First Calderdale & Huddersfield - History

History

First Calderdale & Huddersfield is an amalgamation of First Halifax (formerly First Calderline) and First Huddersfield. The company of today originally formed part of the Yorkshire Rider company in the 1980s and 1990s, which operated most of the services in the West Yorkshire area. The company was formed in 1986 at the time of deregulation with the town suffix at the end of the name, Calderdale was Yorkshire Rider Halifax, Kirklees was Yorkshire Rider Huddersfield.

Yorkshire Rider continued operation of services until 1994 when the company was purchased by Badgerline Group, who would merge with Grampian Regional Transport in 1995 to form the First Group. The services were renamed Rider Halifax and Rider Huddersfield in 1995 then renamed again the same year, with Rider Halifax changed to Calderline and would also incorporate the Todmorden operation of Yorkshire Rider and Rider Huddersfield changed to Kingfisher.

In 1996, the First logo started to appear on services and Calderline and Kingfisher were given their own individual livery, changing from the green and white of Yorkshire Rider. Although Kingfisher would keep green as its main colour, Calderline changed to a white and blue livery.

In 1998, the First prefix was adopted to the names of the companies, with Calderline becoming First Calderline and Kingfisher becoming First Kingfisher Huddersfield before being shortened to First Huddersfield.

At the turn of the century, the livery of the two companies would changed to incorporate First Group's standard livery now seen on the majority of First services in the country.

First Calderline would rename itself again in the 2000s as First Halifax before the decision to merge the operation of the First services in West Yorkshire to be called First West Yorkshire, which would consist of First Bradford, First Leeds and First Calderdale & Huddersfield.