Operation
Stagecoach South Midlands operated under three different brands:
- The Oxford Tube brand, used for express buses between Oxford and London.
- The Stagecoach in Banbury brand, used for local buses in and around the town of Banbury in Oxfordshire.
- The Stagecoach in Oxford brand, used for local buses in and around the city of Oxford.
From 1 July 2002, the Oxford and Banbury brands were merged to become Stagecoach in Oxfordshire. Then from 1 March 2004 Stagecoach in Oxfordshire and Stagecoach in Warwickshire were split to become two entirely separate divisions of Stagecoach Group.
The local 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 coaches compete with the Oxford Bus Company's Espress service. This unusual level of both service and competition is facilitated by Oxford's status as a prestigious university city, lack of car parking spaces in the city centre, and the consequent large numbers of young, affluent but car-less inhabitants. In 2010 it was announced that a quality contract had been agreed between the two principal bus operators and the County Council leading to joint timetabling and ticketing. A consequence of this partnership was that on 15 July 2010, Stagecoach Oxford began using hybrid buses on Route 1 (Cowley, Blackbird Leys). Twelve buses of this type, which use battery power with a small Diesel generator, had been delivered by the manufacturers Alexander Dennis in time for the launch date, with a further fourteen to be delivered to Oxford later in the year.
Stagecoach in Oxfordshire operates four sub-brands, namely: Stagecoach in Oxfordshire, Oxford Tube, and a National Express franchise from Oxford to Luton and Stansted airports (737).
It also operates Route X5, which is a high frequency inter-urban coach service linking Oxford and Cambridge via Bicester, Buckingham, Milton Keynes, Bedford and St Neots.
Read more about this topic: Stagecoach In Oxfordshire
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