dart in preston in december 2007 parent pilkington family founded 1967 headquarters accrington service area lancashire service type bus services fleet 34 september 2013 website www.pilkingtonbus.com pilkingtons buses 1 is a bus company operating in accrington lancashire . contents 1 history 2 services 3 fleet 4 references history edit pilkington s buses was established by ray pilkington in 1967 as ray s taxis ; beginning only with a single ford zodiac . pilkington soon acquired further vehicles however ; including more zodiacs 3 minibuses 2 ford transit vans and an austin au . these vehicles were used for a variety of taxi and minibus work . upon securing a colliery workers contract in burnley a 41 seater bedford val coach was acquired and operated for a short time on a colliery workers contract . circa 1978 ray pilkington suffered back problems and began struggling to walk without the aid of crutches . after numerous tests it was found that a birth mark had affected his spinal nerves causing paralysis from the waist down . a shock to all who knew him now wheelchair bound ray then father to 7 children between the ages of 2 and 12 continued to run the taxi service and affiliated bed and breakfast business with the help of his wife mary . in 1986 after deregulation the pilkington business made a foray into bus service operation . met with some tough competition from hyndburn transport the accrington based municipal operator a small scale bus war ensued between the two companies . despite the fact that further routes were registered to pilkington s they decided to withdraw their buses in 1988 . after a period of absence from bus operations the next generation of pilkingtons decided to revisit bus operations along with their father ray . on this occasion the business proved more successful with a number of schools contracts and 7 day bus services operated throughout rossendale clitheroe accrington and blackburn . always a family business the pilkingtons themselves carried out maintenance drove the buses and managed the company between them . further stiff competition from rival operators such as stagecoach blackburn transport and later lancashire united began a turbulent period for the company which culminated in the business ceasing operations in 2004 following revocation of their operating licences by the traffic commisioner . 2 in 2006 a new company was formed under the pilkington family name ; this time with ray s son alan at the helm . initially operating under the trading name of king travel a number of town services centred on accrington began and the company made a return to school contract services . in 2007 a major reshuffle occurred in local operations with large umbrella operator transdev blazefield by now owner of local operators lancashire united and burnley & pendle successfully buying out both blackburn transport and northern blue . particularly important was the buyout of northern blue s subsidiary accrington transport which was initially created to fill the gap left by pilkington s three years previously . the smaller accrington town services by this point under the lancashire united name were soon dropped and were picked up once more by the family company ; now trading as pilkingtonbus . a particularly successful period for pilkington s has since followed with a period spent operating local mainstay bus route ; the hyndburn circular albeit under the guise of 20 21 20a 21a branding . further expansion has led to the creation of sister company boomerang travel ltd which operates routes in and around rossendale namely in rawtenstall haslingden ramsbottom and bury . currently pilkington s operate 11 local services under both boomerang and pilkington guises and 9 school contracts in a revised version of the red cream livery worn by the company s previous incarnation . dennis darts with a variety of bodies optare solo midi buses and leyland volvo olympian double decks make up the bulk of the current operating fleet . services edit the company had operated route 20 from accrington to blackburn via oswaldtwistle in frequent competition with lancashire united s routes 1 6 and 7 . thus services are not as frequent . they also operated route 20d a direct service between accrington and blackburn this service was withdrawn and now the company concentrate their services in accrington . in august 2007 the company started operating route 114 between preston and chorley on behalf of lancashire county council . 3 this route was previously operated by blue bus of penwortham . in march 2010 pilkington s started the number 3 huncoat circular then in july introduced 4 more accrington town services . as of july 2015 pilkington s operate seven local services from accrington ; to fern gore oswaldtwistle dill hall huncoat baxenden and great harwood ; as well as four services in the rossendale valley . 4 fleet edit as at september 2013 the fleet consists of 34 buses . 5 references edit companies house extract company no 2346720 pilkington s accrington limited http www.accringtonobserver.co.uk news local news family bus firm ordered off the road 1266311 bus service changes august 2007 lancashire.gov.uk retrieved 1 january 2008 pilkingtonbus.com retrieved 27 july 2015 lancashire independents north west buses v t e bus companies operating in north west england cheshire arriva north west d & g bus halton transport network warrington stagecoach merseyside & south lancashire cumbria mountain goat stagecoach cumbria & north lancashire greater manchester arriva north west bullocks coaches diamond bus north west first greater manchester jim stones coaches manchester community transport rosso stagecoach manchester & wigan stotts lancashire arriva north west blackburn bus company blackpool transport blue bus of penwortham john fishwick & sons pilkingtons buses preston bus preston park and ride rosso stagecoach cumbria & north lancashire stagecoach merseyside & south lancashire transdev in burnley & pendle merseyside arriva north west avon buses cumfybus htl buses stagecoach merseyside & south lancashire the green bus isle of man bus vannin national megabus national express v t e culture and infrastructure of the borough of hyndburn transport accrington corporation steam tramways company accrington corporation tramways pilkingtons buses railway stations accrington church and oswaldtwistle huncoat rishton disused stations baxenden great harwood sport accrington cricket club accrington f.c. accrington stanley f.c. accrington stanley f.c. 1891 church and oswaldtwistle cricket club crown ground enfield cricket club great harwood f.c. great harwood town f.c. peel park rishton cricket club thorneyholme road media 2br accrington observer the bee education accrington academy accrington and rossendale college heathland school the hollins technology college mount carmel rc high school norden high school and sports college rhyddings business and enterprise school st christopher s church of england high school companies holland s pies howard & bullough kleeneze morada history burnley rural district politics council elections 1976 79 80 82 95 96 98 99 2000 02 03 04 06 07 08 10 11 12 14 15 constituencies accrington hyndburn north east lancashire by election 1880 retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title pilkingtons buses & oldid 740922943 categories bus operators in lancashirehyndburnhidden categories use dmy dates from june 2015 navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links this page was last modified on 24 september 2016 at 05 41 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; 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