Possibly one of London’s most scenic bus routes is the 464. Incepted as a Tramlink feeder service, though starting well before Tramlink itself, the route connects Biggin Hill to New Addington for onward connections to Croydon. The number reflects the fact that those onward connections were originally by route 64; it is unfortunate that the route did not penetrate as far as Addington Village where more direct connections into Croydon by routes 130 or 353 would have been available. (The 464 does connect with the 130 but the time taken to visit Fieldway is comparable to the time saved by missing out Selsdon.) This has, of course, now been cured since Tramlink started, taking just 20 minutes from New Addington!

The route partially replaced Metrobus’s commercial route 356, which had run from Tatsfield and Biggin Hill directly into Croydon via Coney Hall and West Wickham. In fact this route was considerably quicker than the 464/64 combination for getting into Croydon, but not that many people used the through facility. But the section between Tatsfield and Biggin Hill is quite useful in itself, and is now the major bus route to Tatsfield. Tatsfield is also linked from the south to Oxted and Warlingham by route 411, but this is a much more sketchy service than the 464’s quite impressive (for a country area route) daily half hourly service.

The only downfall is that it is not now a Tramlink feeder route after all, having retained its 464 route number and not offering the through fares available on the T-prefixed routes.

To get between New Addington and Biggin Hill, buses cut across Biggin Hill Valley along quite narrow and twisty hills. Here 342 (W342 VGX), one of the Dennis Mini Pointer Darts bought for the route, emerges at the top of Salt Box Hill, opposite Biggin Hill Airport. Although the route is operated by the former East Surrey Godstone depot of Metrobus, meal relief journeys, such as the 1108 from New Addington caught here on 17 February 2001, are covered by Orpington drivers between work on other routes.

Photo by Robert Munster.

From the airport buses follow the old 356 route, reaching as far as Lebanon Gardens in Biggin Hill before plunging down Stock Hill back into the Valley. They then run along Ricketts Hill Road (not much of a hill really, when compared to Jewels, Salt Box and Stock Hills!) to the picturesque village of Tatsfield.

Because of the narrow roads at both ends of the route — especially Jewels Hill and Salt Box Hill, as can be seen in the picture above — the timetable has been carefully designed so that the 2 buses meet as far away from these sections as possible, and drivers’ duty cards carry an instruction not to proceed into the narrow section before they have seen the other bus! Passing other cars can be quite entertaining in some places, let alone two 2.4m wide buses. The instruction is clearly a prudent one, as, quite by coincidence, the bus photographed here was running 9 minutes late for some reason, and the second bus was already standing behind me waiting to descend!

Interestingly a direct link between Biggin Hill and New Addington is not a new idea. During the 1960s, the Orpington Rural Transport Association developed a midibus route to connect Biggin Hill and Orpington via Berrys Green, the precursor to present day route R2. An ambitious plan was hatched to extend the route from Biggin Hill, and it was originally to have bifurcated there with branches to both Tatsfield and New Addington. Slow progress on development of the south end of the Valley meant that only the New Addington route ever saw the light of day, and even that didn’t last long. But it is ironic that the 464 now combines both these legs! The ORTA route actually ran through the north end of the valley, descending via Stock Hill and then serving Oaklands Lane before climbing Jewels Hill to Arnhem Drive (rather than Homestead Way) and New Addington.

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See also routes Line 3, 64, 130, R2