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Hants & Dorset

Preserved Bristol Lodekka in November 2008
Parent	Southern Railway (1929-48) British Automobile Traction (1929-48) Tilling Group (1929-42) British Associated Transport (1948-62) Transport Holding Company (1963-68) National Bus Company (1969-83)
Founded	1920
Ceased operation	1983
Service area	Bournemouth Fareham Lymington Poole Southampton Winchester
Service type	Bus operator
Depots	14

Hants & Dorset Motor Services Ltd was a stage carriage bus service operator in southern England between 1920 and 1983.

Early history

In 1916, the British Automobile Traction Company Limited (a subsidiary of the British Electric Traction Company) and others formed the Bournemouth & District Motor Services Limited. Following the purchase of Trade Cars of Southampton in 1920, the Hants & Dorset Motor Services Ltd name was adopted. In that same year, the Tilling Group bought an interest in the company and from that year until 1929 Hants & Dorset grew rapidly.

In 1929, the Southern Railway took up its option to buy shares, under the terms of the Road & Rail Transport Act 1928, when the four railway companies were able to invest in bus operators.

By the late 1920s and early 1930s, the network of Hants & Dorset bus services was largely complete. Hants & Dorset operated buses in an area approximately bounded by Bournemouth, Poole, Southampton, Lymington, Fareham and Winchester. Hants & Dorset replaced the trams operated by Poole Corporation in 1935.

Nationalisation

The Southern Railway's half-share in Hants & Dorset passed to the government-owned Transport Holding Company (THC) when the railway company was nationalised in 1948. British Automobile Traction sold its shares to the Tilling Group in 1942, who in turn sold out to British Associated Transport in 1949, and thus Hants & Dorset became 100% government owned.

Common management and merger

The THC's successor inspired a reorganisation in 1964 that saw Hants & Dorset and northern neighbour Wilts & Dorset fall under common management, at Hants & Dorset’s head office in Bournemouth.

A year earlier, Wilts & Dorset had taken over a large independent, Silver Star of Porton Down. As part of the THC’s early rationalisation, Wilts & Dorset had previously, in 1950, taken over the Basingstoke operator Venture, which had passed to the Red & White group five years earlier and which, following Red & White’s voluntary nationalisation, had in turn passed to the THC.

Upon both Hants & Dorset and Wilts & Dorset passing to the National Bus Company (NBC) on 1 January 1969, as a result of the Transport Act 1968, the operators merged in 1972 under the Hants & Dorset name and management. Rather than Hants & Dorset's green, the enlarged operation adopted a fleet livery of National poppy red, similar to Wilts & Dorset's. The new operation covered routes from Pewsey in the north, Poole to Fareham in the south, Basingstoke in the east, and Shaftesbury and Warminster in the west.

A year later, the substantial Winchester operator R Chisnell & Sons (t/a King Alfred) passed to Hants & Dorset, along with an eclectic mix of vehicles, most of which were withdrawn from service as non-standard. Chisnell had operated Winchester city services and a country service to Basingstoke.

Hants & Dorset took over the services operated by Western National in Swanage in 1974.

Hants & Dorset had a reputation among NBC subsidiaries as somewhat loss-making. While routes in the Poole-Bournemouth, Southampton, Basingstoke and Salisbury areas made reasonable returns, those elsewhere were weaker. The impact of the private car throughout the 1960s and 1970s together with successive withdrawals and fares revisions further weakened what had now become marginal rural services. During the 1980s, Hants & Dorset's financial position was so precarious that it had to be propped up by an inter-company loan from fellow NBC subsidiary Amalgamated Passenger Transport Ltd in order to remain solvent.

Provincial

NBC acquired the Gosport & Fareham Omnibus Co (trading as Provincial) in 1970. It passed under the head office control of Hants & Dorset but Provincial remained a separate entity, in part under its own control, owing to the terms of a 1929 Act under which it was established. Provincial retained a green livery.

Market analysis

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, in order to match supply and demand without undue cross subsidy, Hants & Dorset like other NBC subsidiaries embarked on a number of market analysis projects. These helped identify viable networks where the local authorities concerned, which by now not only had the power to subsidise bus services but were actually facing resultant financial constraints, could subsidise additional mileage.

MAP, as it was known, emerged from the Midland Red company in 1977 and was applied throughout Hants & Dorset's territory, culminating in redrafted timetables and an attempt at fostering local support through the use of sub-brands identifiable to specific, local markets. These were:

South Wessex (Poole, Bournemouth and Lymington)

Wiltsway (Salisbury and surrounding areas)

Winton Line (Winchester)

Venture (Basingstoke)

South Hants (Southampton)

New Provincial or Provincial Joint Services (Hants & Dorset Fareham and Gosport & Fareham operations)

Depots

At its height, Hants & Dorset operated from garages at Andover, Basingstoke, Blandford Forum, Bournemouth, Eastleigh, Fareham, Lymington, Pewsey, Poole, Ringwood, Salisbury, Southampton, Swanage and Winchester.

End of the road

In the early- to mid-1980s, the National Bus Company, with an eye to the future, began dismantling its larger operating subsidiaries, of which Hants & Dorset was one. The goal was the formation of units that could better serve their local markets, although later splits were to ensure a successful privatisation.

So on 1 April 1983, Hants & Dorset Motor Services was divided into three operating companies: Wilts & Dorset, Provincial and Hampshire Bus.

There re-emerged the name Wilts & Dorset, albeit with a significantly different operating area from that of the old company (from 1983, covering Bournemouth, Poole, Lymington, Salisbury, with a head office remaining at Bournemouth). Wilts & Dorset was sold to its management in 1987 and bought by the Go-Ahead Group in August 2003.

Recognizing the increasing level of joint working, Hants & Dorset's Fareham activities merged with the Gosport and Fareham undertaking, under the Provincial name, trading from Hoeford, Gosport Road, Fareham, and all but closing the former Hants & Dorset Fareham garage other than for storage. Provincial was acquired by FirstGroup as First Provincial, then merged into First Hampshire & Dorset in 2003.

Finally, the former Hants & Dorset operations in Basingstoke, Winchester and Southampton became Hampshire Bus, whose head office was in Eastleigh. Of the three, Hampshire Bus was the weakest, yet this was one of the first companies to sell under the privatisation of the National Bus Company, in April 1987. It was acquired by Stagecoach, but in October 1987 Stagecoach sold the Southampton area operations to Solent Blue Line (itself acquired by the Go-Ahead Group in July 2005). Stagecoach retains the Winchester, Andover and Basingstoke operations.

Trivia

• The Hants & Dorset company was affectionately known as "Pants & Corset".
• The company operated from the higher level of a unique two-tier bus & coach station in Bournemouth, dating from 1930. Having been rebuilt in the 1950s, it was rendered unsafe following a fire in 1976, and demolished and replaced with a car park in the early 1980s.

See also

• List of bus operators of the United Kingdom

References

1. Morris, 1996, p.13
2. Prince, James (2006). Glory Days: Hants & Dorset. Ian Allan Publishing Ltd. p. 6. ISBN 9780711031050.
3. Morris, 1996, p.39-41
4. Corporation and Company vie for Poole Transport Rights Commercial Motor 9 November 1934 page 76
5. Morris, 1996, p.68
6. "Hants and Wilts Merger from April 1 Wilts and Dorset | 31st January 1964 | The Commercial Motor Archive". archive.commercialmotor.com. Retrieved 1 August 2023.
7. Harris, Chris (2021). Hants & Dorset Recollections: The final 20 years. Silver Link Publishing. p. 23. ISBN 9781857945782.
8. Freeman, J.D.F.; Jowitt, Robert E.; Murphy, R.J. (1984). King Alfred Motor Services - The story of a Winchester family business. Kingfisher Railway Productions. ISBN 9780946184101.
9. Bus buy for Go-Ahead The Guardian 12 August 2003

• Morris, C. (1996) Hants & Dorset A History Croydon: DTS Publishing ISBN 9780952344889

External links

Media related to Hants & Dorset Motor Services at Wikimedia Commons

v t e Former bus companies of the United Kingdom
National	Associated Motorways Blazefield Holdings British Bus British Coachways British Electric Traction Fraser Eagle GRT Group HCT Group National Bus Company Tilling Group
England	v t e Former bus companies operating in England North West England Avon Buses Birkenhead Transport Blackburn Transport Blue Bus & Coach Services Bluebird Bus & Coach Bu-Val Buses ChesterBus Citibus Tours Crosville Motor Services Cumberland Motor Services Finglands Coachways First Chester & The Wirral GHA Coaches Glenvale Transport GM Buses Halton Transport Jim Stones Coaches John Fishwick & Sons JPT Lancashire United Transport Manchester Community Transport Maynes Bus Maytree Travel Merseybus MTL North Western Road Car Company (1923) North Western Road Car Company (1986) Pennine Blue Red & White Services Ribble Motor Services Shearings Speedwellbus Transdev Northern Blue UK North Yelloway Motor Services North East England Black Prince Buses BrightBus Busways Travel Services Cleveland Transit Durham Travel Services Jolly Bus Kingston upon Hull City Transport Mexborough and Swinton Traction Company Northern General Transport Company OK Motor Services Samuel Ledgard Scarlet Band South Yorkshire Transport Tates Travel United Automobile Services Venture Transport West Riding Automobile Company West Yorkshire Road Car Company Yorkshire Rider Yorkshire Terrier Yorkshire Traction Midlands Barton Transport Birmingham City Transport Birmingham Motor Traction Central Buses Chase Coaches First Northampton Glossopdale Bus Company Go West Midlands Ludlows North Birmingham Busways People's Express Premiere Travel Probus Management South Notts Bus Company Stevensons of Uttoxeter Travel de Courcey Travel Merry Hill Travel Your Bus Yourbus Zak's Buses East of England Eastern National Omnibus Company MK Metro South West England Abus Alexcars Badgerline Bristol Omnibus Company Crosville Motor Services Devon General Greyhound Motors Great Western Railway Hants & Dorset Nippy Bus Shamrock Buses Silver Star Motor Services South Gloucestershire Bus & Coach Southern National Sureline Trathens Travel Services WebberBus Wessex Bus Western Greyhound Western National Yellow Buses South East England Alder Valley Aldershot & District Traction Badger Vectis Boro'line Maidstone Cavendish Motor Services Countryliner Eastbourne Buses East Kent Road Car Company Epsom Coaches Fleet Buzz Invictaway Kent Top Travel Maidstone & District Motor Services Maidstone Corporation Transport Marchwood Motorways Moss Motor Tours New Enterprise Coaches Portsmouth Corporation Transport Shamrock Buses Southampton Citybus Southdown Motor Services Southdown Buses Thames Transit Thames Valley Traction Tillingbourne Bus Company Velvet Yellow Bus Services Greater London Abellio Surrey Bexleybus Birch Brothers Boro'line London Capital Citybus Capital Logistics Connex East Thames Buses First London Grey-Green Harris Bus Kentish Bus Limebourne London Buslines London Country Bus Services London Country North East London Country North West London Country South West London Easylink London Electrobus Company London Forest London Pride Sightseeing London Traveller MTL NSL Buses Quality Line Thorpes Tower Transit Travel London Travel Surrey Westlink
Scotland	v t e Former bus companies operating in Scotland Scottish Bus Group Central Scottish Clydeside Scottish Eastern Scottish Fife Scottish Highland Scottish Kelvin Central Buses Kelvin Scottish Lowland Scottish Midland Scottish Northern Scottish Strathtay Scottish Western Scottish Other operators Arriva Scotland West A1 Service Dart Buses First Scotland East First Stop Travel Gibson's of Moffat McKindless Munro's of Jedburgh Oban and District Rapsons Scottish Motor Traction Strathclyde Buses Western SMT
Wales	v t e Former bus companies operating in Wales Companies Crosville Motor Services Express Motors GHA Coaches Islwyn Borough Transport National Welsh Omnibus Services Padarn Bus Red & White Services Rhondda Transport Company South Wales Transport Western Welsh

v t e Bus operators in South West England
Bristol	First West of England Stagecoach West
Cornwall	Kernow Plymouth Citybus Stagecoach South West Truronian
Devon	Buses of Somerset Plymouth Citybus Stagecoach South West
Dorset	Buses of Somerset First Hampshire & Dorset Morebus South West Coaches
Gloucestershire	First West of England Stagecoach West Oxford Bus Company (via Pulham's Coaches)
Somerset	Bakers Dolphin Bath Bus Company Berrys Coaches Buses of Somerset Somerset Passenger Solutions Damory Coaches First Hampshire & Dorset First West of England Quantock Motor Services South West Coaches Stagecoach South West
Wiltshire	Connect2Wiltshire Faresaver First West of England Salisbury Reds South West Coaches Stagecoach West Swindon's Bus Company
National	Megabus National Express FlixBus

• 1920 establishments in England
• 1983 disestablishments in England
• Former bus operators in Dorset
• Former bus operators in Hampshire
• British companies disestablished in 1983
• British companies established in 1920