Created 17-Jan-20
Modified 8-Mar-24
This service has an interesting and quite complex history for one that changed very little in the almost sixty-year period it ran. It was notable for the variety of different vehicles that could be seen operating it over the years with nearly all makes of double-deck chassis being seen at some time or other.
Until the service started on 8-Sep-1930 there was no direct bus between Cardiff and Merthyr Tydfil although several operators had applied for licences, all had been refused by Merthyr Tydfil Council (MTC), who were responsible for licensing within the Borough until road service licensing by the Traffic Commissioners was introduced in 1931 as a consequence of the Transport Act 1930. Cardiff and Merthyr Tydfil agreed to each other's application in 1930 and licences were obtained from the authorities in between. However, the Ministry of Transport which had dealt appeals from the unsuccessful applicants made two important stipulations. Firstly that the route was not allowed to deviate into Pontypridd and secondly that Rhondda Tramways should also be granted a licence.
Rhondda insisted on inter-availability of return tickets and this proved a stumbling block initially so that the service commenced operation just by MTC and Cardiff, taking turns in providing the bus that should have been provided by Rhondda Tramways. MTC eventually gave way and Rhondda participation commenced from 29-Nov-1931.
Little changed in the years before World War 2, although the operators tried unsuccessfully to gain permission to operate via Pontypridd. The fare conditions on the route meant that it carried little, if any, local traffic and the train provided a faster link between the two terminii. It seems that single-deckers were used almost exclusively until 1939 - in September that year both Cardiff and Rhondda withdrew their services as a wartime economy so for the surviving MTC bus running every three hours a new Bristol K5G was normally used. The full service recommenced on 6-May-1946 but for about three months Rhondda also provided Cardiff's bus as the latter was short of vehicles.
The two termini changed in the postwar period, with buses moving from Greyfriars Road to the new bus station in Cardiff from 1-Jan-1955 whilst in Merthyr Tydfil the opening of the new bus station there saw the service extended along Castle Street into the bus station from 5-Aug-1968.
In early 1960 the route was changed between Merthyr Vale and Troedyrhiw to run via Aberfan instead of direct on the A470. However in 1969 Cardiff and Rhondda reverted to the original route leaving only the MTC buses operating via Aberfan. This was believed to be to ease pressure on running times when one-man operation was implemented. A further route change occurred from 14-May-1961 when the opening of the newly-completed Northern Avenue in Cardiff saw this service routed that way, by-passing Whitchurch village.
The number of stopping places was approximately halved in Dec-1969, from 76 to 37 (34 for journeys not via Aberfan). This would also have helped with running time, all operators will be have been keen to avoid the need to introduce an additional bus to maintain the hourly frequency when the service became one-man operated. Cardiff were the first to convert to one-man operation from 15-Nov-1970 with Rhondda following quite quickly on 13-Dec-1970. A Rhondda exception was their first journey to Cardiff at 0800 which was usually one of the 30-foot long Regent Vs which then went onto a different service.
The service had almost always been loss-making and economies were regularly sought. The Sunday service was reduced in 1962 from hourly to every 90 minutes. From that date the Sunday service was two morning round trips operated by MTC with the rest of the service operated with each operator only running for eight months of the year. Continuing losses led to Cardiff ceasing operation from 31-Jul-1971 and Rhondda (by now Western Welsh) from 27-Nov-1971.
MTC replaced the lost workings but still struggled to keep the service viable despite trying links across Merthyr Tydfil to Pant or Prince Charles Hospital or express services using the A470(T). By 1981 the service was approximately every two hours on weekdays and every three hours on Sundays with most, but not all, services running through Aberfan. By 1988 it was hourly but the last bus back from Cardiff was around 1800, a pattern which continued until the end of what had become Merthyr Tydfil Transport in Aug-1989.
The route numbering was complex to say the least. Cardiff gave it the number 41 and I believe may have displayed this from the outset as the buses used had a number display, they renumbered it 20 from 6-Jan-1964. Rhondda didn't originally use service numbers and then from 1949 to 1952 showed numbers for services in the timetables when this service was the 1. These numbers then disappeared from the timetable, probably because a more comprehensive route numbering system was being put together when this service was given the number 100. From 1954 new buses delivered to Rhondda were able to display route numbers and this number would then be shown when a suitable bus was used. The service was renumbered into the Western Welsh series, along with the other Rhondda services, as the 327 from 3-Jan-1971. Merthyr Tydfil had only bought for brief periods vehicles with a facility to display route numbers and certainly in the seventies and then again right at the end this display was usually used to display the fleet number. On paper at least the service was allocated the number 7, which was certainly used in Rhondda/Western Welsh timetables latterly. It became the 27 for a period in the mid-eighties but was then given the number 1 by the 3-Jan-1989 service revisions.
There were additional services operated by Merthyr Tydfil to Cardiff or Treforest Trading Estate that were works services and didn't appear in timetables. The Treforest service in the late 1960s required three buses, this gradually diminished until it ceased about 1977. Another interesting operation as it ran three times a day every day of the year, including Christmas, was a service to the East Moors steelworks in Cardiff. This started in 1941 and will have been a way tapping into additional labour during the war, with some of the employees probably having worked in the Dowlais steel works until it closed in 1930 with production transferred to East Moors. MTC ceased operating it in June 1965 when it was taken over by Morlais Services.
© David Beilby
