In 1979, the Company was granted ten vehicle licences for it's contract-hire, tour and private hire work. The first vehicle acquired was was an ex demonstrator Ailsa/Volvo, closely followed by six ex-Bournemouth Corporation Fleetlines. The fleetname carried was City Buses. A yellow livery was chosen, considered to be noticeable by Lyndon Rees, the driving force behind the new Company (as he is today), and also because the six ex-Bournemouth buses still carried their yellow livery!

In 1981 the fleetname was simplified to Citybus and the livery changed to canary yellow, with blue and orange relief. During 1982, Resident Bus Services were introduced, to carry the increasing number of passengers from the large new housing estates. In the mid 80's it introduced air-conditioned vehicles on its coach services into China, and later on its orders for new buses.

In 1991, Citybus won the tender to operate it's first franchised service, being the Hong Kong Island route 12A, a route previously operated by China Motor Bus (CMB). Early 1992 saw the Hong Kong Government announce that owing to the continuing poor performance of CMB, it was offering 25% of CMB's routes for tender. The announcement in October that year saw Citybus's bid win, with the twenty eight routes to commence in September 1993.  Owing to the relatively short time between this announcement and commencement of these new routes, Citybus were unable to acquire the number of new buses required, and looked to Singapore, from where over 100 second hand Atlanteans were acquired, being completely refurbished, with new Alexander "R" type front ends, before entering service. Network 26, was the brand name given for these new routes.

With the opening of the new airport at Chek Lap Kok, on Lantau Island in July 1998, the Govenment invited tenders for two packages to provide express bus servises to and from the new airport. Citybus won one package, and as a result, introduced a new branding on these services known as Cityflyer.

In 1999 Citybus was acquired by Stagecoach, but has retained it's yellow livery.

For further information about Citybus, may I recommend Mike Davis's excellent book "Hong Kong Buses Volume 3 - Citybus", and the excellent CD-ROM, produced by Citybus, which accompanies the Hong Kong release of OM45401, and which was on offer to subscribers of Corgi's bus magazine, Bus Route.

In June 2003 the company was acquired by Chow Tai Fook Enterprises, the parent company of the major rival operator New World First Bus. After a series of restructuring, Citybus is now a subsidiary of NWS Transport Services Limited, which is also the parent company of New World First Bus and New World First Ferry. NWS Transport has since re-dominated the franchised bus services in Hong Kong Island.
 

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This page last updated Monday, 26th May 2008

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