Bus Shite

[Sir Snipes]

Are you boys familiar with Mayne of Manchester? A small, family owned bus operator covering a few niche routes East out of Manchester city centre, usually out to Ashton under Lyne but a few others too. They ran from 1920 all the way to 2008, being the last such independent operator and sold to Stagecoach when the owner retired and his sons didn't wish to continue running the business. Save for a few book listings and a wikipedia footnote, there's little left to show for their long history, and I dare say the Metrolink extension  would have consumed their routes eventually regardless. They ran their buses in a distinctive burgundy, initially with blue stripes later cream.

I have many memories of them, as they were the best service for my home journey (230-235 services) but were less frequent than the Stagecoach services (216, 236,237) that ran parallel then diverged before hitting Droylsden - I was often faced the dilemma of jumping on the 216 or waiting for the "better" Mayne service to show up, often if having to jump off the Stagecoach and hoping to flag down the Mayne in time to switch when they passed one another. Also the driver changes mid-service, when the bus passed the depot in Clayton (now an Aldi) or the infrequent trip to Glossop on a Sunday/Bank Holiday (237) and having to give the driver directions through the scenic High Peak route. Don't know why I'm posting this now, just feeling nostalgic I guess.

Ashton Under Lyne bus station, in classic colours for the anniversary.

Heading toward the main bus station, Piccadilly Gardens Manchester. My brother was a big fan of Vinyl Exchange back in the day, who are still going strong, amazingly. Also these Scanias had the best seats - well stuffed benches!

My stop at Piccadilly gardens. These "modern" Dennis things had the worst seats - horrible individually moulded plastic things. Disgrace! 

Nothing worse for me than ignoring the 216 and sprinting for the Mayne only to round the front and see it was the useless 217! Same place - I used this stop outside the Natwest for many years.

One of the few single deckers they operated. This is Clayton, now thoroughly dominated by the Manchester City FC presence. Also left is the "B of the Bang" art piece for the 2002 Commonwealth games - what a disaster that thing was. If you google street view this junction and flip back through time you can see it being cut up after bits of it fell off into the road. Asda and bits of the Velodrome in the background on the right.

Not sure where this is as I never used this service. If I had to guess I'd say Deansgate and that Weatherspoons is The Moon under The Water but really not sure. They ran a few of these models for years. I'm not really a bus guy so don't know what it is? Atlantean? The quintessential Mayne before more modern busses arrived in the late 90s.

When Stagecoach bought them out many of the staff and vehicles transferred over. Quite bizarre seeing distinctive vehicles in new colours (full disclosure I'm not sure if this is an ex-Mayne bus but it's close enough for illustration).

[artdjones]

33 minutes ago, Sir Snipes said:

Are you boys familiar with Mayne of Manchester? A small, family owned bus operator covering a few niche routes East out of Manchester city centre, usually out to Ashton under Lyne but a few others too. They ran from 1920 all the way to 2008, being the last such independent operator and sold to Stagecoach when the owner retired and his sons didn't wish to continue running the business. Save for a few book listings and a wikipedia footnote, there's little left to show for their long history, and I dare say the Metrolink extension  would have consumed their routes eventually regardless. They ran their buses in a distinctive burgundy, initially with blue stripes later cream.

I have many memories of them, as they were the best service for my home journey (230-235 services) but were less frequent than the Stagecoach services (216, 236,237) that ran parallel then diverged before hitting Droylsden - I was often faced the dilemma of jumping on the 216 or waiting for the "better" Mayne service to show up, often if having to jump off the Stagecoach and hoping to flag down the Mayne in time to switch when they passed one another. Also the driver changes mid-service, when the bus passed the depot in Clayton (now an Aldi) or the infrequent trip to Glossop on a Sunday/Bank Holiday (237) and having to give the driver directions through the scenic High Peak route. Don't know why I'm posting this now, just feeling nostalgic I guess.

Ashton Under Lyne bus station, in classic colours for the anniversary.

Heading toward the main bus station, Piccadilly Gardens Manchester. My brother was a big fan of Vinyl Exchange back in the day, who are still going strong, amazingly. Also these Scanias had the best seats - well stuffed benches!

My stop at Piccadilly gardens. These "modern" Dennis things had the worst seats - horrible individually moulded plastic things. Disgrace! 

Nothing worse for me than ignoring the 216 and sprinting for the Mayne only to round the front and see it was the useless 217! Same place - I used this stop outside the Natwest for many years.

One of the few single deckers they operated. This is Clayton, now thoroughly dominated by the Manchester City FC presence. Also left is the "B of the Bang" art piece for the 2002 Commonwealth games - what a disaster that thing was. If you google street view this junction and flip back through time you can see it being cut up after bits of it fell off into the road. Asda and bits of the Velodrome in the background on the right.

Not sure where this is as I never used this service. If I had to guess I'd say Deansgate and that Weatherspoons is The Moon under The Water but really not sure. They ran a few of these models for years. I'm not really a bus guy so don't know what it is? Atlantean? The quintessential Mayne before more modern busses arrived in the late 90s.

When Stagecoach bought them out many of the staff and vehicles transferred over. Quite bizarre seeing distinctive vehicles in new colours (full disclosure I'm not sure if this is an ex-Mayne bus but it's close enough for illustration).

They preserved 8859VR, one of their Regent Vs for years, but some time after the sale it got shipped out to Japan.

That's how it looked in service.

That's it as last seen in Japan. It got reregistered before export, as 8859VR would be valuable. It's on a 2008 Volvo C30 at present, and the registration is probably worth a lot more than the car.

[Sir Snipes]

Never imagined an old bus from east Manchester would find it's way all the way to Japan!