For those interested in old buses (and coaches)

[PhilJ W]

6 hours ago, Rugd1022 said:

 

 

 

2 hours ago, pH said:

What’s the story behind this? Unusual pattern of damage. With what looks like a permanent ‘Private’ on the board and so many staff around, has someone just failed driver training?

Either it struck or was stricken by another vehicle and sustained damage to the offside and then swerved or skidded into the bridge parapet. The lack of damage to the radiator can be explained thus. The RT's had what was known as a 'floating' cab. It wasn't attached to the chassis but suspended from the upper deck floor. This was common practice with many half cab buses from the 1930's until the early 60's. This made accident repairs, such as in the above accident easier.

[PhilJ W]

I might add that the post war RT's were unusual in that the rear platform and staircase were also 'floating' Being suspended from the upper deck floor. This is why the RT chassis finished just behind the rear axle. AFAIK the only other buses to have this feature was the Bristol FLF. This again was to make accident repairs easier, without the complication of chassis damage. The chassis of the RT in the photograph might be damaged as the dumb irons seem to be out of alignment.

[Gwiwer]

On 25/12/2021 at 09:30, John M Upton said:

Locally, Stagecoach South (Southdown as was) have gone for route names and numbers.  In Chichester you have route branded buses for:

 

Selsey 51

Witterings 52/53

Tangmere 55

South Downs Connection 60

Coastliner 700 (the latter now largely the corporate long distance yellow/orange with discreet route branding.)

 

However, the ability by Chichester Depot to keep the correctly branded buses on the correct route is pretty woeful.  Coastliner 700's winding up in Selsey being not uncommon for example.

 

However as the new Stagecoach corporate livery (which in my opinion is hideous!) spreads out, the route brandings are being dropped with the exception of the 700.

 

In Worthing there is a route called The Pulse which as far as I am aware has no number or at least none displayed, I think this may well go when Worthing Depot get around to having their allocation resprayed, they seem to be well behind the other depots in Stagecoach South for some reason.

There are some duties which legitimately take Coastliner vehicles elsewhere at times. In the same way some of London Transport’s Country Area bus routes saw planned operation by Green Line coaches. This is usually done as an efficiency measure allowing early or late journeys on local routes to form a part of a driver’s (or crew’s) overall duty.  
 

Chichester and Worthing are not that good at allocating correctly-branded vehicles to their routes. Pulse is the surviving cross-town link (originally so named because it took you “straight to the heart of Worthing”) running between Lancing and West Durrington. The route is a compromise in some areas where other routes were withdrawn but the result is many areas of the town being more than the government-advisory 400m from public transport.  Coastliner buses turn up on the Pulse and vice versa daily. Unbranded buses also turn up on both.
 

South Downs branded buses are supposed to run only on the 1 (Worthing - Midhurst) and 60 (Chichester - Midhurst) but do stray. Unbranded buses also turn up on those routes daily.   On Sundays when Worthing runs the 91 (Midhurst - Petersfield) on contract using buses off the 1 branded green ones are often used. Chichester uses green ones on the 600 to Elmer (Bognor Regis) which was part of the 60 since those routes began but which was separated when South Downs branding began with National Park support; the SDNP does not include Bognor!  

[Rugd1022]

 

 

[decauville1126]

13 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

 

South Downs branded buses are supposed to run only on the 1 (Worthing - Midhurst) and 60 (Chichester - Midhurst) but do stray. 

 

The nice 5 ex-Gold singles we had that were painted green and branded for the 1's are a long distant memory! A rattly 36xxx is now our regular beast, a 27xxx if we're unlucky. At least the 36xxx's are reasonably quick off the blocks.

[Gwiwer]

13 minutes ago, Rugd1022 said:

 

 

I always thought it a curious twist of fate that the youngest members of the RT class were registered “OLD”. 

 

LT voided further OLD marks for the first Routemasters on the grounds that they were new!  Instead they gained SLT marks. 

[Oldddudders]

That pic is mid-70s, I think. RT4549 seems to have been at Leatherhead & Reigate garages then. 

[Gwiwer]

22 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

That pic is mid-70s, I think. RT4549 seems to have been at Leatherhead & Reigate garages then. 

The other vehicles are not in focus but the VW Beetle appears to be M-reg which supports mid-70s. The cream waistband on the RT is a pre-1970 relic though far from all were repainted yellow upon the creation of LCBS in 1970. 
 

LH ran the 418 which was converted to one-man operation in 1973 which may help to date this view more precisely although a single school journey continued to be RT worked. That continued beyond the normal Bookham terminus to Effingham.  
 

I can therefore say with some confidence that this is the 07.54 Tolworth - Effingham school bus. This working had a scheduled RT dupe between Leatherhead Garage and Effingham but that was beyond red bus territory. 
 

The red RM could be showing 281 Twickenham Station and placing the location as Tolworth. 
 

 

Edited January 1, 2022 by Gwiwer

[45655]

I wondered what an RT was doing on the 418s in the mid-70s so thanks for the explanation!

 

I grew up on the route (in Lower Ashtead) and used it regularly at one time.  My recollection is that it went over to SM single deckers in 1971, but I’m happy to be corrected on that.

 

The SMs - OPO with front entrances and centre exits - seemed frightfully modern when they first appeared and I remember nipping down to Dorking garage after school to see the first examples when they appeared there.

 

Keith.

[Oldddudders]

1 hour ago, 45655 said:

 I remember nipping down to Dorking garage after school to see the first examples when they appeared there.

I infer you might have been at skool in Dorking? Ashcombe Road, perhaps?

[45655]

Indeed. 1966-73.

[Oldddudders]

1 hour ago, 45655 said:

Indeed. 1966-73.

Aha. I was 1959-66, while wife Sherry, imaginatively 'Ashcombe' on RMweb, was 1961-68.

 

You will probably recall my twin brothers, Adrian and Keith Dudley, 1965-72. The former died of a brain tumour in 2016, the latter is living in rural Derbyshire. 

[45655]

I certainly remember the names and have a vague recollection of faces.  Sorry to hear about Adrian - sadly none of us is getting any younger...

 

I knew another young lady who was known as "Sherry" (her surname was Sherrington) but she came to us for sixth form (71-73).

 

Keith.

[Metr0Land]

Queen's Jubilee Time.  No not the present one but 1977 Silver Jubilee.  London Transport painted 25 RM's silver and had a parade from Hyde Park to Battersea with them on Easter Sunday 1977 before they entered service.  Surprisingly the weather played ball.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 1, 2022 by Metr0Land

[4630]

35 minutes ago, Metr0Land said:

Queen's Jubilee Time.  No not the present one but 1977 Silver Jubilee.  London Transport painted 25 RM's silver and had a parade from Hyde Park to Battersea with them on Easter Sunday 1977 before they entered service.  Surprisingly the weather played ball.

 

 

 

Very nice to see. 

I appreciate that TfL’s budget is very constrained at the moment and it’s almost a ‘hand to mouth’ existence, but I’d like to think that someone somewhere in TfL has been able to eek out a budget to allow an appropriate vinyling job on a few of the current fleet operating in London.  
 

Something matching on a few Overground and Underground rolling stock vehicles wouldn’t go amiss either.  
 

It’s not as if the event is very likely to be repeated in any of our life times. 
 

 

Edited February 6, 2022 by 4630

[Gwiwer]

37 minutes ago, Metr0Land said:

London Transport painted 25 RM's silver

And fitted carpets in the lower saloon gangways. Conductors were issued special yellow Gibson rolls for their ticket machines which carried sponsorship (advertising by another name) intended to match that on the vehicle concerned. 
 

In reality the carpets got filthy very quickly, were often damp and smelled bad. The yellow tickets were very hit-and-miss because a conductor didn’t stay with the same bus all day. I suspect most or all didn’t swap their rolls as intended. 
 

I travelled on most of the silver Routemasters. I only received a yellow ticket once and it wasn’t advertising the same spomsor as the bus was. I received yellow tickets randomly on red buses quite often. 
 

A great gesture, and one repeated 25 years later with gold Routemasters, but operational reality  didn’t match the plan. 

[PhilJ W]

3 hours ago, Metr0Land said:

Queen's Jubilee Time.  No not the present one but 1977 Silver Jubilee.  London Transport painted 25 RM's silver and had a parade from Hyde Park to Battersea with them on Easter Sunday 1977 before they entered service.  Surprisingly the weather played ball.

 

 

I remember taking the then current girlfriend and her two year old lad to the Easter Parade at Battersea that year. The lad went missing for about five minutes until we found him quite happily sitting on the kerb watching the buses going by. To think that that little boy would be 47 now.

[Gwiwer]

43 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

To think that that little boy would be 47 now.

And so would I if I hadn't had quite so many birthdays  

 

[RANGERS]

6 hours ago, Metr0Land said:

Queen's Jubilee Time.  No not the present one but 1977 Silver Jubilee.  London Transport painted 25 RM's silver and had a parade from Hyde Park to Battersea with them on Easter Sunday 1977 before they entered service.  Surprisingly the weather played ball.

 

 

I can remember going to London on a day trip in 1977 and travelling on one of the silver RMs on the 73 I guess it would have been, it was around Easter so they wouldn’t have been in service for very long at that point.

 

sadly it doesn’t look like it’ll be an exercise that’s going to be repeated this year, though since all the ‘77 repaints were sponsored by third parties, TfL’s money woes shouldn’t be an excuse not to do it. It’s a shame, 70 platinum grey Borismasters or ADL/BYD battery buses would be quite a striking sight.

 

And whilst we’re considering how these would be funded, I wonder how many of the 1977 sponsors still exist?

[John M Upton]

This was the 2002 Gold Jubilee effort:

 

The Routemasters didn't look too bad (RM6 was unique I think in getting a white stripe which made it look a lot better) but most of the various efforts across the various operators was very hit and miss with a mixture of paint and vinyl which simply didn't match.

 

Looked pretty awful when freshly applied and once a bit of road grime and sunshine had got to them, many bar the odd complete repaint one looked terrible.  Thankfully they were quickly repainted red again.

[BrushVeteran]

We did one at Oxford Bus on a Trident, which was back at Plaxton's for warranty bodywork so had to be repainted. It turned out to be quite attactive.

[John M Upton]

Outside the urban sprawl of the capital, Stagecoach South went for a regal purple version of standard fleet livery:

 

It wasn't great...

 

[Gwiwer]

1 hour ago, John M Upton said:

It wasn't great...

And I'm not sure why the modest Herne Bay depot considers itself "Simply The Best" either   Forever in the shadow of the larger Westwood location which ran (and still runs) the bulk of the Thanet routes but owing more operationally to Canterbury.

 

[Metr0Land]

I don't have many good photos of the silver RM's in service.  Money was tight in those days for discretionary spend, and colour slide film was relatively expensive given my available monies, coupled to which when I got to town the weather was often poor.  Anyway, a shot on the 25 near Oxford Circus and Trafalgar Square on route 12.

 

 

 

Edited April 1, 2022 by Metr0Land

[Metr0Land]

Talking Pictures TV (Sky 328, Freeview 082) has a short Look At Life Weds 07:40 UK time featuring the Harlow Dial-A-Ride from 1974 with Ford Transit minibuses.  I think it's been on before but in case anyone missed it.....