DSCN3374 Newspaper item telling that 'Essex County Buses' was in town - 4 Sep 2009

Essex County Buses began operating two town bus services in Bury St Edmunds on 2 September 2009. The services were in direct competition with First Eastern Counties services 81 and 82, in fact the new operator used the same route numbers and ran their buses 10 minutes in front of those of FEC on exactly the same route pattern. The front page of the Bury St Edmunds local newspaper, the ‘Bury Free Press’, carried this item in the Friday 4 September issue. (Unfortunately the item carried what I saw as two errors – it stated that the ECB buses ‘are new vehicles’. It also stated that the ECB service ‘was designed to run five minutes ahead of First buses’ – it was actually ten minutes ahead). Within six months the company had gone.