For those interested in old buses (and coaches)

[John M Upton]

Strolling through my photos, I came across this nightmare that I thought I had eradicated from my memory, a Southdown Queen Mary PD3 in Stagecoach Stripes....

Yikes...

[J. S. Bach]

26 minutes ago, John M Upton said:

Strolling through my photos, I came across this nightmare that I thought I had eradicated from my memory, a Southdown Queen Mary PD3 in Stagecoach Stripes....

Yikes...

 

That reminds me a little of Broward's older scheme:

 

 

[Gwiwer]

7 hours ago, John M Upton said:

I forget exactly what their usage among the 'normal' Routemaster's was about:

The East London Buses unit had operated the X15 with the type. A bespoke service (including free morning papers) aimed at getting folk from the new homes in the Beckton area to the City and West End more quickly prior to the arrival of the DLR. 

 

Quite a bit of work went into the vehicles including a full repaint into the “red Green Line” style livery meaning they still had plenty of life after the X15 went driver-only (briefly) and was subsequently withdrawn. 
 

They joined the RML allocation out of U on the 15 and moved to WH when that route was cut back at its eastern end.  Some stayed there to the end of crew operation on the 15. RMC1461 was repainted in Green Line livery as a heritage vehicle (which it still is with Stagecoach) and ran thus daily on the 15 and elsewhere as a special at times. 

In addition to the well-known RMCs two RMAs, 3 and 5, were also repainted for the X15 in order to provide adequate spare cover though were only used if an RMC was unable to perform. 

[PhilJ W]

I remember the RMA's being hurriedly placed on the 175 route when LT was running short of buses. Inside they had the far more comfortable 'Green Line' seats used in the RCL's with the same grey/maroon moquette. Unfortunately they didn't last very long on the route as the lack of vertical grab rails made it difficult for the conductors. They could certainly move though as they were designed to use the Motorway towing a trailer so were fitted with the AV690 engine.

[John M Upton]

RMA's seem to have eluded my camera for the most part apart from RMA11 which I seem to have met twice, both times in Chichester of all places:

 

[PhilJ W]

IMHO the RMA was the best Routemaster followed by the RMC by virtue of their interior appointments. The RCL comes third  but I always think the long Routemasters look odd with the half bay inserted in the middle. 

[Gwiwer]

15 hours ago, PhilJ W said:

RMA's being hurriedly placed on the 175 route when LT was running short of buses ..... they didn't last very long on the route as the lack of vertical grab rails made it difficult for the conductors. 

Union objections and passenger complaints were also raised about the lack of destination blinds.  A slipboard in the lower nearside window was nowhere near as visible as the LT-standard full-set of blinds where the RMAs just had a blank red (in their days on the X15/175) panel.  They really were only pressed into traffic as a stop-gap when the alternive would have been wholesale cancellation of the service.  And for several reasons they were not permitted to stray from the 175 but did manage a few trips on the regular 15 / 15A whilst allocated to the X15 largely because those were "live" balancing workings for a with-flow peak-hour service.  Their use on an all-day Upton Park route 15 duty would have raised union eyebrows there, too.  

3 hours ago, PhilJ W said:

IMHO the RMA was the best Routemaster followed by the RMC by virtue of their interior appointments. The RCL comes third  but I always think the long Routemasters look odd with the half bay inserted in the middle. 

To each their own of course.  The standard bus RM is a masterpiece of engineering and aesthetic design but the ability to insert an extra half-bay (and in more recent times an entire fifth bay) shows just how versatile the original design was.  I make no bones about the RCLs having been my favourites.  I spent some happy times swaying and rolling gently through Sussex and Surrey when they ran the 414; they also ran the 405 but as that was nearly straight up the A23 it lacked the same deep rural legs and always felt much more like the urban bus it was.  I managed a few Green Line trips on them too including one of the last forays on the 709 down from Baker Street to Godstone long after all other Green Line routes had converted to driver-only operation.  Officially at least.  At about the same time the 706 was short of rolling stock and Tring garage turned out an RT almost daily on a Victoria - Aylesbury peak turn.  There were other ad hoc substitutions too of course but that 706 duty became famous.  

[PhilJ W]

4 hours ago, Gwiwer said:

  

To each their own of course.  The standard bus RM is a masterpiece of engineering and aesthetic design but the ability to insert an extra half-bay (and in more recent times an entire fifth bay) shows just how versatile the original design was.  I make no bones about the RCLs having been my favourites.  I spent some happy times swaying and rolling gently through Sussex and Surrey when they ran the 414; they also ran the 405 but as that was nearly straight up the A23 it lacked the same deep rural legs and always felt much more like the urban bus it was.  I managed a few Green Line trips on them too including one of the last forays on the 709 down from Baker Street to Godstone long after all other Green Line routes had converted to driver-only operation.  Officially at least.  At about the same time the 706 was short of rolling stock and Tring garage turned out an RT almost daily on a Victoria - Aylesbury peak turn.  There were other ad hoc substitutions too of course but that 706 duty became famous.  

I lived a few minutes walk from the Romford Green Line garage in London Road when the RCL's were in service. At the same time I was courting a young lady from Brentwood and made regular use of the 721 service. As she lived not far from the Robin Hood terminus in Brentwood it was virtually a door to door service. They were replaced by driver only RP class, not bad but not a patch on the RCL's. Fitted with proper coach seats but they had thinner cushions and not a lot of legroom. Their replacements were atrocious, a standard Leyland National with slippery and shiny plastic covered seating! By then the closure of the east London Green Line routes had been decided and someone decided to drive away the remaining clientele.

Edited December 29, 2020 by PhilJ W

[Metr0Land]

RCL2226 in Purley on a Sunday early in 1974 on the 709.  I remember being surprised at just how good a load there was compared with the dwindling loads on other Sunday Greenline services.

 

 

 

[ardbealach]

Heading now to Glasgow in 1967 and the last days of the Trolleybuses in the city.  They are all lined up in Hampden Garage after the end of services with the  Hampden Park football stadium in the background;  the conductor rewiring (is that the correct word?) the trolley poles and outside Glasgow Cathedral. (AM) 

[decauville1126]

On 21/12/2020 at 11:44, John M Upton said:

My seasonal contribution, almost twenty years to the day:

 

 

 

We referred to them as bread vans and used them on the 8 and 9 routes from Worthing. Soon learnt how to do clutchless gear changes up and down! Together with the Dennis Tridents they were the most disliked steeds. 

[PhilJ W]

1 hour ago, ardbealach said:

Heading now to Glasgow in 1967 and the last days of the Trolleybuses in the city.  They are all lined up in Hampden Garage after the end of services with the  Hampden Park football stadium in the background;  the conductor rewiring (is that the correct word?) the trolley poles and outside Glasgow Cathedral. (AM) 

With the short lived totem below the number plate. London Transport objected to its use by other operators.

Edited December 29, 2020 by PhilJ W

[ardbealach]

Found these two - again they are all lined up in Hampden Garage at the end of the Glasgow trolley bus services.  And a single decker as well in service.  (AM) 

[Gwiwer]

5 hours ago, Metr0Land said:

RCL2226 in Purley on a Sunday early in 1974 on the 709.  I remember being surprised at just how good a load there was compared with the dwindling loads on other Sunday Greenline services.

The Sunday service amounted to just two round trips Godstone - Baker Street and back which were the sum total of the crew's duty.  I have never quite understood why unless they were intended as hospital visiting services.   The main service was only three rounders in each weekday peak (no Saturday service) with the contra-peak trips that I saw often near-empty though they could pick up a few if a 706 or 708 had been delayed or cut out.  

 

Godstone was also responsible for the Sunday-only limited-stop 482 worked by one of its RMLs and usually carrying the driver, conductor and a lot of air.  That was a Caterham - Smallfield Hospital visiting service upon which rover tickets were not valid and it only took you to or from the hospital, not intermediately.  The timings of the 482 mean that it could not have been covered by the 709 crew.  There was also for some time a mysterious late-evening Sunday trip on the 409 from Godstone to East Grinstead and back, not too far removed time-wise from a near-parallel trip on the 708, which also doesn't fit neatly into any obvious duty and covered a leg of that route not otherwise served on Sundays.  I suspect that the 482 and late 409 were part of the same duty but it meant that GD had two costly Sunday crew duties (the 482 and 709).  

 

Both 482 / 409 and 709 Sunday duties survived the one-man conversion of GD's routes on that day; the regular 409 / 411 went over to AF operation since that class was otherwise spare after their weekday 410 was withdrawn on Sundays.  

[Metr0Land]

40 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

The Sunday service amounted to just two round trips Godstone - Baker Street and back which were the sum total of the crew's duty.  I have never quite understood why unless they were intended as hospital visiting services. 

 

One route that definitely did have a lot of hospital visiting traffic on a Sunday was the 477 (Dartford-Swanley?) and remained crew operated until 1978 at least.  This gave rise to the odd situation where it was cheaper to use the vehicle off the 477 to operate the 493 Orpington Station-Ramsden Estate with RMC's on a Sunday, a route with little Sunday traffic.  RMC1493 is seen at Orpington station Apr78.

 

 

[Gwiwer]

53 minutes ago, Metr0Land said:

 

One route that definitely did have a lot of hospital visiting traffic on a Sunday was the 477 (Dartford-Swanley?) and remained crew operated until 1978 at least.  This gave rise to the odd situation where it was cheaper to use the vehicle off the 477 to operate the 493 Orpington Station-Ramsden Estate with RMC's on a Sunday, a route with little Sunday traffic.  RMC1493 is seen at Orpington station Apr78.

 

 

The 477 Sunday service was extended from Dartford to Joyce Green Hospital supplementing the 499 on that day largely for hospital visiting. The 499 was a DT RMC duty whereas DT and SJ shared the 477. 

[ColinK]

Behind the iron curtain, Harzgerode, East Germany in 1988, very strange to British eyes.

[J. S. Bach]

And to US eyes! They kind of look like they are built somewhat backwards.

[Dunsignalling]

13 minutes ago, J. S. Bach said:

And to US eyes! They kind of look like they are built somewhat backwards.

Indeed, if all that overhang was at the front, they'd be a bit of a handful to drive!

 

John

[Gwiwer]

Not even a "schnautzen" among them.  I recall those coming up the mountain in Austria in full (if bland) post bus colours with the "alpenhorn" liberally used to warn of their approach from miles away.  

[Johann Marsbar]

Ikarus 55's was the model designation, I believe.

 

Karl Marx Stadt, 1981....

 

 

Preserved Dresden one operating a City tour,  2012.....

 

 

On our trip to the DDR in 1981, my Father used to refer to them as "Duck Buses" as the rear looked like a ducks ar.e.....

 

[PhilJ W]

Just put another deck on top and you have an Atlantean or Fleetline. Some of those converted to single deck similarly looked a bit odd.

[Johann Marsbar]

21 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

Just put another deck on top and you have an Atlantean or Fleetline. Some of those converted to single deck similarly looked a bit odd.

 

Like this...

 

[stewartingram]

Or this one from Gt.Yarmouth

[leopardml2341]

IIRC the GGPTE one(s) was a local repair to a decapitated 'decker', whereas the Gt. Yarmouth ones were built like that?