Dennis Dart - Low Floor

40805/33/7/8  R312GHS & R670/4/5DUS   

Following a tendering exercise by Worcestershire County Council First Midland Red was successful in winning the first permanent park and ride service for Worcester. The new so called Worcester North Park & Ride started operation on 17 April 2001. For the contract First Midland Red leased five new Low Floor B34F Caetano Nimbus Dennis Darts (351-4/6 Y351-4/6AUY), which were delivered to Worcester Garage on the 11th and 12th April 2001 in a Purple and Orange "Worcester North Park+Ride" livery. To meet the contract requirement fifteen volunteer drivers were sent on a three day training coarse on customer care and disability awareness and these drivers worked on a special rota which includes all of the Park and Ride operation. The only other First Group Caetano bodied Dennis Dart at the time W809VMA which was used during March and April 2001 for driver and engineering training. Four out of the five vehicles were required at any one time to operate the service between Perdiswell to the north of the City Centre and the Bus Station on a 10-minute headway. With the introduction of the national vehicle numbering scheme the vehicles were put into the 42xxx series of numbers. During November 2006 the vehicles were fitted with electronic destination displays. With end of the operation of the Worcester North Park and Ride by First these vehicles were repainted into standard Barbie livery. The vehicles ended their days with First Midland Red at the Hereford depot. All five were withdrawn on the 5th September 2015 with the closure of the Hereford depot. A number of the vehicles went onto see service with First Potteries.

Livery Key : Barbie 3 - is the new corporate Firstgroup livery for all vehicles which is a modified version of the original Barbie livery (The dates in brackets are when the vehicle was repainted) 

42401/2/3/4/5/6   P401/2/3/4/5/6MLA

42455  R445CCV

42455 arrived with First Midland Red in early November 2008 from First Devon and Cornwall. The vehicle was originally part of batch of 18 vehicles which were new to Western National during 1997/8 and the batch being registered R447-64CCV. A number of the batch were moved in latter life to First Eastern Counties at Great Yarmouth. 42455 had been in service at Camborne running on services in Cornwall before its move to Worcester. The vehicle entered service at Worcester in November 2008 and was eventually moved to Kidderminster Garage. 42455 was sold with the depot to Diamond Bus in March 2013. The vehicle ended its days in service at Redditch depot which too by this time was under the ownership of Diamond Bus.

42641   N341EUY

46641 was originally numbered 341 and was part of the order for Plaxton bodied Dennis Darts Midland Red West made in in 1995. As the 14th vehicle in the order it was an early low floor vehicle. 341 (E341EUY) entered service at Kidderminster Garage towards the end of April 1996 with Shropshire County Council funding the difference in cost between a standard vehicle and the low floor bus. As an early low floor Dart the vehicle is virtually unique in that it is plated to carry two wheelchairs whereas more recent low floor vehicles can normally only carry one. The vehicle was used on a number of Council sponsored routes, which were the 712 (Mondays to Saturdays), 538 (Tuesdays only), 141/2 (Wednesdays only), 491/2 (Thursdays only), 713 (Saturdays only) and some journeys on the 297. These contracts continued until the Summer of 1999 after which the vehicle was used on general Kidderminster Garage work until September 2000. It then found a niche as the back up vehicle for the two low floor Dennis Darts (X371/1CUY) being used on the contracted service 303 plus it saw use on the new service X33 running between Redditch and Kidderminster. First Midland Red lost the service contracts to Pete’s Travel from 8th April 2002 and 341 went back to operating more general services running from Kidderminster Garage. In January 2003 as part of service changes at Worcester the vehicle moved to Worcester Garage in company with low floor Darts 327/9/30 from Redditch. The vehicle has been painted in the low floor Barbie livery to match 327/9/30 even though it did not not qualify for the livery as it lacks a corporate internal seats and fittings. However, from 4th September 2003 341 together with 327/9 and 330 were transferred to Kidderminster Garage for use on the X33, 300 and 303 services when the contract for the services were won back from from Pete's Travel. With the introduction of the national vehicle numbering scheme the vehicle were put into the 426xx series of numbers. With the sale of Kidderminster depot to Diamond Bus in March 2013 the vehicle was to transfer with the sale. However it was decided that 42220 was included in the sale and so 42641 was withdrawn from service  and ended up being sold for scrap in June 2013.

Livery Key : Barbie 3 - is the new corporate Firstgroup livery for all vehicles which is a modified version of the original Barbie livery (The dates in brackets are when the vehicle was repainted) 

42889/90-4 VX54MUC/O/P/UV & VX05JWW

In November 2004 Firstgroup announced a major vehicle order for a total of 125 new low floor buses from Alexander Dennis at a total cost of £15M. As part of the order First Midland Red received a total of 46 new vehicles which included six 10.7-metre Pointer Darts. Firstgroup has ordered a total of 80 vehicles across the whole group. On Friday 26th November 2004 First Midland took delivery of a number of new single and double deck vehicles from Alexander Dennis.  Two Darts arrived with three double deck vehicles and were initially put into store at Worcester. The first were joined by three more vehicles of the same type over the next couple of days. The first of the vehicles entered service at Kidderminster on 17th December 2004. From the same date 42217/9/20 moved back to Worcester Garage for use on Worcester city services. The sixth vehicle in the batch VX54MUW (42894) arrived at Worcester during February 2005. As this sixth vehicle had not been registered by 1st March 2005 when the 05 plates were introduced a new registration mark was issued of VX05JWW. This vehicle entered service at Kidderminster during the second week of March 2005.  42889/90/1 were included in the sale of Kidderminster Garage to Diamond Bus in March 2013. The vehicles have continued in service at Kidderminster depot. The remaining three vehicles at Worcester Garage were seen as none standard and were in October 2013 transferred to First Potteries. In April 2017 following service changes in the Potteries area there was a need for slightly larger vehicles so 42892-4 moved back to Worcester in exchange for Enviro 300's 67647/8/9 from Worcester Garage. During August 2021 VX54MUU was withdrawn due to excess chassis corrosion. An replacement vehicle 43876 was found at Stoke depot .

Livery Key : Barbie 3 - is the new corporate Firstgroup livery for all vehicles which is a modified version of the original Barbie livery & New Urban is the latest version of the corporate livery (The dates in brackets are when the vehicle was repainted) 

43475 R475CAH

With the reduction in services operated by First Eastern Counties a number of vehicles were made surplus in spring 2012. Many of the surplus vehicles were sold for scrap but R475CAH was transferred to First Midland Red. The vehicle entered services at Kidderminster Garage in April 2012. When Kidderminster Garage was closed in March 2013 and sold to Diamond Bus the vehicle was transferred to that operation.

43869-74 EG52FFL/T/V/U/J/Y

In a quest to replace the low floor Dennis Darts in the First fleet that do not comply with the DDA access requirements a number of short wheelbase Dennis Darts were purchased from Ensign Bus. These vehicles had been in use on Jersey and had been built to a special narrow body specification for use on the island. The vehicles arrived with First Group still with their Sate of Jersey registration marks. All have been re-registered with 52 plate registration marks and have been refurbished prior to entry into service. This has included painting the vehicles in the latest First Group corporate urban livery.  Six of the vehicles entered service at Worcester in June 2013 running alongside the Optare Solos on city services. During June 2014 it was found that 43871 and 43872 were incorrectly registered with the wrong registration marks when they were imported from Jersey by Ensign Bus. the plates were transposed. This was corrected during June 2014. With various bus service changes in Worcester the vehicles were gradually transferred to the Hereford depot. All six were allocated to Hereford on the day of the depot closure on 5th September 2015. All six were initially stored in the closed depot before transfer to Cornwall.

Livery Key : First Urban - is the new corporate Firstgroup livery for all vehicles (The dates in brackets are when the vehicle was repainted) 

315 SN03LGA

Over the weekend of the 29th and 30th May 2004 First Midland Red took delivery of what was then  their fourth short wheel-base low floor Dennis Dart SN03LGA. The vehicle is an Alexander Dennis demonstrator that was first registered in May 2003. The vehicles was loaned to First Midland Red for use on the Worcestershire County Council subsidised Flexi-Link services 914 and 915 that link Kidderminster with Stourport. SN03LGA carried no external markings to show it is being operated by First Midland Red.  The vehicle entered service with First Midland Red on Tuesday 1st June 2004 and was fitted with a radio telephone for use by drivers to communicate with the Worcestershire County Council control centre so that they knew when and where passengers require picking up from. This on loan from Alexander Dennis was replaced in March 2005 by 2 new Optare Solo vehicles (See Optare section and vehicles 1720-3). 315 was returned to Worcestershire County Council in March 2005.  

371/2 X371/2CUY

Over Using government funding to improve bus links to hospitals in Worcestershire the  service 303 between Kidderminster and Worcester was extended to the Worcester’s Royal Infirmary three sites of Castle Street, Ronkswood and Newtown in the city from 4th September 2000. Worcestershire County Council funded the revised service and was branded under their “easyLINK” brand. First Midland Red leased two new short-wheelbase Dennis Dart SLF buses which were registered X371CUY and X372CUY from Minstral Group PLC to meet contract requirements. Being a short term contract Firstgroup were not prepared to allocate new buses to First Midland Red. From Monday 8th April 2002, the contract for services 303 and X33 (which ran between Kidderminster and Redditch under the same initiative) was taken over by Pete’s Travel. Both of these vehicles were withdrawn from service with First Midland Red on Saturday 6th April 2002 and were passed back to the lease company.