In 1996, Westbus established a separate Hillsbus brand to run express services from the Hills District to the Sydney CBD and North Sydney, initially via the Anzac Bridge and from 1997 via the M2 Hills Motorway. However, the Hillsbus brand seemed to have disappeared by the 2000s as these services were classified as Westbus rather than Hillsbus in early versions of the Westbus website. These Westbus services, however, are still referred to by Westbus as "Hills City Express".
Current entity
On 11 February 2002, Hillsbus was revived as a joint venture between Westbus and National Express' newly acquired Glenorie Bus Company, and introduced a new bus route 642 under the Hillsbus brand. This service linked Dural and the City via the M2 and was therefore known as a "M2 City" express service. On 8 July the same year, Hillsbus introduced three more M2 City routes 650, 652 and 654. According to the Hillsbus timetables, these Hillsbus services were operated by Glenorie, even though neither Westbus nor Glenorie buses were used. In December 2004, all Westbus routes operating out of Northmead and Seven Hills depots, as well as the rest of Glenorie Bus Company, were rebranded Hillsbus. At the same time, Hillsbus took over the operation of Harris Park Transport routes 620 - 630, following the latter ceasing operation. The services were transferred from Hillsbus to Sydney Buses on 28 January 2005. On 25 September 2005, after the purchase of Hillsbus by ComfortDelgro Cabcharge, routes 620, 625, 626, 627 and 630 were transferred back to Hillsbus. Despite the rebranding to Hillsbus, the new Hillsbus website was only launched in January 2006, about a year after the rebranding. The delay could be related to the debt of Westbus and was only resolved after the sale of Westbus and Hillsbus to CDC. After the launch of the new website, it still did not show any timetables of the former Glenorie-operated timetables until May/June 2006, and during this period, customers were asked to check the Glenorie website instead. When the Parramatta - Rouse Hill section of the North-West T-way opened on 10 March 2007, routes 730 and 735 were transferred from Busways to Hillsbus with route 718 transferred from Hillsbus to Busways. On 30 June 2014, the Opal card was rolled out on all of Hillsbus' NightRide and Region 4 routes. On 28 July 2019, as part of the Sydney Metro Northwest opening in May, bus routes in the Hills District were reorganised, with some services rerouted to stop at various Sydney Metro stations.
Routes
Since 2005, Hillsbus' services have formed Sydney Bus Region 4. In August 2013, Hillsbus successfully tendered to operate the Region 4 services for another five years from August 2014. Hillsbus operates the following services:
As of April 2020, Hillsbus operates 621 buses across four depots:
Foundry Road in Seven Hills - Head Office of Hillsbus
Dural
Northmead
Seven Hills - another depot also in Seven Hills, smaller than Foundry Road depot
Hillsbus also operated 62 buses at the Camellia depot designated for Station Link between September 2018 and May 2019, but they have since been moved to other Hillsbus, Hunter Valley Buses and Blue Mountains Transit depots after the cessation of Station Link.
Livery
Prior to 2010, Hillsbus adopted Westbus' new plain yellow livery. With the introduction of Metrobus routes, the Metrobus livery was applied to new buses dedicated to Metrobus operations. In 2010, the Transport for NSWwhite and blue livery began to be applied on new buses and repainted buses. Fleet dedicated for Station Link also carried the Transport for NSW livery but with "Station Link" labels and a pink body front. Most of the Station Link fleet have had the labels and pink front removed after the cessation of Station Link.
