Omnibus World: September 2026

The former Crosville depot, now a Aldi store.

Nowhere exemplifies the trials, tribulations, entrepreneurship and shear recklessness of the bus deregulation years than Heswall Bus Station. From October 2026, Heswall and the rest of Wirral will become one of two areas on Merseyside returning to franchised services: operated by Go Ahead and under the control of the metro mayor.

First, a bit of history. Mr. Pye, who had been in the motor omnibus and motor coach business since 1919, had a fleet of about 20 vehicles and ran routes between Heswall and Birkenhead. In January 1924 Crosville purchased the business of Johnny Pye. With the business and buses, there was a plot of land in Heswall that also transferred to Crosville. Very shortly after purchase, a new depot and a Bus Station were built on this land in Telegraph Road and a variety of vehicles arrived including Crosville’s first Bristol vehicle, a 1919 Bristol 4-ton chassis with Ch28 bodywork. The allocation in 1947 was 27, in 1956 it was 32, in 1959 - 33, in 1965 - 33 and in 1970 - 26.

The depot closed on 4th September 1988 and buses transferred to Rock Ferry and West Kirby. The Heswall depot premises were demolished and are now the site of a public house called the 'Johnny Pye'. The Bus Station also closed in 1988 but was eventually re-developed on the same site. Today, between the bus station and pub is a road called Pye Road. The modern ‘band stand’ bus station has three loading bays and additional space for two buses to layover.

In March 1988 ATL (Western) purchased Crosville England upon privatisation of NBC and a year later sold it on to the Drawlane Group. Subsequent depot sales and various brand name changes saw PMT, First Bus and Stagecoach take ownership of various parts of the former Crosville empire on Wirral.

Throughout the privatised years, Heswall has seen a mix of tendered (Merseytravel) and commercial bus services. The big groups also took the opportunity to battle each other and occasionally attempt to remove the smaller independents. Arriva became the dominant operator for some considerable while occasionally losing tendered routes to the likes of Avon Bus who would become the largest independent operator on Wirral. Arriva in turn would clash with First Bus on the core routes into Liverpool before First sold its Wirral operations to Stagecoach. A sensible solution was eventually negotiated by Merseytravel with one of its first quality contracts whereby the operators shared the two Liverpool routes with equal number of buses and shared revenue. Stagecoach also turned its attention to route 22 (West Kirby-Chester), a tendered service with additional financial support from Cheshire County Council, that had alternated over the years between Arriva and Avon Bus. Stagecoach registered some commercial workings but soon realised the errors of their ways and retreated.

Route mileage from the bus station has reduced in the past forty years with many residential areas now devoid of buses, many frequencies greatly reduced and other routes convoluted in an attempt to service hospitals and shopping centres. More recently the situation has stabilised, and routes and schedules have seen little change whilst the number of operators has also settled down. Stagecoach/Arriva share the core 471/472 Liverpool route, Happy Al’s have the 22 and most of the local school routes, whilst A2B from nearby Prenton have been a constant on the smaller local routes.

From October 2026 the franchise for all bus services on Wirral has been awarded to Go Ahead and school services awarded to St Helens based Huyton Travel part of Tower Transit. The future for smaller operators is uncertain and it is likely that Heswall will once again become a one operator bus station.