A Touch of Class

Virtually all evening bus services in Redditch were withdrawn in the late 1990's following vehicle vandalism and driver assaults. Worcestershire County Council looked at options to improve bus provision in Redditch and in 2003 the County Council successfully won Urban Bus Challenge funding from the Department for Transport. The funding was based around improving access to the Alexandra Hospital from as much of the town as possible and helped First Midland Red purchase new low floor Enviro 300 single deck vehicles. For evening provision the Council decided to look to a taxi operator and have created a three vehicle Taxibus service giving a 20-minute frequency on the service 51 to/from Batchley which is linked to a similar 20-minute frequency on the 55/56 routes. The latter routes also serve the Alexandra Hospital. The service was operated by a taxi operator "A touch of class" who acquired brand new 7-seater minibuses for the services. The taxibus service operated until 12th April 2009 when the contract for the evening services to Crabbs Cross and Batchley were renumbered 55A and 56A and passed to Diamond Bus .