From 1 January 2024 a new bus will start to run from Edinburgh Airport to Edinburgh Waterloo Place.- https://www.brightbustours.com/brightbus-airport-express/
It is in addition to the long standing #100 Lothian Buses Express.
It will run every 15 minutes 0300 to 2330 from the Airport, 0330 to 2300 from the City. It is run by Bright Bus Tours, a trading name of McGills East Scotland/Midland Bluebird, for £4 each way, undercutting Lothian.
Sincere question: What would be the advantage of these buses over the tram?
If going to Waverly station, the bus will drop you a bit closer.
The buses also start running a couple of hours earlier than the tram does, making them useful if you have an early morning flight.
Also, both this bus and the Lothian one, are dedicated to the airport trade with luggage racks. The tram is serving all local stops on the way, so is no faster than the bus, and no specific luggage room.
And the Lothian bus has integrated ticketing with the rest of the Lothian buses system- City, East Coast and West Lothian.
The new bus has integrated ticketing with the two Bright Bus Open Top tour routes. It's a bit early to tell yet if it is also within the ticketing scheme for the rest of the McGills network which includes buses to the Falkirk Wheel and the Kelpies.
It's a case where I know I should use the tram, but would a!ways the bus for convenience factor, personally.
I am a bit surprised to see competition on the route, and also that McGills can undercut Lothian's fares by £1.50, when they still have to pay the airport access charge. It feels as if the airport route will be cross subsidised by the open top routes.
I enjoyed taking the tram last time but was leaning toward trying the bus next time. And now I definitely will, since the new Bright Bus stops even closer to my hotel. I can just wheel my bag across the street instead of three or four blocks!
I researched both tram and bus options when I went to Edinburgh in September, and ended up on the Airlink 100 bus. I came to the bus stop before the tram stop, I could buy my ticket from the driver, and there was plenty of room for luggage storage; jet-lagged me was happy. Seems to take the same amount of time, so if it's cheaper and possibly closer to my hotel I'd use a bus again.
the trams do have plenty of dedicated luggage space.
This new service seems reasonable and may be suitable for some people, just wondering if they have made arrangements with the Scottish government to allow Scottish entitlement bus pass holders to use the service free of charge. can't see anything on the website .
McGills are pulling out of running ordinary buses in Edinburgh due to Lothian Buses being so dominant in the area. Because of that I suspect there is no Scottish Government or Edinburgh City money in the offering for them as it looks to be linked to their hoho tour buses. It does however had a schedule and stops between the city centre and airport so it possibly could get the money down the road.
I don't know where MC-Glasgow gets that information from, but it is not on the McGills website or traveline.
The Edinburgh local services which they run are under contract to the City Council (not commercial) and the X38 to Falkirk and Stirling is under no threat which I see. Lothian Country do not operate to either destination and there is no evidence I am seeing that they intend to expand in that direction.
The only Edinburgh route to have gone is the route from Livingston and Bathgate- which closed at the start of December, along with a number of services outside Edinburgh- in West Lothian. Some taken over by Lothian Country, and some by Scottish Citylink.
The original quote I found mentioned them ending services in the city as well as West Lothian. There routes in Edinburgh itself seem to be very very limited and were when First ran them.
