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This is a list of Transport for London (TfL) contracted bus routes in London, England, as well as commercial services that enter the Greater London area (except coaches).
Bus services in London are operated by Arriva London, Go-Ahead London (Blue Triangle, Docklands Buses, London Central and London General), Metroline, RATP Dev Transit London (London Sovereign, London United and London Transit), Stagecoach London (East London, Selkent and Thameside), Sullivan Buses, Transport UK London Bus and Uno. TfL-sponsored operators run more than 500 services.
Examples of non TfL-sponsored operators include, but are not limited to: Arriva Herts & Essex, Arriva Southern Counties, Carousel Buses, Diamond South East, Go-Coach, First Beeline, Metrobus, Stagecoach South, Thames Valley Buses and Reading Buses.
Classification of route numbers
In Victorian times, people who took the bus would recognise the owner and the route of an omnibus (Latin: "for everyone") only by its livery and its line name, with painted signs on the sides showing the two termini to indicate the route. Then, in 1906, George Samuel Dicks of the London Motor Omnibus Company decided that, as the line name 'Vanguard' had proved to be very popular, he would name all lines 'Vanguard' and number the company's five routes 1 through to 5. Other operators soon saw the advantage, in that a unique route number was easier for the travelling public to remember, and so the practice of using route numbers soon spread.[1]
Historic classification
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Bus routes run by London Transport were grouped as follows.
The London Traffic Act 1924 imposed numbering known as the Bassom Scheme, named after Superintendent (later Chief Constable) Arthur Ernest Bassom of the Metropolitan Police who devised it. For many decades, variant and short workings used letter suffixes (e.g. "77B"). The numbers reflected the company that operated the route.
The numbering was revised in 1934 after London Transport was formed:
| Route numbers | Type of service | |
|---|---|---|
| 1–199 | "Central Area" red double-decker services. | |
| 200–289 | "Central Area" red single-decker services. | |
| 290–299 | "Central Area" night bus routes. | |
| 300–399 | "Country Area" north of the River Thames. | (Rural services were operated by London Country Bus Services after 1970).[2] |
| 400–499 | "Country Area" south of the River Thames. | |
| 500–699 | Trolleybuses. | |
| 701–799 | Green Line. | |
| 800–899 | "Country Area New Towns" routes. | |
Current classification
| Route numbers | Type of service |
|---|---|
| 1–599 | Most local day routes, including 24-hour services. |
| 600–699 | School services, with the majority of them operating only one return journey per day. |
| 700–799 | Regional and national coach services, including Green Line. Also used for temporary TfL routes. |
| 800–899 | Regional and national coach services. |
| 900–999 | One mobility buses route within TfL, detailed below. |
| Other letter-prefixed routes | Local day routes, including 24-hour services, with the letter denoting a key area the bus travels through. |
| EL-prefixed routes | East London Transit routes. |
| SL-prefixed routes | Superloop routes. |
| N-prefixed routes | Night Bus routes. |
List of routes
All routes operate in both directions unless detailed.
1–99