West Midlands Dudley Road bus corridor

The Dudley Road bus corridor is a collection of bus services operated in the West Midlands, United Kingdom.

History

The routes originally formed part of a jointly-worked Birmingham City Transport/Midland Red high-frequency bus operation known as 'The Track' on account of its origins as a tramway, and with its City Centre terminus in Edmund Street in Birmingham. The original route variations and short workings comprised:-

Service 80 - Birmingham-Cape Hill

Service 82 - Birmingham-Bearwood

Service 83 - Birmingham-Soho

Service 84 - Birmingham-Smethwick

Service 85 - Birmingham-Spon Croft

Service 86 - Birmingham-Oldbury

Service 87 - Birmingham-Dudley

Service 88 - Cape Hill-Dudley

Service 89 - Oldbury-Dudley

Services 80, 82 & 83 were operated from BCT's Rosebery Street depot and Services 84-89 largely from Midland Red's Oldbury depot (though most Midland Red journeys were worked as either Service 86s or 87s). For many years, an operating agreement prevented Midland Red using their high-capacity D9 double-deckers on these routes. Up until the late 1960s buses ran with 'B' prefixs on their service number blinds (ie: showing B82, B87, etc), although this practice was eventually dropped, first by BCT and then by Midland Red. The routes were wholly-operated by West Midlands PTE from 1973 until deregulation in 1986.

For a brief period in the late 1980s West Midlands Travel extended certain 87 journey to Netherton and Cradley Heath as Service 89.

Current route

Route 82 (NXWM & AKT)

  • Birmingham
  • City Hospital
  • Bearwood

Route 87 (NXWM & DIA)

  • Birmingham
  • City Hospital
  • Smethwick
  • Oldbury
  • Tividale
  • Dudley