite reports to the contrary the Traws Cymru vehicles are not owned by local authorities or the Welsh Government and were still at Ruabon. Versa YJ09OTS was off the road last week following RTC damage.

I have been informed by Charlie at GHA that the last service conducted by GHA was the 11.00pm from Barmouth and was in Solo YJ59GHA The driver had left Wrexham at 8.25pm knowing he may not get paid for this journey. The vehicle still has the final destination displayed – PHOTO LINK


Routes

I have attempted to tabulate a list of all the former GHA routes with an indication of which operator and from what date they are now operated. This will be updated as best as I can and can be found – LINK. Please let me know if any errors or omissions are found.

Credit to that driver. It seems a bit strange the last service was a Cheshire Connect Solo on the T3 route! On the 88 route last Wednesday evening passengers waiting for Wilmslow/Altrincham bound services to get home from work were left wondering what was going on when they saw all the buses on the route heading in service towards Knutsford but not one of them returned to operate a service in the reverse direction.

I just realised it was in another thread I posted about the 88 Enviro 200s. A local councillor has said those buses were purchased using funds provided by Waters Corporation, as their public transport commitment in their planning application. The intention was they would be used on a half-hourly 88 service until 2019, so some questions are being asked about whether any claim can be made to get those buses back on the 88 route. I recall Stephen Byrce saying he had to get approval on the GHA Gold livery at a Cheshire transport committee meeting, which would have been a strange thing to say if GHA had purchased the buses using their own money.

With regards to your list of routes, it partly depends how specific you want to be. The GHA 27 service was commercial, which is actually why the weekday service was at reduced frequency at the busiest time - because GHA wanted to use the second bus + driver for a school contract. At present High Peak are providing a reduced 27 service on weekdays (they've renumbered 27A journeys as 27 and aren't running any services via the 27B route.) Cheshire East have said today they are 'looking at' a 27 Saturday service. Strangely, High Peak had the 27 service originally (as a contract which was originally awarded to Bowers Coaches), then when the contract came to an end they tried to run it commercially but weren't successful, Cheshire East put it out to tender but GHA decided to register the service commercially. So it seems strange that High Peak are having a second go at running it commercially.