Nikos (Nicholas) Sikavitsas was born in the village of Argos Orestikon, Kastoria on 1 January 1937 to Christos Sikavitasa and Anastasia Spyropoulos. He was the first born of three brothers (one of whom died very young) and two sisters. After completing primary school and a couple of years of high school he began working as a carpentry and furniture workshop.
In 1956 he became aware that many Argites were earning a good living in Melbourne, Australia and decided to emigrate. He travelled to Piraeus and boarded an Egyptian cargo ship, converted to passenger accommodation for immigrants. Each dormitory on the ship had contained over 200 men, women and children.
After a week’s delay in Colombo he landed in Melbourne on 1 October 1956. Nikos settled in Brunswick with his future brother in law Ariseidis Liokos and four other young Argites. After an initial, but underpaid, carpentry job he moved to Red Cliffs, near Mildura and became a fruit picker – hard work but at which he was enthusiastic, The owners son also helped Nicholas with his English. After the picking period he worked in local potato and fruit farms and in a local dried fruit factory. In 1959 he obtained additional evening work in a local Macedonian family run café as a cleaner.
After two years he had saved enough money to return to Melbourne and buy a house in Brunswick with his sister and brother in law. Returning to carpentry as a leading hand, he was able to arrange employment for several other family members.
At the same time he was working afternoons and evenings for bus operator J.D. (Doug) Barnes, who owned numerous bus routes in the western and north western suburbs. He worked mainly on what is now Sita route 472 between Moonee Ponds and Williamstown Beach. One of his co-drivers was Evangelos Spyrou.
By the mid 1960s Doug Barnes was looking to sell off some of his runs due to personal circumstances. Nicholas and Evangelos were offered the opportunity to take over the Broadmeadows to Moonee Ponds and Sunbury to Melbourne City runs. They agreed and purchased the runs with four buses, both working double shifts seven days a week to pay off the debt.
Barnes then offered them another four buses with the Moonee Ponds to Keilor and Keilor East runs. They did not, however, have sufficient capital to do this by themselves so Doug Barnes stayed in as a third partner until Nicholas and Evangelos had amassed enough savings to buy him out. However, a contractual dispute resulted in a stalled settlement. They were later able to obtain the required finance and took full control in 1967. The company was known as Kastoria Bus Lines.
In May of the same year, Nicholas also married Arete Voutsadis who had migrated in 1966. He could only spare the time for this in May as the school holidays required one bus less in service!
They had two sons – Christos (Chris) born on 2 June 1968 and Dimitris (Jim) born on 30 April 1970. Both sons would become active in the business once they completed high school and further training.
The split
In May 1970, Nicholas decided to split up the Kastoria partnership. There is some confusion about the actual date with one source stating this occurred on 10 May 1970 and another on 1 January 1971. It does appear the split was decided in mid 1970 (just after son Jim was born!) as the Tullamarine Bus Lines name was registered in July 1970.
In any event, the Kastoria business was split with the Sikavitsas family’s share becoming the new company – Tullamarine Bus Lines, operating three routes. Each partner retained seven buses though Nicholas had the busier routes (at the time).
The depot was established at 7 Louis Street, Airport West, a stone’s throw from the then Kastoria depot and with Pincini’s just a few blocks away.
The 1970s
The formation of Tullamarine Bus Lines coincided, more or less, with the opening of the new Melbourne International Airport at Tullamarine. The new facility replaced the smaller Essendon Airport, which had become ringed by residential development and was inappropriate for modern jetliner use.
International flights first took off from Tullamarine on 1 July 1970, with domestic flights relocated on 26 June 1971. One might surmise that Nick Sikavitsas thought the new airport would play a major role in the direction of the business, hence his choice of business name, although ultimately the airport services came second to serving residential growth in the adjoining north-western suburbs.
TBL’s destination rolls and timetables famously referred to “Jetport” to distinguish between the two airports however this term never ‘took over’ off officially and gradually disappeared from use during the 1990s.
At the time of the split, Melbourne’s bus routes were being renumbered. This resulted in the Moonee Ponds – Broadmeadows service becoming route 477, including some trips which operated to Melbourne Airport instead of Broadmeadows.
Timetables dated 1974 show that the Moonee Ponds-Broadmeadows service ran every 15- 30 mins in peaks and every 30 mins off peak on weekdays to 10.30pm although evening services ran only as far as Gladstone Park with the last bus out of Broadmeadows being at 6.20pm.
During the 1970s, trips to Jetport ran as a branch of 477, with full-length trips to Sunbury numbered route 479 and short workings terminating at Bulla displaying 478.
An extension of the 479 to Gap Road, Sunbury began in January 1973 but was deleted following the introduction of local services within Sunbury in the 1980s, the early foundations of what would became the Donric empire across northern & western Victoria and beyond.
Saturday services were half hourly to Broadmeadows in the morning and hourly to Gladstone Park via Jetport (combined with 478) in the afternoon/evening to 10.30pm, whilst an hourly Sunday service operated to Jetport and Gladstone Park on Sundays to 8pm.
Meadow Fair Shopping Centre in Broadmeadows opened in 1974, followed by Airport West Shoppingtown (Westfield) 2 years later. Although smaller than many centres around Melbourne, both quickly became main hubs in Tullamarine’s network, particularly for route 477 delivering shoppers from surrounding suburbs.
The 1977 timetables were similar to those of 1974, except that some evening services had been curtailed with last buses now at 9pm weekdays, 7pm Saturdays and 6.30pm Sundays.
The Sunbury service at that time had four weekday, two Saturday and one Sunday return trips.
Tullamarine probably came off second best in the separation having inherited mostly older buses, including many of the ex Barnes Bedfords.
A replacement program commenced but did not involve any new vehicles until 1984. Instead there was a batch of three Bedford SB5/ Freighter two door buses from Ventura followed by five Comair VAM70s from the same source. A Freighter VAM70 came from Rennie’s and Comair VAMs from Driver Bros and Moreland.
The buses were painted in a distinctive livery of maroon and cream, which lasted until the first Mercedes Benz buses arrived in the 1980s, when the proportion of colour reversed and became cream with maroon bands.
A distinctive feature of the fleet during the Bedford era was the use of aluminium side panels which gave the fleet a distinctive look but, in the case of older buses, gave rise to speculation as to whether that was holding them together! Sign writing on many units was a simple TBL.
The 1980s
From 8 April 1980 Sunbury received improved town services involving both Tullamarine Bus Lines and Sunbury Bus Service. A joint timetable was issued and shows the 479 having nine weekday trips, six on Saturdays and one on Sundays.
In 1981, use of 478 was reallocated to Moonee Ponds – Airport West – Jetport services. Jetport weekday service ran on average once an hour weekdays with an occasional extra peak trip or longer break. Several peak hour trips serviced the airport maintenance area as well as the terminal. The 477 now applied only to the Broadmeadows services.
During the 1980s Greenvale became a thriving residential development requiring a full time bus service, with route 484 introduced on 6/7/1987 to provide a feeder service into Broadmeadows via Westmeadows. Owing to wide, low-density streets charactered by numerous oversized single and double-storey McMansions and an affluent population, a single winding route was deemed most economical.
The Greenvale service initially ran half hourly in peaks and hourly off peak on weekdays only with a Saturday service introduced in 1988.
Recalling the era of the semi-private service to the Greenvale Geriatric Centre, selected trips operated via the grounds to the west of the suburb on weekdays, catering for shift changes, visitors and day appointments.
Greenvale soon became the focal point of the school bus network operated by TBL. At the time of sale to CDC in 2018, five dedicated school specials pass through the suburb each morning, heading to the numerous schools in Essendon as well as Penola Junior College in Glenroy. Tullamarine Bus Lines also operate school runs into Greenvale’s Aitken College (opened in 1999) from adjoining suburbs including Craigieburn, Gladstone Park and Tullamarine. Route 484 also featured deviations to the nearby Gladstone Park Secondary College and Erinbank Secondary College in Westmeadows (closed in 2010). A local government secondary school was finally established in 2022.
On the fleet side, in the early 1980s, a charter fleet was assembled using four second hand Bedford VAM70 coaches – a Cheetham & Borwick unit ex Bellarine Buslines, a raised deck Freighter body (a twin to one in the Kastoria fleet, another Freighter from Pulitano and an Ansair from Moonee Valley Coaches.
However, when the time came for these to be replaced it was with route buses, with Tullamarine becoming completely absent from the coach arena until 2010!
When government funded new buses were introduced from 1984, Tullamarine actually received the first of the Mercedes OH1316/Ansairs to be built (it was originally painted briefly in Met Bus livery).
Because of the age of all the Bedfords in the fleet and rapid expansion of Greenvale, some 18 new 1316/Ansairs were delivered between 1984 and 1991 – replacing the majority of the fleet.
The 1990s
After leaving school Nick’s son Chris studied computers and business administration whilst Jim undertook a mechanical apprenticeship, studying at Broadmeadows Technical College. This combination of skills proved very useful for the further development of the company and when they took eventual control of the company later on.
Chris married Nicoletta Kolaras and Jim married Efrosyne Parskevoloupos. Each has two children.
Cutbacks made on 29 July 1991 resulted in the loss of 2 off-peak trips on 479 to/from Sunbury. On weekends the Saturday morning return trip to Sunbury was deleted, although the afternoon return trip to serving the Sunbury Mental Hospital (closed in 1985) was inexplicitly retained, including the City extension which was rarely patronised. Route 478 also lost a return Saturday morning service.
On weekdays, a sporadic, skeleton timetable remained between Airport West, Melbourne Airport and Sunbury with a dozen trips each way – when combined, 478 & 479 from Airport West provided peak-hour intervals varying quite randomly between 5 mins (!) and two hours during the peaks and shoulders. A gap of over four hours existed during the day, with no trips ex Airport West between 9:10am & 1:20pm, or ex Melbourne Airport between 10:05am & 2:15pm!
Trips after 1pm Saturdays & on Sundays continued to be combined with 477, operating as a loop service returning via Gladstone Park Shopping Centre and also incorporating Broadmeadows Rd in Tullamarine.
Patronage on their trunk services along Matthews Ave took a hit after a 1.2km extension of the 59 tram route from Hawker St (Essendon Airport) to Airport West Shoppingtown opened on 22 December 1992, although existing 477/478 headways were maintained for the suburbs beyond. End of day short workings terminating at Niddrie were soon truncated to end at Airport West allowing buses to return more directly to the depot.
In May 1993 Tullamarine Bus Lines was successfully awarded the inaugural contract for the Broadmeadows (later Craigieburn) NightRider service, which they retained until November 2008 when Dyson’s won a new contract for the run.
From 10/2/1998 the occasional services from Sunbury & Bulla were supplemented by the new cross-regional Route 500, which travelled to Broadmeadows direct (without needing to travel via Airport West).
The timetable required a single bus with seven trips in either direction during weekday daylight hours only, with varying intervals of 90 mins to 2 hours. It was soon extended to Victoria University campus, Sunbury. School time trips featured significant deviations through Greenvale, Gladstone Park & Tullamarine for students travelling to Salesian College in Sunbury.
The addition of route 500 somewhat complicated local bus options to the airport as connections could be made via two different stations (Essendon and Broadmeadows) at irregular times or required a 477 (or 59 tram) between Essendon and Airport West at other times. To combat this, an unofficial timetable page was created by a Public Transport Users Association committee member listing the limited options available, including connecting trains to/from the City.
Since the late 1990s further housing was built in Attwood, providing suburban infill between Greenvale and Westmeadows, but cheaper land being adjacent to the Melbourne Airport flight path. Route 484 provides coverage along Ardlie St, but poor street layouts leave some residents over a kilometre from their nearest bus stop.
The 2000s
By 2000 the fleet size had increased to 31 buses and 50 drivers. Around this time, Chris and Jim became partners in the company alongside their father Nick.
Deliveries of Mercedes 0405NH / Volgrens continued with nine added between 2000 and 2002.
During 2004 a parcel of land opposite the depot on the corner of Louis St & Moore St was developed into the Octopus Car Wash (& subsidiary Dog’s Life Dog Wash). Not surprisingly, buses from both Tullamarine and Kastoria carried advertising both inside & out promoting both businesses. The close proximity to Airport West Shoppingtown has ensured ongoing success, despite not being on the busier thoroughfare of Matthews Ave.
After a break of a couple of years new deliveries for Tullamarine purchased from 2005 were the successor chassis to the O405NH, the Mercedes O500LE, with ten delivered between 2003 and 2008.
During the March 2006 Commonwealth Games, route 477 was extended to operate until 1:30am on each night between Broadmeadows & Airport West (both directions). Services ran every half-hour until 10pm before increasing to every 20 mins, harmonised with trains at Broadmeadows while also meeting trams at the other end.
The skeleton weekend services on routes 477 & 484 were finally upgraded soon after, as part of a state-wide initiative by the Labor state government.
Route 484 was extended 6km north-east to the Roxburgh Park Shopping Centre via Kirkham Dr and Somerton Rd on 1/10/2006. A minimum standards upgrade also included the introduction of hourly Saturday afternoon and Sunday trips until 9pm. Exactly 12 months later (30/9/2007), the Craigieburn electrification and new station at Roxburgh Park would open.
Saturday afternoon trips were introduced on Route 477 through Westmeadows to Broadmeadows on 1/10/2006, with the full minimum standards upgrade implemented on 5/8/2007.
2008 – Gowanbrae
A new housing estate called Gowanbrae was developed on a peninsula of land surrounded by Moonee Ponds Creek, the standard gauge rail line and the Western Ring Road during the late 1990s and early 2000s, and is now home to around 2,750 residents.When built, it was realised that the narrow roads within the estate were not suitable for full size buses and that a special kind of bus service would be needed.
Route 490 Airport West – Gowanbrae began on 14 July 2008 operating on a fixed route from Airport West Shoppingtown to Bluebell and Gowanbrae Drives (about 5 mins) then on a demand responsive basis within the Gowanbrae estate, pre-bookings being required for pick-ups at a dozen on-request bus stops around the suburb. However unlike Invicta’s TeleBus service in the outer-east, there is no additional surcharge.
Round trip time is approximately 20 minutes. The service operates every 30 minutes in peak hours and hourly off-peak between 6am and 7pm weekdays and hourly on Saturdays between 9am and 4pm. No service operates on Sundays or public holidays.
With the introduction of the Gowanbrae run, Tullamarine acquired a Mercedes 815D / A.B. Denning Vario midibus second-hand ex Logan City Bus Service, Brisbane (43). A former National Bus Co. Custom Coaches Mercedes LO812 “pie cart”, ex (421), was also purchased as a backup bus, after briefly laying unregistered with Westernport Coaches (Dineen). Both vehicles were painted up in the full TBL livery, the 815D with a Gowanbrae route map on the rear.
The 2010s & SmartBus
Residents of Tullamarine and Gladstone Park were among the biggest winners from the introduction of the Green & Yellow Orbital SmartBus services in 2010.
Route 902 (introduced 5/4/2010) followed a direct path between Airport West & Broadmeadows via Melrose Dr, Mickleham & Broadmeadows Rd deviation & Johnstone St, halving journey times to just 20 minutes, compared to 35-40 mins on the circuitous 477 service. The SmartBus service ran more often, and introduced evening services past midnight 6 days a week.
The addition of Route 901 to Melbourne Airport six months later (on 25/9/2010) further boosted options between Gladstone Park & Broadmeadows – on weekdays there is eight buses an hour on this corridor.
Gradually increased traffic congestion along route 477 had impacted on reliability, while overall patronage dropped following the introduction of the more direct SmartBus 901 & 902 services.
A major overhaul of the 477 timetable was made on 21/06/2015 with an all-day 20 min service introduced, allowing peak hour runtimes to be corrected. The more frequent 20 min off peak service allowed better coordination with trains at either end of the route & acknowledged the higher off-peak demand in the local social-economic areas the route traversed.
Saturday services were reduced to every 40 mins, now offset with the 484 through Westmeadows and again harmonised with Craigieburn Line trains. In addition to the timetable changes, an off-peak section via local streets in Broadmeadows was discontinued, with residents well served by the SmartBus services along Johnstone St. This change was originally advertised to commence 29/06/2008 but the late Transport Minster Lynne Kosky intervened at the eleventh hour.
In more recent years, Greenvale has expanded north of Somerton Rd on both sides of Greenvale Reservoir. To cater for new housing estates springing up along Mickleham Rd, a new Route 543 service was introduced on 16 October 2016. The service runs 7 days a week until 9pm with a 40 minute base frequency and provides a link to Roxburgh Park Station via Greenvale Village. Some attempts were made to off-set services with the existing 484 service in the area.
Sale of business – May 2018
At the time of the sale, Tullamarine Bus Lines was managed by Nick’s sons, Chris and Jim. It was sold to CDC in May 2018 with 36 buses. As of 2024, the current depot on Louis St continues to operate six routes in the surrounding area – 477, 478, 479, 482, 484 & 543 – along with about a dozen school runs serving institutions in Essendon, Niddrie and Greenvale.
