The long established town of Stockton-on-Tees grew quickly, with the development of the Stockton and Darlington Railway, in the 1825.

The lower reaches of the river, with their deeper sheltered water, soon drew the attention of the industrialists, Middlesbrough rapidly becoming the magnet for investment in iron and steel production, with its associated heavy engineering workshops.

The population grew extremely rapidly as a consequence, requiring mobility to places of employement, so opportunities arose for investors to take advantage of a market for public transport.

From the 1870s onwards, several privately owned tramways, operated by horse or steam, plied for trade both in Middlesbrough and Stockton; all the surviving ones were taken into the control of Imperial Tramways in 1896.

A new electrified tramway system started in 1898 running on three-foot-seven-inch gauge track. The main route ran from Norton to North Ormesby, with a second line running from Middlesbrough Railway Station to Linthorpe village.

By 1914, competition was coming from small local bus operators so Imperial started its own services using motor buses, the first to Grove Hill and later from Stockton to Yarm and from Middlesbrough to Stokesley.

During 1921, the local authorities of Middlesbrough, Thornaby and Stockton on Tees exercised their option and purchased the vehicles and services of Imperial TramwaysCo. Ltd.

Middlesbrough Corporation ran its own fleet but the Thornaby and Stockton tramwayswere jointly operated by the two councils.

Meanwhile, a consortium of local business interests had promoted services in Cargo Fleet and the neighbouring South Bank under the name of South Bank, Normanby and Grangetown Railless Traction Company. Electric buses were used, taking overhead power from locally generated low voltage electricity. Because they ran on rubber tyres and not rails, they became known as the "trackless".

The scheme was eventually taken into municipal control by Eston Urban District Council and Middlesbrough Corporation under a joint board, the Tees-side Railless Traction Board, and opened in 1919.

Services developed rapidly during the 1920s. Motor buses were becoming larger and much more reliable and were considered to be preferable to the ageing trams. 1934 saw the final abandonment of the trams, many more motor buses then being bought to replace them and expand services.

The second world war years saw a period of austerity in the bus industry. Supply difficulties, both of vehicles and labour with which to operate them, brought many changes. By the late 1940s, moves werebeing made to amalgamate the local systems, but were put off by talk of local government re-organisation.

This however didn't come about till 1968, when the County Borough of Teesside was formed. It brought together municipal transport administrations from South Bank to Stockton on Tees. The new amalgated operating entity was Teesside Municipal Transport.

Old loyalties and customs died hard, and the job of unifying the system was fraught with difficulty. Staffing shortages, brought about by the higher wage structures being offered by expanding local industries, caused great disruption in services, and passenger numbers began to fall. Many innovative changes were made however, particularly the integration of services. Services went where the passengers wanted to be, as opposed to where the boundary confines of the individual operators had dictated.

Further local government re-organisation followed only six years later, in 1974, when an enlarged local authority, Cleveland County, was formed. The name of the bus undertaking was changed to Cleveland Transit. A lot of rationalisation was achieved, depots were closed as the fleet slimmed but services were expanded into East Cleveland for a while. In 1986 the undertaking was reconstituted as a council-owned company.

By 1991, central Government was in the process of taking the bus industry out of public ownership, and a decison was taken to sell off the Company. A management-employee buy-out was completed and Cleveland Transit Ltd came into being. Expansion came when the assets of Kingston Upon Hull City Transport Ltd. were accquired in 1993.

More rationalisation quickly followed, but de-regulation was allowing other operaters into a hitherto controlled market. Services were decimated, and many became unprofitable and were abandoned or rationalised.

Nationally, it was an era when large PLCs were coming into the market, and in 1994 Cleveland Transit passed into the Stagecoach empire. Darlington and Hartlepool were brought under its control as part of a greater Teesside unit. It operated as an autonomous Company until 2000 when it became part of Stagecoach North East.

David Hunter