CDC Melbourne


CDC Melbourne is a bus operator in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It is a Melbourne bus company that operates 55 bus routes under contract to Public Transport Victoria. It is a subsidiary of CDC Victoria, itself a subsidiary of ComfortDelGro Australia, in turn a subsidiary of Singapore-based ComfortDelGro.
CDC Melbourne is the third-largest commuter bus operator in Melbourne, with 16% of the market share in the city.

History

The origins of CDC Melbourne can be traced to January 1976 when Kefford Corporation purchased Point Cook - Werribee Passenger Service, Werribee. In July 1987 Bono Bus Lines, Footscray was purchased with route 406 Footscray – Keilor East and the operation rebranded as Westrans.
In January 1988, Kefford Corporation purchased the Sitch Group with subsidiaries:
Also in January 1988, Kefford Corporation purchased routes 605 Melbourne City Centre - Elsternwick and 630 Elwood - Monash University from Sinclair's Bus Service with the operation rebranded as Eastrans.
In May 1991, St Kilda Bus Service was purchased with route 606 Port Melbourne - St Kilda and rebranded Werribee Bus Lines. Later the Point Cook, Sitch and Weribee operations were also brought under the Westrans brand.
In February 2009, ComfortDelGro Cabcharge acquired Kefford Corporation for A$149.2 million, including the Eastrans, Westrans, Davis and Benders Busways brands. At the time of its acquisition by CDC in 2009, Kefford was the fourth-largest bus operator in Victoria with a 16% market share, and with a fleet of 328 buses and six depots.
In July 2011, Eastrans commenced route 601 as a high frequency shuttle between Huntingdale station and Monash University. In July 2013, CDC acquired the route operations of Driver Group for $22 million, comprising five routes and 42 buses, and integrated into the Eastrans brand.
In October 2014, Eastrans and Westrans were combined and rebranded as CDC Melbourne.
In December 2017, the Wyndham depot was opened in the suburb of Truganina, replacing the Altona and Werribee depots which were subsequently closed.The head office of CDC Victoria and the Operations and Customer Centre were also moved from Altona and Sunshine respectively into the new depot.
In May 2018, Tullamarine Bus Lines, including its Tullamarine depot, was acquired by ComfortDelGro Australia. The bus operations were rebranded CDC Tullamarine and integrated into CDC Melbourne on 17 August 2018.
CDC Melbourne initially signed a ten-year performance-based contract with the Victorian government in April 2018, due to commence on 1 July 2018. However, in June 2018, the government offered a seven-year contract to all Melbourne bus operators, with no end-of-term access to staff, depots, fleet and intellectual property. This meant that under this contract, operators are not obliged to transfer any of their assets to the government. CDC Melbourne successfully negotiated with the government and secured the seven-year contracts for its Melbourne metropolitan bus services, which commenced on 1 August 2018.

Depots

CDC Melbourne operates from four depots, whose names may differ from the suburbs they are located in:
CDC Melbourne also used to operate from Altona and Werribee depots until they moved into the newly-opened Wyndham depot, which opened in December 2017.

Fleet

At the time of its acquisition of Kefford in 2009, CDC Victoria acquired a fleet of 328 buses. When the Driver Group was purchased in 2013, CDC Victoria also acquired 42 buses, bringing the Victorian fleet to 420 buses. As at March 2016, the CDC Melbourne fleet consisted of 277 buses and coaches. At April 2018, prior to the acquisition of Tullamarine Bus Lines, the fleet consisted of 281 buses and coaches. When Tullamarine Bus Lines was acquired in 2018, CDC Melbourne also acquired 36 buses, bringing the fleet to 317 buses and coaches.
Westrans fleet livery was white with red stripes for buses at Altona and Sunshine depots, and white with blue stripes at the Werribee depot. Eastrans fleet livery was white with white and green stripes. The Public Transport Victoria white and orange diamonds livery has been adopted as standard for route service buses and an orange, blue and white livery was adopted for charter buses. However some buses still retain the old Westrans livery with CDC Melbourne signage.

Routes

The following routes are operated by CDC Melbourne under contract to Public Transport Victoria: