Eastern Shuttle (bus company)

For the now defunct airline shuttle service, see Eastern Air Lines Shuttle.
Eastern Shuttle

Eastern Shuttle #51104, bound for Philadelphia, boards customers in New York City's Chinatown.
Founded 2003
Headquarters 90 Bowery
New York, NY 10013
Locale Northeastern United States
Service area I-95 corridor
Service type Intercity coach service
Routes 2
Hubs
Operator New Oriental Tour[1]
Website Eastern Shuttle

Eastern Shuttle is a provider of intercity bus service in the I-95 corridor between New York City and Richmond, Virginia, and is one of a number of companies that compete in the Chinatown bus market out of Manhattan's Chinatown.

History

What is Eastern Shuttle today originally was two different Chinatown bus companies that both began operations around 2003, Eastern Travel (Eastern) and Dragon Coach, later Today's Bus (Today's). Eastern provided service initially to Philadelphia and later to Boston.[2] Following complaints from Greyhound and Peter Pan, and a requirement for all intercity services to move into the South Station terminal, Eastern left the Boston and competed in the New York City-Washington, D.C. market, with most trips servicing the Baltimore Travel Plaza. Today's provided service between New York City and Philadelphia or Washington, D.C.

In fall 2008, shortly after Eastern began offering Wi-Fi on its coaches and started servicing Penn Station, Coach USA purchased Eastern using the operating authority of a then-inactive company whose operations were sold to Peter Pan in the early 2000s.,[3] giving Coach USA its first foothold in the Chinatown bus market. In winter 2009, Coach USA purchased Today's,[4] giving Coach USA a foothold in the Chinatown bus market to Philadelphia.

Earlier in 2008, Coach USA had introduced its Megabus service into the northeastern United States out of a hub near Penn Station which competed at the time with two of the companies purchased by Stagecoach to form what is now Eastern Shuttle. With the acquisition of Eastern and of Today's, Coach USA used Eastern to significantly expand its Megabus service to Philadelphia and DC.

In August 2009, Coach USA divested itself of Eastern Shuttle operations, and the two lines are no longer affiliated with each other.[5] Eastern schedules have since been removed from the megabus.com website and customers are no longer able to make reservations for Eastern buses on the Megabus website. While Coach USA does not own Eastern Shuttle, Coach USA continues to own all of Eastern's fleet.

Fleet

Eastern Shuttle bus in the red livery.

The Eastern Shuttle fleet consists entirely of single-deck MCI and Van Hool coaches painted either solid white (sometimes with the standard Coach USA stripe) or red, with (front to rear) EASTERN on the sides (and in most cases, the front) of the bus in plain lettering in the opposite color, the American flag, and the agency's telephone number. Most of the fleet consists of coaches transferred from other Coach USA properties (including Megabus), along with some coaches purchased for Eastern and a handful of coaches that were inherited when Eastern Shuttle was purchased by Stagecoach (the inherited buses and units painted red do not have Coach USA stripes on them). All Eastern Shuttle coaches branded as such are equipped with Wi-Fi.

Stop locations

Eastern Shuttle route network.

Current stop locations for Eastern Shuttle are listed below.

City Route Stop location(s)
Baltimore Cherry Hill light rail station
New York City 28 Allen Street
(departures and arrivals)		 New York Penn Station (departures)
34 Street – Penn Station (Seventh Avenue) (arrivals)
Philadelphia 1021 Arch Street Independence Mall
Richmond 910 North Boulevard
Rockville 305 North Washington Street
Washington, D.C. 715 H Street, NW

See also

References

  1. ↑ Notice regarding Eastern Travel on Megabus' official Facebook page
  2. ↑ Chinatown's Bus Wars - City Limits
  3. ↑ Coach USA acquires Eastern Travel & Tour
  4. ↑ Todays Bus Now Part of Eastern Coach/Coach USA
  5. ↑ "As of today, Eastern Shuttle will no longer be affiliated with Mega Bus. Eastern would like to thank Mega Bus for their professionalism" from Eastern Travel's Twitter page
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