Early years In 1908 a hired
Darracq-Serpollet
steam bus made a trial run from
London to
Maidstone. A public service commenced a week later between Maidstone and
Chatham. In July, a further service was introduced between north Maidstone and the Athletic Ground via
Maidstone West railway station. The venture was not entirely successful, and an increase in fares was not enough to prevent the vehicles being re-possessed. In 1910, the undertaking was purchased by Walter Flexman French, who named the company the
Maidstone, Chatham, Gravesend & District Motor Omnibus Service. It was registered as Maidstone & District Motor Services Limited in March 1911.
British Electric Traction acquired part of M&D in 1913. A year later, new routes were introduced from Maidstone to
Ashford,
Faversham,
Hastings,
Sevenoaks and
Tenterden, and between Chatham and Faversham. By 1917. fourteen services were in operation using letters for identification. A later expansion of services resulted in letters being replaced by numbers.
Tilling Group acquired an interest in the company in 1921, while Maidstone & District became a public company in 1922. M&D opened the first
bus station in England, sited in Palace Avenue,
Maidstone in 1922. In 1929, M&D acquired the Chatham & District Traction Company, but retained the Chatham & District fleetname as a separate operation until 1955. The advent of the
Road Traffic Act 1930 saw the demise of a number of independents, many of which were acquired by M&D. The formation of the
London Passenger Transport Board in 1933 required M&D to surrender most its operations in
Dartford and
Gravesend, together with garages in Dartford and
Northfleet. M&D acquired Autocar Services in 1928, keeping it as a separate company until the purchase of its rival, Redcar Services in 1935. In 1935, M&D took over the
Hastings Tramways Company, which brought
trolleybuses into the fleet. The Hastings Tramway fleetname was retained for the
Hastings trolleybus system until 1957. During the
Second World War Gillingham depot was destroyed in a bombing raid in August 1940.
Post war As the 1950s drew to a close, the Hastings Tramways fleetname disappeared, the M&D fleetname appearing on vehicles from 1957. M&D made a decision to abandon the trolleybus system and ordered some of the country's first
Leyland Atlanteans to facilitate this and continued to buy the type as replacement for earlier smaller capacity double deck vehicles. M&D also purchased a number of single-deckers for one-person operation of rural services, initial examples being based on the
Albion Nimbus chassis.
AEC Reliances were purchased until the mid-1960s, when several batches of
Leyland Panthers were ordered. At the same time, the
Daimler Fleetline with lowheight
Northern Counties bodywork succeeded the Leyland Atlantean as the standard double deck intake.
National Bus Company bodied
Volvo Ailsa B55 Maidstone & District became part of the
National Bus Company (NBC) on 1 January 1969. The company purchased several batches of
Leyland Leopards for both bus and coach work. An unusual order was for a fleet of 30 two-door Marshall single deck vehicles based on Daimler Fleetline 33 ft. chassis for one person operation in the Medway Towns. In 1972 these were exchanged with similar age
double deckers Fleetlines from Northern General Transport. NBC introduced standard liveries in 1972 and the traditional dark green and cream livery gave way to NBC leaf green. The company made its first loss in 1971, necessitating some rationalisation. To reduce overhead costs, NBC decided to have a single senior management team and amalgamated finance and purchasing functions for M&D and the adjacent company
East Kent Road Car Company with the control of the company transferred to the
Canterbury office. In 1973, some services were transferred between East Kent and M&D, with M&D gaining operations in
Faversham and
Rye and reducing services in
Ashford and closing its depot. In 1974. services were renumbered in a common sequence with those of
East Kent Road Car Company. Services were re-numbered according to area with most services receiving three digit numbers, the first of which indicated the area of operation. Vehicle purchases now followed NBC practice with
Eastern Coach Works bodied
Bristol VRTs and several batches of
Leyland Nationals including some dual purpose buses for a proposed network of limited stop services. In 1975, as part of a trial for NBC, trial batches of the
MCW Metropolitan,
Volvo Ailsa B55 and Bristol VRT series 3 entered service at Silverhill, eventually transferring to the
Medway Towns. M&D went on to buy large numbers of Bristol VRTs, although it also took two batches of
MCW Metrobuses. Services in
Chatham began to serve the new
Pentagon Bus Station in 1976, while Lower Stone Street Bus Station in Maidstone was redeveloped using NBC's standard layout. This enabled the closure of the original bus station in Palace Avenue, although the booking office building was purchased by the
Kent & East Sussex Railway and re-assembled at
Tenterden Town railway station.
Gravesend area services were recast as part of a co-ordination scheme with
London Country Bus Services. London Country took over a number of town services from M&D, and M&D's Gravesend Depot closed 18 months later, the remaining local services passing to London Country's
Northfleet depot. 1979 saw the replacement of the former
Green Line 719 service between
London and
Wrotham and the
Maidstone -
Tenterden extension of
National Express 008 with a limited stop service 919. It was initially operated with dual purpose Leyland Nationals. Between Wrotham and
Farningham, the service called at most bus stops, taking over three hours end to end. Despite the subsequent introduction of coach specification vehicles, the service was not a success. In the early 1980s, expectations of a complete merger with East Kent began to grow. Vehicles and operations were interchanged, including some M&D Atlanteans, which were swapped for AEC Regents. In 1980, the National Bus Company's first Market Analysis Project was completed in the
Hastings area, leading to the adoption of the "Hastings & District" name for buses operating from Silverhill, Hastings and
Hawkhurst depots. Services were cut and
Bexhill depot was closed in April 1980. A group of former M&D drivers formed Bexhill Town Bus Services, initially operating a number of elderly Leyland Nationals acquired from
Plymouth Citybus. The Hastings & District operation became a separate company in 1983, although
Hawkhurst depot remained with M&D while Rye passed to the new company. Hastings & District was eventually purchased by
Stagecoach Holdings, who combined it with parts of
Southdown Motor Services company to form South Coast Buses. The 1980s saw a number of depot closures, notably the
Maidstone depot in Knightrider Street in 1981, following co-ordination of local services with
Maidstone Borough Council Transport under the Maidstone Area Bus Services banner, and the relatively new facility at
Tonbridge. The company's Central Works in Maidstone also closed, with maintenance being devolved to a new company Kent Engineering (based in
Canterbury and
Hawkhurst), who also undertook maintenance for East Kent. The express coach services between
London, the
Medway Towns and Maidstone were re-branded
Invictaway in the early 1980s, this name also being applied to route 900 between
Gillingham and
Gatwick Airport. An all-over black livery was used. To enhance these services, several batches of
Leyland Olympians with ECW double deck coach bodies were acquired and painted in a green and white livery. This was later applied to the whole Invictaway fleet.
Privatisation double-decker bus in the first post-NBC Maidstone & District livery On 7 November 1986, M&D was sold in a
management buyout. NBC's standard green livery was retained, although the white relief was later changed to cream. M&D took a cautious approach to
deregulation, mainly registering inter-urban routes which followed major roads. Casualties included the routes serving
North Downs villages south of
Sittingbourne and
Faversham together with the majority of Sunday services. There were also some improvements, including increased frequency on the trunk 70-74 group of services westwards along the London Road from
Maidstone together with improvements local services in the
Medway Towns. In 1986, the first of 90
Mercedes-Benz vehicles were acquired for service in
Tunbridge Wells and
Chatham. M&D purchased
Northern Counties Palatine bodied
Leyland Olympians in significant numbers post-privatisation. Joint operation of services with
East Kent Road Car Company ended with deregulation in August 1986. The long-established route 10 between
Maidstone with
Ashford and
Folkestone was split in two at Ashford, with M&D no longer operating on the route. M&D initially avoided confrontation with council-owned
Boro'line Maidstone. Buses continued to be garaged in Boro'line's depot in Armstrong Road. In 1991, Boro'line was put up for sale, so M&D decided to register a number of town services in direct competition. When Boro'line entered
receivership in June 1992, the depot, fleet and part stores of Boro'line were sold by
administrators
KPMG Peat Marwick to Maidstone & District for £975,000 (). Most of Boro'line's fleet was disposed of, with the exception of one former
Maidstone Corporation Massey Brothers bodied Leyland PD2 which passed into M&D's heritage fleet, while the company moved into Boro'line's depot, which at one point became the head office of M&D,
Kentish Bus and Londonlinks. In late 1992, Maidstone & District was accused of using unfair tactics against independent competitors in Maidstone, such as Bygone Buses, Mercury Passenger Services and Turners of Maidstone, which cumulated in Maidstone & District being summoned to a
Monopolies & Mergers Commission inquiry. The inquiry concluded in 1993 that Maidstone & District had engaged in a
bus war with competing independents "against the public interest" across Kent, using tactics such as adjusting service timetables to run immediately before a competitor's service, parking vehicles in bus stops and refusing competing operators' access to
Chatham Pentagon bus station.
Sale to British Bus bodied
Volvo Olympian Maidstone & District was acquired by
British Bus, who also owned the neighbouring Kentish Bus operation, for £16 million () on 13 April 1995. The Invictaway services were re-branded as Green Line. Vehicle replacements saw Bristol VRTs replaced by Olympians. In 1996, the
Cowie Group acquired British Bus. A new livery, designed by Ray Stenning and based on M&D's traditional green and cream including a stylised scroll fleetname, was introduced. It first appeared on a batch of
Plaxton Pointer-bodied
Dennis Dart SLFs, many of which were acquired under a Quality Partnership scheme with
Kent County Council for three routes in Maidstone. The application of the new livery across the fleet was curtailed by the decision of the recently renamed
Arriva group to introduced a corporate livery and rename its subsidiaries. In April 1998, the company became
Arriva Kent & Sussex, also adopting the fleetname 'Arriva Serving the Medway Towns', with both now being part of
Arriva Southern Counties. In April 2013 Maidstone & District Motor Services Ltd., by then listed as a dormant company, was acquired by a small Norfolk operator, Dogwood Coaches, the owner of which originates from the Medway Towns. There are plans to reintroduce bus services in Kent under the M&D banner, in association with a local operator. ==References==