The South Midland name has come and gone through the
years. As part of Red and White and then Thames
Valley, it was a Tilling Group-influenced operation. Under
the aegis of BET's City of Oxford, the name was absorbed
into the Oxford-South Midland fleet name in National Bus
Company days. When this company was split into Oxford Bus
Company (city services) and South Midland (all the
rest), the latter ran independently until taken over by Thames
Transit, already competing fiercely with Oxford Bus in
Oxford. This itself was sold to Stagecoach Oxford, which
has gone on to be part of Stagecoach South Midlands (with
an "s").
Here are a few images of the South Midland fleet from its brief
spell as an independent company .
| When Oxford-South Midland was split up, so were some batches of vehicles. 28 gained South Midland's Orbiter livery. The company took over 190 departures from Witney to Oxford to connect with the successful 190 Oxford-London service |  |
| Meantime sister 30 received "traditional" South Midland livery and was running to Chipping Norton. Others in the batch could be seen in South Midland Satellite livery or Oxford's coaching colours. |  |
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South Midland ran Optare City Pacers for a while, although they ran in this blue livery unlike anything else in the fleet. 32 is seen in Oxford. |
| South Midland were using Carlyle-bodied Ford Transits even before Thames Transit brought the Mellor-bodied "Snoopy" to Oxford. 13,18 and 25 stand at Gloucester Green, Oxford. |  |
| Similar 23, picking up in Queen Street, Oxford, became an Orbiter. |  |
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643 (formerly 492)shows off the mostly-maroon livery used for school contract buses. At the time of the split, Oxford Bus retained all its two-door citybus Bristol VRTs, while South Midland took all the single door, mostly lowheight vehicles. |
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Less severe was this maroon/cream livery used from Wantage garage, although 631 (formerly 464) stands outside Witney garage with preserved highbridge Regent V 956 from the Oxford Bus Museum. |
| Bicester garage had long been the haunt of those 'deckers too tall to pass under the notorious Oxford Station Bridge, and naturally was home to the batch of Leyland Titans acquired from Greater Manchester Transport. |  |
| Handsome Leyland Titan 704 waits at the under-reconstruction Gloucester Green before returning to Bicester. This livery was a development of the Orbiter colours. |  |
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Echoes of a past that South Midland never had? 4386LJ was a Bristol Lodekka FS6G acquired as a training bus. The Tilling-owned South Midland never ran 'deckers. |
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A genuine relic of the old South Midland is this Bedford OB, preserved by Oxford Bus Museum Trust, and seen here rallying at Didcot. |