Metroline Fly Solo In The Garden Suburb

Some of London's quirkiest bus services lie in the Golders Green area, serving the community of Hampstead Garden Suburb. For the past twelve years they've been operated by Arriva The Shires, but Metroline managed to steal all three for the latest contract, which commenced on Saturday 9th June 2018. Even though these routes are pretty small compared to some of the monstrosities found on our bus network, this change certainly wasn't an easy transition.

Under the old...

The H2 is the only substantial bus service in Hampstead Garden Suburb, operating a circular route between the extensive residential area and Golders Green. It undertakes a ridiculously complex routeing in an attempt to serve as many streets and houses as possible, but is surprisingly busy considering the overall wealthy status of this locality. Vehicles are sectioned off from the main bus station at Golders Green, with a little lay-by alongside Finchley Road being appropriate for these tiny buses which would feel intimidated by the towering double deckers in the other part. There are some really tight turns involved along the route and whilst it is pretty much all residential, the narrow streets and fancy houses, frequented by vegetation, mean the external surroundings are always attractive. In addition, this route skims the Hampstead Heath Extension and goes past some stunning churches and graveyards, so if you have 28 minutes spare in Golders Green I'd certainly recommend taking a circuit on the H2. Conveniently, halfway through the journey it links up with the mainstream 102 service at a stop called Market Place. It runs every 12 minutes from Monday to Saturday, with this requiring three buses, whilst on Sundays and during the evening the frequency reduces to every 20 minutes. Due to the aforementioned difficult manoeuvres en route, the tiny 7.8m Optare Solos have to be used and these routes are essentially prohibited from having odd workings from the rest of the London fleet. The capacity restraints are also the reason why the H2 has such a high frequency, considering the proportion of residents who use the bus is presumably minimal. Arriva The Shires operated this service, along with the 631 and H3, from Garston (GR) garage and generally the reliability was very good, with hardly any disruptions being possible on these services. However, as you might've guessed, the garage was quite some distance from the terminal, so the dead mileage costs can't have been cheap.

I know its only a little h, but East Fincley isn't the destination!

If you thought the H2 was bizarre, try the H3. It runs at an hourly frequency, Monday to Saturday only, from 0900-1400, with an extra morning peak commuter journey, but just gives up on Sunday and during the late afternoon/evening. Its peak vehicle requirement is for one vehicle, which is crosslinked to the 631 service. This route runs at school times and was formerly known as the H1, making four trips to and from the Henrietta Barnett School, with the journey time being around five minutes. Interestingly, the route is two-way in the afternoon. The H3 is a fair bit longer, with a Golders Green-East Finchley-Golders Green circuit taking around 50 minutes to complete. It is one of my favourite single deck services in London, but not only because of the weird operational hours. Upon departure from the sidecourt, it uses some of the fancy narrow streets of Hampstead Garden Suburb like the H2, passing the incredible church and cemetery en route, before using Hampstead Way with very fancy homes hidden behind hedges. On Wildwood Road the homes become mansion-like, with multiple fancy cars in the driveway, along with large recreational areas of woodland which seem to be underused. There is a brief connection with the 210 bus at Kenwood House, but after this the H3 uses The Bishops Avenue, colloquially referred to as "Millionaire's Row", as it is littered with enormous mansions that form some of the most expensive property in the country. It's hard to believe that this is still zone three and surprisingly the homes aren't glamorous either, with most of the homes being deserted and derelict, whilst others are a building site. It must be very rare to have a passenger request the bus along this incredible stretch, which is over all too quickly as the bus arrives at East Finchley Station and its modest high street. The last section to Hilltop isn't as extravagant as Hampstead Garden Suburb, but it does generate most of the H3's usage and the streets the bus uses to turn around are quite fun nevertheless, with parked cars on both sides making it a really tight squeeze. I hope my brief marketing has been successful, as I would strongly encourage you to take a ride on the H3. There is absolutely nothing like it in London and is enjoyable even if you're not a bus enthusiast.

Ehh? What's that? All will be revealed...

Metroline assumed operation of the Hampstead routes on Saturday 9th June 2018, from Cricklewood (W) garage, which is conveniently only ten minutes away from Golders Green. As the older Optare Solos were too old for another five year contract, some brand new examples of this type were ordered, numbered OS2499-2504, although these are the SR model. However, they didn't arrive until September, so initially Metroline were forced to loan the ex-Garston buses from Arriva and use them on the Hampstead routes until the new buses arrived. The first day of operation wasn't too bad, with only a couple of service issues, although the buses were identical to their appearance under the old contract, apart from the stickers in the windscreen stating that the bus was on loan to Metroline. The operator didn't bother with replacing the Arriva logos. These old Optare Solos weren't particularly healthy though, with a combination of poor maintenance as well as exhausting dead runs from inner London to Hertfordshire resulting in terrible reliability levels. They were breaking down all the time and on most days the H2 was operating with only two buses instead of the designated PVR of three. Those ex-GR buses certainly did sound questionable from a passenger perspective and eventually a photo emerged of OS70 with a completely burnt out rear. Service levels fell off a cliff and something drastic had to be done, as the performance was unsatisfactory for such a theoretically easy set of routes. In the weeks leading up to the takeover date, an anonymous white Optare Solo SR demonstrator had been sighted at Cricklewood (W) garage for type training purposes. However, a few weeks after it was returned, the bus re-emerged on the H2, but in service this time! After having been at Ellenvale Coaches for a while, this non-TfL vehicle was used on the Hampstead routes all through the summer and even had an oyster machine and assault screen fitted, although iBus technology was not installed. Initially, the vehicle was banditised, but after a couple of days the LEDs were programmed for the routes, suggesting that it would be staying for longer than we initially thought. It proved to be a lifeline for Metroline, with it being used intensively on almost every H3 duty, as well as some H2 evening runs and even then the latter route was falling short of PVR on most days. Even though I wasn't initially going to bother going up to Hampstead until the new vehicles arrived, it isn't every day that a non TfL spec vehicle is put into service on a London route - the bus even had seatbelts!

Not red and with no blinds!

My first experience of Metroline on the Hampstead routes was very telling indeed, with the operator really struggling to produce any sort of service given the circumstances. When I arrived it was quite worrying to see only two vehicles (OS68 and OS71) in service on LVF, with the H2 still being a bus down despite the Ellenvale (unevenly) bridging what could've been a 36 minute gap. To make matters worse, the driver for the scheduled 1300 H3 departure simply vanished and after 22 minutes of waiting, it became apparent that this trip wasn't running at all, which is very poor for an hourly service and I can assure you the other punters were not amused! A circuit on the Ellenvale (H2) to waste time was an interesting experience, with one passenger commenting on how the newer model has a lower capacity than the ex-GR Solos. Upon arrival at Golders Green, OS68 was still abandoned in the forecourt, but there were also saw unusual tailbacks on Finchley Road. After walking up the road, I found OS71, the only other bus working the H2, broken down in the middle of the Finchley Road, effectively making it a one way street - what an awful position to give up! This meant that there was only one active vehicle out of a requirement for four buses. After 15 minutes OS71 got going again, but it did sound awfully unhealthy.

At this point, the Ellenvale switched to the H3 so that the last departure of the day could actually run, whilst the driver of OS68 returned so the H2 could at least operate a two bus service. I also found out from the driver that the white demonstrator had broken down earlier in the day on The Bishops Avenue! Perhaps Metroline had stretched their backup bus too far... It was working properly on my trip at least, so it was a shame the driver wasn't route trained and we ended up doing a U-turn in the middle of Hampstead Garden Suburb after missing a turn! Thankfully, as these buses are so small, getting out of there wasn't too difficult and after some directions from passengers, we did actually make it to the Hilltop. After some awfully tight squeezes, the circuit was almost complete, but the driver made another wrong turn, this time too soon rather than too late, so we had to endure the entire circuit again and were twenty minutes late upon arrival at Golders Green. I don't really know who to blame here, as it could be Arriva for not maintaining their Solos properly, Optare for being so late with the new batch, or even Metroline for the shoddy state of affairs on my visit, but what was certain is that they were desperate for their new buses...

No way! They actually exist!

Being three months overdue, it was rather surprising when some of the new Optare Solos actually showed up at Cricklewood (W) garage in the middle of September. Apparently the reason for them being delayed so heavily is that they were specifically designed for the H-routes, although I am clueless as to what modifications have actually taken place.  For whatever reason, it wasn't possible to fit conventional blinds to this batch of buses, so TfL were forced to make an exemption and permit the use of LEDs on the new Solos, which are informatively programmed for the Hampstead routes and maybe the 268 if worst comes to worst - Garston (GR) garage did throw their Solo's on that route from time to time! They're also currently carrying "CW" garage codes, when in fact Cricklewood is simply known as W. Maybe this is the sign of things to come.... Before entering service, one made a surprise visit at Holloway (HT) garage for its open day on Saturday 15th September 2018, although due to misdemeanour from certain members of the public the bus ended up broken before it had even hit the road. A couple of days later, two sneaked out into service on the H2 and H3 and by the weekend all bar one had made their debut. However, due to an unknown issue which is reliant on a timetable change in October (one would assume this would be the smaller capacity of the new Solos), they are currently banned from the 631. It also explains why an extra bus was ordered as part of the tender specification, which suggests its PVR will be rising. I must say that the vehicles look incredibly smart, with the immaculate Metroline livery suiting the curved bodywork and I was very excited to finally sample them after so much anticipation.

So buses are allowed to apologise for not being in service.

I am of the opinion that the LEDs look fantastic, although at times they are quite difficult to read as the text displaying "via Hampstead Garden Suburb" is so condensed, whilst in rainy weather they're not perfectly clear in photos. There also seemed to be a technical glitch with the iBus programming, as my bus just displayed "H2 to Golders Green" for the entire journey, whilst on LVF the buses refused to show stops outside the area surrounding the terminus. Nevertheless, the seats provided are very comfortable, with the vast majority being high-backed too. It really was quite refreshing to see a bus that wasn't unbearably worn out on these Hampstead services. They sound quite different to the Ellenvale demonstrator for some reason, with the London buses having more of a growl to their engine, whilst the Ellenvale had attributes of an E200 MMC engine. Despite being quite noisy for a new bus, they're very quick off the mark and offer a smooth ride, whilst the driver on my journey was truly superb. She greeted every single passenger and offered them brilliant customer service, being one of the friendliest drivers I've encountered for, well, years. If anyone high up in Metroline reads this, it was OS2501 on Saturday 22nd September 2018 at around 3pm and please pass on my praise! These buses gave a really relaxing journey and I'm really looking forward to having the Solos as part of the future London fleet, they're top notch in my opinion. Hopefully, now that Metroline have a more dependable fleet, the operation of the Hampstead routes can improve - they have run them before so hopefully have the advantage of experience too! I see the potential.

Thanks for reading and stay safe!