Scottish Omnibuses Ltd. (SOL) was a company set up by the British Transport Commission on 4 April 1949 to take over the bus and coach operations of Scottish Motor Traction (SMT) and its subsidiaries under the

nationalisation Nationalization (nationalisation in British English) is the process of transforming privately-owned assets into public assets by bringing them under the public ownership of a national government or state. Nationalization usually refers to p ...

provisions of the

Transport Act 1947 The Transport Act 1947 (10 & 11 Geo. 6 c. 49) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Under the terms of the Act, the railway network, long-distance road haulage and various other types of transport were nationalised and came under ...

. SMT itself remained in private hands, continuing its motor sales, service and insurance businesses.Hibbs, John (1968). ''The History of British Bus Services'', p. 211. David & Charles, Newton Abbott. . SOL took over the holding of SMT's former subsidiary companies, while those buses and coaches it operated directly continued to use the SMT brand until the early 1960s, when, after a brief flirtation with "Scottish", the fleet name "Eastern Scottish" was adopted.McCallum, Forbes & Bloomfield, Stephen W. (1965), ''British Bus Fleets No.22: Scottish Bus Group'', p. 75. Ian Allan, London. In 1961 the holding function of SOL was transferred to a new company Scottish Omnibuses Group (Holdings) Ltd, which, following the demise of the British Transport Commission, came under the control of the state-owned

Transport Holding Company The Transport Holding Company (THC) was a British Government-owned company created by the Transport Act 1962 to administer a range of state-owned transport, travel and engineering companies that were previously managed by the British Transport C ...

the following year. It was renamed as Scottish Bus Group Ltd. in 1963, and became part of the

Scottish Transport Group The Scottish Bus Group (SBG) was a state-owned group of bus operators covering the whole of mainland Scotland. The origin of the grouping was the operators owned by and including the Scottish Motor Traction company, which were transferred t ...

in 1969 following the addition of ferry services. SOL itself remained as a bus and coach operator in south-east Scotland, trading as Eastern Scottish, until reorganisation of the group in 1985, when it was split into Eastern Scottish Omnibuses Ltd. and

Lowland Scottish Lowland Scottish Omnibuses Ltd was a bus operator in south eastern Scotland and parts of Northern England. The company was formed in 1985 and operated under the identities Lowland Scottish, Lowland and First Lowland / First SMT, until 1999 whe ...

Omnibuses Ltd. Following privatisation these were eventually re-united in 1999 under the banner of First Edinburgh.

References

{{Reflist Former bus operators in Scotland 1949 establishments in Scotland Transport companies established in 1949 Transport companies disestablished in 1985 1985 disestablishments in Scotland