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All change at High Wycombe.
High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire is the latest town in the United Kingdom to have a major change in its bus operators. At the end of July 2024 Arriva, trading as ‘Arriva The Shires’ closed its bus garages in High Wycombe and Aylesbury. Following the announcement the other large operator in the towns, Go-Ahead owned Carousel Buses, a subsidiary of their Oxford Bus Company said they would step in and take over most of the services that were operated by Arriva. City of Oxford in the late 1980s had operated buses in High Wycombe, so they reintroduced some of the old route numbers and also brought back the fleet name ‘The Wycombe Bus Company’ on their Carousel branded buses, which carry a mostly bright red livery.
This DVD programme was filmed over four visits to the area. The first two visits were made during the filming of our ‘Classic Bus Running Days in High Wycombe and Beaconsfield’ DVD programme in April and July 2023. The third visit, in June 2024, just weeks before the departure of Arriva also includes a visit to the busy bus station in Aylesbury and our final trip in August 2024 shows the ‘new order’ in the town with a good number of interesting buses in service. There are also two other independent operators in High Wycombe and Aylesbury, Redline Buses and Red Rose Travel Ltd., both based in Aylesbury that operate a number of interesting buses in a red and white and red and yellow livery respectively. There is plenty of variety of vehicles to be seen. Arriva operated a number of Wrightbus vehicles such as StreetLite single deckers, Volvo B7TL and B9TL double-deckers, Optare Versa, ADL Enviro200 single-deckers and Enviro400 double-deckers as well as a number of Mercedes-Benz Citaro single-deckers. Carousel also operates StreetLites, Enviro200 and Enviro400 buses and Mercedes-Benz Citaros. Firstbus also run into High Wycombe with their X74 route from Slough. We see Firstbus StreetLites still in their Southampton livery operating alongside the very smart First Beeline livery on Enviro400MMC double-deckers. Our filming locations include High Wycombe bus station, Oxford Road, Oxford Street, Church Street and Castle Street in High Wycombe. A short sequence is filmed in Beaconsfield and during our visit to Aylesbury we film at the bus station, Walton Street and Friarage Road.
On our return visit to High Wycombe in August 2024 we see Redline, Red Rover and Firstbus in action, but the main operator is now Go-Ahead’s Carousel buses taking centre stage. You will see a batch of former First Glasgow Enviro200MMC single-deckers in both First and Carousel liveries. These buses have just come off lease from Firstbus. Also just off lease are a batch of 2009 ADL Enviro400 double-deckers from National Travel West Midlands and these are seen operating in their former operator’s two-tone red livery. Also seen in action is a former Dundee Wright-bodied Volvo single-decker from McGill’s Xplore Dundee fleet. So, plenty to see, but too much to mention here! Enjoy!
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| Filmed : | 2023 & 2024 |
| Duration : | 75 mins |
| Price : | Within UK - £16 |
| Rest of world - £18 | |
| Format : | DVD -R |
| Picture Aspect 16:9 | |
| Order Ref : | D467 |
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