Original London United logoLondon United RATP Group logo
London United[2] commenced operating on 1 April 1989, as one of 12 operating subsidiaries of London Buses in preparation for privatisation. In November 1994 it was sold in a management buyout.
In April 2006 both operations were rebranded with the Transdev name and logo, removing the London United and London Sovereign brands, although both companies continued as separate legal entities.
In November 2009 Transdev purchased NCP Challenger with seven Transport for London contracted routes, 87 buses and garages at Park Royal and Twickenham.[6] These were integrated into the London United business.
RATP Dev
In 2009 Transdev's majority owner, Caisse des dépôts et consignations, commenced negotiating with Veolia Environnement to merge Transdev with Veolia Transport. As part of the resulting agreement, it was agreed that the RATP Group, which had a minority shareholding in Transdev, would take over ownership of some of Transdev's operations in lieu of cash payment.
This resulted in London United transferring to the RATP Group, while London Sovereign remained with Transdev and become part of the merged Veolia Transdev group.[7][8][9][10]
This agreement took effect in March 2011, and RATP Group renamed its newly acquired business London United.[11]
In 2015, a charter unit was established under the United Transit brand with a grey and red livery.[12]
Since July 2021, London United has taken on most routes from RATP Group's other London subsidiary Quality Line, [13] with routes 413, 463 and S1 being transferred to Go-Ahead London.[14]
In December 2021, RATP's London bus operations including London United were transferred to a RATP joint venture with Australia's Kelsian Group (parent company of Tower Transit) known as RATP Dev Transit London.[15]
When new, the 11-acre (4.5 ha) site was described as one of the finest plants in the country and was the main depot of London United Tramways with 20 covered tracks. The garage is nowadays divided into two sections, one used by London United, with an entrance off Wellington Road, and the other by Transport UK London Bus with an entrance off Stanley Road.
Fulwell was the first garage in London to receive trolleybuses in 1931, and together with Isleworth was the last to operate them until 1962. The last trams operated from the depot in 1935, although some of the tram tracks were, until recently, still visible in the cobbled surface of the Stanley Road entrance. The garage has never reached its capacity, even taking in much of the work from Twickenham when it closed in 1970, and in 2001 107 buses were allocated. In 1999 the garage housed 13 London Country buses after Arriva Croydon & North Surrey shut its Leatherhead garage. The buses on route 85 were operated from the forecourt with Arriva drivers.[citation needed]
Hounslow garage was opened by the London General Omnibus Company in 1913 on the former site of the District Railway's Hounslow Town station. The garage along with many others was requisitioned in the First World War. Hounslow was the subject of two firsts in 1925 and 1930 with the first pneumatic tyre buses and the original Dennis Dart allocated respectively. The garage had one problem though: the roof was too low and only open toppers and single deck vehicles could use the depot until the mid-1930s when the roof was raised.[citation needed]
A London Transport survey in 1947 found that 92 vehicles were allocated to Hounslow, a garage with a capacity of 72. This was mainly achieved by parking buses on a plot of land behind the garage that was also used to stand vehicles terminating there on layover. The garage was rebuilt in the early 1950s and included a new bus station in front of the garage. The planned allocation was now up to 120 vehicles, although the allocation in 2002 was 127.[citation needed]
Hounslow's first one-man operated double deckers were MCW Metrobuses delivered in 1982 for routes 111 and 202. With the allocation still high, Hounslow runs a number of night services on behalf of other London United garages to enable it to fit the buses into the garage. It was also the first garage in London to operate a low-floor bus with the arrival of Wright Pathfinder bodied Dennis Lance SLF in December 1993.[17]
There were plans to relocate the garage away from the town centre, and allow the expansion of the adjoining bus station. In 2005 an unsuccessful planning application for a site in Hanworth Road was lodged. This was largely due to a campaign by residents overlooking the site.[citation needed]
The original plan was to create a temporary home for the Riverside garage buses and staff whilst that garage was re-built with a view to taking on the workload from Mortlake and Turnham Green which were to close. However this idea was changed and the garage took on the work from Turnham Green which closed and also inherited the garage code V. Following service reductions, Mortlake and Riverside closed in 1983, with some of their work moving to Stamford Brook.[citation needed]
In 1981 Stamford Brook took on Airbus routes A1 and A2 following the withdrawal of the existing British Airways services between Heathrow Airport and central London. These vehicles were transferred in 1994 to West Ramp (which became an outstation of V) leaving the garage with an allocation of MCW Metroriders, MCW Metrobuses, Leyland Olympians and Dennis Darts.[citation needed]
Tolworth (TV)
Dennis Dart SLF/Plaxton Pointer 2 with Transdev branding, in Staines bus station on Route 290
Tolworth was originally planned in the late 1990s following the closure of Kingston Garage and the announcement that the site was to be part sold off and part converted into the new bus station. A recruitment centre was opened on Tolworth Broadway long before building work ever started.[citation needed]
Route K5 transferred to Tolworth from Quality Line on 25 January 2020. Routes 406, 418 and 465 transferred to Tolworth from Quality Line on 25 April 2020.[citation needed]
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