Now i don't like to moan very often on here but i think this open to debate, so please have your say if need be, it seems lately that First Group lately seem to be on the slide, throughout the UK, with the closures of Braintree, Bracknell, Plymouth and Hereford depots, most of those depots vehicles upon closure were rather old particularly Plymouth it seems to me that First seem to think that the major towns and cities such as Bristol and Manchester come off better for this years new bus orders, you only have to look at Stagecoach for example upon snapping up the Chester and Newcastle operations immediately invested in new buses which turned them into profit making depots, looking at the regional aspect here in Eastern England, we are rather rural in nature particularly Suffolk and Norfolk, indeed the last new buses excluding the ex Park and Ride B7RLE's was the 2003 batch of deckers for the 66 route, First in Ipswich under previous management particularly gave up many of their traditional routes, one example was the 90 route to Sudbury, which seems to do well with Beestons, Hedingham,Chambers and Stephensons equally as well have turned round previous First Essex routes. Steve W sadly has gone into retirement however yesterdays news on the movements up north in Norfolk was particularly worth reading http://busandtrain.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/first-vehicle-cascades-and-more.html so i won't repeat it here.
First Volvo B6 386 L101 WYS at the ITM back in 2003.
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