The story
Founded by Edward Lyndon Rees on Aug 5, 1977.1
Citybus was founded on 5 August 1979, by former China Motor Bus traffic manager Lyndon Rees with one Volvo B55 double-deck bus, providing a shuttle service for the Hong Kong United Dockyard in Hung Hom. In 1981, it commenced operating a residential bus route between City One Shatin and Kowloon Tong MTR station, which provided an innovative "breakfast bus" service. In 1982, the United Transport Group purchased a 49% shareholding.
In 1984, Citybus began a cross-boundary coach service between Hong Kong and Shenzhen with ex National Travel West and West Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive Eastern Coach Works bodied Leyland Olympians. In 1985, the company introduced five air-conditioned Olympian coaches. Since then it has continued to expand its fleet of air-conditioned buses.
In the late 1980s, Citybus was purchased by Tsui Tsin-tong's CNT Group. It commenced operating residential bus services with 100 new Olympians linking housing estates to MTR stations.
In December 1990, Citybus launched Capital Citybus in London with an all-yellow livery for the routes in North and East London and a red and yellow livery for central London.
This was sold to FirstGroup in July 1998 and renamed First Capital.
In 1991, the Hong Kong Government awarded Citybus its first franchised route, 12A (Admiralty Tamar Street to Macdonnell Road) on Hong Kong Island, which was originally operated by China Motor Bus and then withdrawn in the 1980s.
In September 1993, Citybus took over 26 franchised routes from China Motor Bus after winning a competitive tender. These were branded as Network 26. To operate these, a fleet of 101 Leyland Atlanteans was purchased from Singapore Bus Service. A further 14 franchised routes were awarded to the company in 1995 without tendering, with the fleet now expanded to more than 500 buses. During these years Citybus expanded its penetration of the Hong Kong Island market pushing nearly all China Motor Bus routes into low profitability.
In 1996, with the Tsing Ma Bridge coming into operation and the commencement of settlement in the Tung Chung new town, Citybus won another tender to operate 13 new franchised routes serving Tung Chung and the new Hong Kong International Airport. In 1998, the airport Cityflyer service commenced, which is part of Citybus and is solely used for Airport express routes to the city. The Cityflyer service consisted of a series of four routes: A11, A12, A21 and A22, with A10 being added in 2006. Citybus also operates various Overnight Airport routes and Airport Shuttle Routes.
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In 1998, following the expiration of the franchise of China Motor Bus, a further 12 routes were transferred to Citybus. Citybus's fleet was up to 1,100 buses. The remaining routes of China Motor Bus were transferred to a new operator, New World First Bus.
Its business was expanded into mainland China with a joint venture operation in Beijing through Citybus (China) Limited. It was not only Beijing's first joint venture bus operation, but it also marked the introduction of air-conditioned buses for the first time in the capital city. Following the success of this route, a second urban express coach route was introduced in Beijing. However, the services in Beijing were terminated shortly after the disposal of shares of Citybus (China) Limited from Citybus to Kingsman Global Limited, another Hong Kong company, in June 2004. Citybus had also once operated a route (route 658) in Tianjin. The service is now operated by another company after Citybus disposed all its interest in Citybus (China) Limited.
In July 1999, Citybus was purchased by Stagecoach Group of Scotland. In 2001, the cross-boundary coach service between China and Hong Kong was discontinued.
In June 2003, Stagecoach Group sold Citybus to Chow Tai Fook Enterprises, the parent company of the major rival operator New World First Bus. After a series of restructurings, Citybus became a subsidiary of NWS Holdings, which was also the parent company of New World First Bus and New World First Ferry.
In August 2020, along with New World First Bus, Citybus was sold to the Bravo Transport consortium, made up of private equity firm Templewater Bravo, Hong Kong-listed investment holding company Hans Energy and British bus operator Ascendal Group. The founder of Ascendal Group, Adam Leishman, also became the CEO of Bravo Transport.
In July 2022, Bravo Transport announced that it would be discontinuing the New World First Bus brand, and the NWFB operations merged into Citybus on 1 July 2023, when the bus franchises were renewed.
From Wikipedia’s article on Citybus (Hong Kong), shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4