The days of red and cream buses on the city’s streets are numbered after Brighton and Hove Buses announced a rebrand.
The bus company said today its will be respraying buses with a new teal and aqua colour scheme over the coming months and years.
The buses will also have a series of rainbow coloured icons representing passengers on the side.
The last time the buses’ colours were changed was 35 years ago.
Ed Wills, Managing Director at Brighton and Hove Buses, said: “Our brand livery has not changed much since the 90s, but we, and our city, have changed hugely in that time.
“That’s why we’re transforming our brand to more accurately represent the spirit of who we are today and the unique, vibrant city that we serve.”
The company says the new scheme represent the colours of the sky and the sea, and are likely to start hitting the streets in autumn.
Its logo is also changing, to include what it describes as ” a slick A to B journey line”.
This video shows how Brighton and Hove Buses looked in 1988, before the last rebrand – but still in red and cream colours.
I rather like the two blue colours – sea and sky? – and they reflect the railings on the seafront. Lightish blue teal for Brighton and dark green for Hove. A rainbow for diversity – our city is, after all, an eclectic mix of white middle class people.
But the big question? Will our buses still be named after eminent Brightonians and Hovites? I’ll chain myself to “Adrian Bunting” in protest if that changes!
Waste of money. Need more buses and drivers, not new colours. Nothing on windows either want to see our!
All good – as long as they dont stick any graphic on the windows. One of the many joys of riding on a bus is the view so obscuring the windows with images makes bus travel less attractive, counteracting the company’s plan to attract more passengers.
Can we have an end of the word “brand”? The ‘bus fellow uses it three times in his remark.
A huge mistake, in my view. Red and cream has been the main livery of the company and its predecessors for decades and this tradition and length of service should not be done away with – not now, not ever. Ed, I’m afraid it smacks of “we’ve got to keep up with the times” for its own sake, rather than because it’s necessary. It also smacks of bringing the livery closer to that of sister company Metrobus – I reckon they’ll be identically liveried in a few years.
Fact is, the buses in Brighton have always been red and cream – save the few decades of Corporation blue – and, in as important a tourist city as Brighton is, the continuity of an iconic bus livery is as critical as it is in London. Shades of blue make our buses look like any other – why fix it when it ain’t broke?
Fiddle around with the design as much as you like but ditch the red and cream at your (and our) peril.
I’m not quite sure what you think the consequences might be? A mass bus boycott? Fairly sure life will go on as normal
Hmm, Brighton and Hove buses were NBC green and white between around 1970 till 1986 when they went private again. Corporation also gave up traditional red and cream at around the same time and went blue and white until they were sold off around 1997.
Hmm, Meterobus, various views on that bunch, none of them very good, probably the worse company I’ve ever dealt with and as for dealing with complaints, they have staff who haven’t got a clue where their buses operate and that’s worrying and an excuse for a bus service that ran consistently late was because it had to stop and pick up passengers !!! And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
I agree
The Brighton, Hove and District Bus Company were always red and cream. Brighton Corporation buses were blue and white.
Finally, Southdown buses, remember them, were a kind of forest geen and cream before nationalism occurred and then they became almost completely green with a thin white stripe.
Nothing like blowing money on wokery that literally no1 cares about when actually we just need some better cross town express services that said rebranding budget could have been spent on.
Tbh it’s really cliché and actually not a great design. Equally why are they green? They still run on diesel, maybe if they ran from electric cables without massive lithium batteries that are charged by a diesel engine, like other more forward thinking places they would have a right to call them selves more environmentally friendly.
Buses need to be refurbished and is a planned maintenance programme. Seats are tatty and floors need to be treated. It’s nothing new and is happening every week at every bus company.
Complete waste of money, if you’re a bus traveller you still will be regardless of the colour, everyone sees the buses coming because they stand out, older and people with poor eyesight can recognise them easily. What is the point in rebranding buses? Cheaper fares or deals for local residents is more likely to sell the seats
Buses need to be maintained and repainting them and putting in new seating on older buses has happened forever.
I agree, red buses stand out as do those route branded ones, Blue 49’s purple 28’s etc.
Agree cheaper fares and running a reliable service will do much to improve public transport but it goes a lot deeper than that.
Stupid road restrictions and layouts cause much of the delays to bus services.
I Think the busses should remain red, but the seating should be changed, do away with cloth like material, use material that can be cleaned like PVC.
Most of us care about the price of bus travel and not what colour the bus is painted. I’m guessing this will cost money
Hope this rebrand is more successful than Royal Mail to Consignia years ago, and the BA logo on their planes – both abject and costly failures
ALL VERY WELL CHANGING THE BUS COLOURS WE’LL STILL BE LUMBERED WITH THE 50S IN HOLLINGDEAN WHICH ALL DATE FROM THE 50S ( 1850S ) , WITH NO PHONE CHARGING POINTS , AND ARE ALL REALLY GROTTY , YET THEY GIVE THE NEANDERTHAL STUDENTS THE LATEST BUSES AND THEY SIT THEIR WITH THEIR SHOES ON THE SEATS IMBIBING ALCOHOL WHICH IS AGAINST THE POLICIES OF BRIGHTON AND HOVE BUSES ALSO , WE NEVER KNOW WHEN THE 50 WILL COME – THE WORLD ‘S BIGGEST BOOK THE BRIGHTON AND HOVE BUSES BOOK OF EXCUSES SND THERE ARE NEVERANY METROS AS WE’RE ALL ILLEGITIMATE IN HOLLINGDEAN
You’ve made critical comments about the age of the 50 service buses before.
As pointed out before, BH&D don’t have any buses older than 2005.
So no phone charger, so what, not a vital piece of equipment and you’re only sitting on it for a short time.
Yes the buses are old stock, but having had the misfortune of travelling on this service, it’s no wonder you get the old buses. At least twice I travelled on it, a gentleman wet the seat. According to the driver, this resident does it at least once a week and the bus has to go to the depot for cleaning and drying out. On another occasion, local kids thought it clever to rip up Metro newspapers and mouthy rude customers make me glad I don’t have to use the 50 more than once a month.
Students may have their feet on the seats but they don’t pee or poo on them like the 50.
As for drinking, it’s not a company policy, it’s law, and it’s not down to drivers to police it, they have limited options.
As for those Metro’s, not sure buses have them any more but as stated above, they look delightful all ripped up and thrown around by those children of Hollingdean.
Too much like the Arriva livery .
I really hope the buses retain their names
I like the red. Traditionally buses are red. I hope it is just a respray and we are not going to get the 5, 5a, type buses everywhere. No heating in winter and extremely cold. Not that we get any kind of say in such things
Instead of spending time and money on changing the colours and appearance, it is a pity they cannot get the buses running on time, and avoiding cancellations without warning. And they should tell all their drivers that when the buses all bunch up, as at Churchill Square, they should allow for passengers making their way towards them. They should not quickly and deliberately shut the doors when they see someone running in front of them, then shrug their shoulders and drive off.
Having said that, many of the drivers are very helpful and friendly. It is just the odd ones who treat passengers with contempt.
As for the miserable young people who love to put their feet up on seats (and they also do this on nearly every train that stops at Sussex University), they are an utter disgrace.
I really don’t mind what colour the buses are I got on a 78 bus to the dyke couldn’t see a thing out of the window it was filthy disgusting.
I live in lower bevendean bus number 48 if you havnt got a bad back when you get on you will have by the time you get off, they quite often miss our service out if a driver goes sick take a 48 off, also what’s really bad if a bus is just running to garage from bevendean the driver should let you get on and drop you at bottom of the avenue he has to go there no option and you can get a very frequent 49 from there but no you have to wait another 20 minutes I have lived in bevendean for 67 years we’ve always had a raw deal
Haha Jane,
I don’t agree you’ve had a raw deal for 67 years.
Brighton Corporation ran service 10’s and 11’s Bevendean to Westdean and Hangleton with a 15 minute headway until they were sold, (Wrongly in my Opinion) to the Go-Ahead group in 1997.
Being an ex Blue Bus employee, I can’t recall there ever being any serious problems with the service, yes we had breakdowns, crashes and the occasional service cancelled due to operational reasons so I’m not quite sure you’re right.
Service 10/1 and route 27 (Saltdean-Brighton Stn) always had the newest buses on them while the 49 route always had the oldest up till 1995 when the 49 went single decker.
Service 10/1 also had one of the newer Double Decker Coaches allocated during the winter so not a such a raw deal surely.
Go-Ahead ruined much of the former Blue Bus Network I’m afraid, Blue bus used to have a good network locally and ran Country buses from its Lewes Depot and ran services as far as Bodiuam Castle, Crawley and operated local service’s in Burgess Hill and Haywards Health.
Go-Ahead I’m afraid gave up much of the network and Metrobus took over some service’s in Burgess Hill but couldn’t run them properly and they also gave them up. One thing that killed Burgess Hill was the selection of route numbers, for decades buses were numbered 34a/c 35a/c obviously Anti-Clock or Clockwise. Metrobus decided to use 34w/e 35 w/e, west and east that was so confusing, no indication if they were going EAST on the Clock wise route or EAST on the Anti-clock loop.
So incompetent too, they advertised a route in Redhill as being diverted due to Gas works until 1700. 3 of us waited at the temporary stop on the diversion route and the bus didn’t show. We ended up getting a taxi between us and on enquiring with customer service (if that’s what they call it) what happened, I was informed that because the road works finished an hour earlier they put the bus back on normal line of route and couldn’t explain how we were to know that being out in a country lane.
I made a few inquiries with the Department of Transport on this issue and further with the traffic commissioner who told me they should have continued the diversion route as advertised and would log the complaint for their records.
Maybe military camouflage would be better and then they will be even more difficult to spot when the bozoos in the control room remove them from the time table without informing the public or the disabled.
They want to run more buses on the 28/29 that will be going to Eastbourne apparently from Ringmer and Tunbridge Wells, can’t even run town services so where are they getting drivers from to run these. I know pull more local routes off.
I Highly recommend B&H seriously looks at getting it’s local service’s in order before expanding.
Couldn’t the money be spent on cleaning up the mess left on buses so we don’t have to travel in a tip. Or reducing bus fares. Or is that all too sensible?