Arriva North West and Wales - Further Developments and Acquisitions

Further Developments and Acquisitions

Arriva North West became responsible for the management of Arriva Cymru Ltd on 25 February 2002, and to reflect this, the name for this division of Arriva became Arriva North West and Wales. Arriva North West and Wales expanded further when the Crewe, Macclesfield and Winsford depots of Arriva Midlands North Ltd were transferred to it on 1 February 2003 and this has enabled Arriva North West and Wales to assume control of much of what was Crosville Motor Services with the exception of the Rock Ferry - Birkenhead, Chester and Ellesmere Port (now closed) depots which are part of First Chester & The Wirral.

It has also pursued acquisitions and on 2 August 2004 Liverpool based independent Merseyline Travel of Garston was acquired - perhaps to strengthen Arriva Merseyside's competitive moves against GTL before it was acquired by Stagecoach. In Greater Manchester it acquired one of the major independent operators in that region Blue Bus of Bolton enabling a good strategic fit with the Arriva Manchester operation and expansion into Bolton, Salford and Wigan.

Some of the operations of KMP of Llanberis were acquired by Arriva in August 2008 and merged with Arriva Cymru. This removed competition along the route between Llandudno and Bangor. The rest of KMP was acquired by independent Padarn Bus in April 2009.

From 1 January 2009, the Wales operations were split from Arriva North West and became Arriva Buses Wales with a separate Managing Director.

From 23 July 2011, Skelmersdale Depot was closed down, losing 19 jobs. All services (apart from service 313 Skem-Wigan) transferred to the other depots.