Minis go first class to the City
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• A new London minibus service to shuttle City executives to and from work starts this week.
Earthline will operate between Waterloo, Sloane Square and the City with a fleet of four Mercedes 507D minibuses equipped with reclining seats, telephones, faxes, satellite television, newspapers and a hostess. Passengers will have the choice of classical music or CNN financial news on headphones.
"We wanted to reproduce as much as we could first-class aircraft accommodation," says Gregory Lee, a founder of the Chiswick-based company. "We're filling a niche because until now there's been nothing in between the cab and the tube."
Lee insists that Earthline is not directly competing with London Transport. "We are targeting a very limited number of people and the vehicles only operate during the rush hour," he explains.
Earthline currently operates vehicles every 15 minutes between 07:15 and 09:00hrs and 18:00 and 20:00hrs. Lee hopes to increase the frequency to every five minutes using an extra four minibuses. The service originally started two weeks ago. But it had to stop after three days because its owners did not have a London local licence to accompany its PCV licence.
Lee hopes to have a Docklands service running by the summer — he says he is not worried by the failure of Harry Blundred's Docklands service: "We are taking people to and from their place of work that is where the demand is," says Lee. He adds that the company realises "there's not a great deal of demand for circulating within the Docklands area".
Lee and his partner Giovanni Imperiali, both from financial and marketing backgrounds, are now looking at expanding into the Battersea and New Kings Road areas.