Gaia Trafikk was the largest

public transportation Public transport (also known as public transportation, public transit, mass transit, or simply transit) is a system of transport for passengers by group travel systems available for use by the general public unlike private transport, typical ...

provider in

Bergen Bergen (), historically Bjørgvin, is a city and municipality in Vestland county on the west coast of Norway. , its population is roughly 285,900. Bergen is the second-largest city in Norway. The municipality covers and is on the peninsula o ...

and Os, Norway until it merged with HSD forming Tide. Gaia was formed by the 1998 merger of

Pan Trafikk Pan Trafikk was a Norwegian bus company operating in and around the city of Bergen. The company was created as a merger between Åsane Billag and Bilruta Fana–Os–Milde. The company had depots in Åsane, Fana, Os and Søreide. In 1999, ...

, the bus company serving northern and southern Bergen, and

Bergen Sporvei Bergen Sporvei AS was a municipal owned public transport company that operated in Bergen, Norway from 1898 to 1998. The company operated both the Bergen Tramway, Bergen trolleybus and the yellow buses in Bergen. History The company was founded a ...

, the company serving Bergen's inner city. The route network covered most of Bergen, but the western suburbs were serviced by

Hardanger Sunnhordlandske Dampskipsselskap Hardanger Sunnhordlandske Dampskipsselskap (HSD), founded in 1880, was one of Norway's largest privately held public transportation providers. Its bus operation HSD Buss AS was founded in 1999, and serviced 15 million passengers annually in large ...

(HSD). This resulted in a fixed fleet between the yellow buses of Bergen Sporvei and the red buses of Pan Trafikk being operated by the same company, and coordinated, making a more user-friendly bus system. The largest owners of Gaia was Bergen City Council (43.6%), HSB (7.9%), Yrkestrafikkforbundet (7.3%) and Os City Council (7.3%). Among the fleet of about 300 buses are 8

trolleybus A trolleybus (also known as trolley bus, trolley coach, trackless trolley, trackless tramin the 1910s and 1920sJoyce, J.; King, J. S.; and Newman, A. G. (1986). ''British Trolleybus Systems'', pp. 9, 12. London: Ian Allan Publishing. .or trol ...

es (two of them are

dual-mode bus A dual-mode bus is a bus that can run independently on power from two different sources, typically electricity from overhead lines like a trolleybus or from batteries like a hybrid bus, alternated with conventional fossil fuel (generally diesel ...

es), making Bergen the only city in north-west

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located enti ...

to have them. Gaia fleet also contained 36 natural gas buses. Gaia Trafikk is merged with HSD forming the company

Tide Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by the combined effects of the gravitational forces exerted by the Moon (and to a much lesser extent, the Sun) and are also caused by the Earth and Moon orbiting one another. Tide tables can ...

. The general assembly at HSD approved the merger on 29 June 2006, while the approval at Gaia came on 17 July 2006. The new company is listed on the

Oslo Stock Exchange Oslo Stock Exchange ( no, Oslo Børs) (OSE: OSLO) is a stock exchange within the Nordic countries and offers Norway’s only regulated markets for securities trading today. The stock exchange offers a full product range including equities, deriv ...

. Both British

Arriva Arriva plc is a British multinational corporation, multinational public transport company headquartered in Sunderland, England.Nettbuss Vy Buss, formerly branded as Nettbuss, is the largest bus company in Norway, owned by Vy (transport operator), Vy. It was established on 10 February 2000 as the continuation of the bus operations from former NSB Biltrafikk. In addition to bus serv ...

had announced a wish to buy Gaia, indicating a price around NOK 400 million.

References

{{Authority control Companies based in Bergen Defunct bus companies of Norway Trolleybus transport in Norway Bus companies of Vestland Transport companies established in 1998 Transport companies disestablished in 2006 1998 establishments in Norway 2006 disestablishments in Norway