This page sets out to give an overview of the Sydney metropolitan private bus route scene from 1924 to the present.
It contains firstly lists of routes and operators of all known private bus routes at the following dates, which are significant for the reasons shown:
- 1924 – Following the first allocation of route numbers.
- Second half 1925 – When the enduring 1925 route number system had started.
- 31 October 1931 – Immediately prior to the implementation of the State Transport (Co-ordination) Act of 1931, when many private bus routes ceased.
- 1 March 1937 – When the Department of Road Transport & Tramways took over 15 private bus routes as part of a policy of progressive consolidation of ownership under a single operator, where routes were in territory that was competitive with Government bus routes.
- 1 January 1960 – When the post-World War II population boom had resulted in Sydney’s suburbs expanding to the south, west and north of the CBD and many new private bus routes had started to serve the new suburbs.
- 1 January 1980 – Shortly before the start of the process to renumber bus routes into the Sydney Region Route Number System.
- 1 January 2005 – Shortly after completion of the renumbering of metropolitan private bus routes into the Sydney Region Route Number System, but prior to the contract reviews which commenced in 2006.
- 1 July 2010 – Following the completion of the contract reviews conducted by the Ministry of Transport (now Transport for NSW) in the wake of amendments to the Passenger Transport Act, which changed the style of Government management of private bus services.
- 1 July 2015 – Showing some changes of operator after tenders had been called for most regions.
Secondly, it contains a list of routes transferred from State Transit Authority to Transit Systems upon privatisation of Contract Region 6 on 1 July 2018.