Bus Shite

[Yoss]

@cms206

My brain is not, unfortunately, as encyclopedic as I would like, or even as much as it used to be, so we'll be needing these. 

The rear of both these books are full of interesting* appendices. Appendix 4 in the second book lists every central route and dates they were operated by RMs and from which garage. 

 

So we'll go straight to the 62, which seems to confirm your dates but by my maths, which involved fingers, even the 60 directly above it appears to be slightly shorter. 

 

And the 124 and 124A are even shorter. I have no idea what the 124 was but it was run by Catford. 

 

There are 12 pages of these so I started skimming but I found an interesting one at the end. 

The 609 had Routemasters for six and a half months on Sundays only on a route that was trolleybus Monday to Saturday. As much as I like Routemasters it really is a backward step replacing trolleybuses. 

[cms206]

124 was Forest Hill Stn - Welling via Grove Park and Eltham, with M-F peak extensions to Woolwich; 124A was the Sunday variant which terminated at Eltham Well Hall Stn, and continued to Bexley Hospital on Sunday evenings only. Both were converted to DMS operation.

62 was a seven day allocation, so maybe I got my wires crossed as it didn't have daily variations or extensions/curtailments, bar perhaps the twice daily Creekmouth Power Station journies.

[Remspoor]

3 hours ago, cms206 said:

Yes, but even in multicultural London Scots are too hard to understand 😂 we have a Scottish cafe at Angel now though so integration is a matter of time.

Quite possibly; Barking, from memory, had the shortest lived RM conversion in London - @Yoss may be able to confirm - as the 62 converted from RT to RM operation in 4/79, then again to T operation by February 1980.

Dad never drove RMs at Barking. He did drive then at Upon Park when he first went on the buses.  Route 15. We got to see the Christmas lights for free for 2 years, riding on the top deck at the front. He wanted to work at Barking as it was just a 20 min walk away.  He had to wait for a vacancy to work at Barking. Edit: I should say the route he mainly worked on was the 87. I believe he  only wanted to work a crew bus. However, when the  RTs were withdrawn he was given no choice but to convert to OMO buses. I do not remember RMs at Barking, that maybe is because I was living in Hampshire by that the time the book says they where used on the 62s

The days the driver does not have much interaction with the passengers do they. I thought screens and the oyster card (or what ever it is called) put and end to the need to talk to each other. Even the stop announcements are automatic. Driving OMO buses when the Titan was introduced was very different.

[Remspoor]

To add to the above it would seem that RMs were  running on the 62s for  9 months.

https://bus-routes-in-london.fandom.com/wiki/London_Buses_route_62#History

 

[cms206]

24 minutes ago, Remspoor said:

Dad never drove RMs at Barking. He did drive then at Upon Park when he first went on the buses.  Route 15. We got to see the Christmas lights for free for 2 years, riding on the top deck at the front. He wanted to work at Barking as it was just a 20 min walk away.  He had to wait for a vacancy to work at Barking. Edit: I should say the route he mainly worked on was the 87. I believe he  only wanted to work a crew bus. However, when the  RTs were withdrawn he was given no choice but to convert to OMO buses. I do not remember RMs at Barking, that maybe is because I was living in Hampshire by that the time the book says they where used on the 62s

The days the driver does not have much interaction with the passengers do they. I thought screens and the oyster card (or what ever it is called) put and end to the need to talk to each other. Even the stop announcements are automatic. Driving OMO buses when the Titan was introduced was very different.

London is a totally different kettle of fish to driving buses in the provinces, but even that has changed since I first sat backside in a bus seat in 2008 (manual Mercedes minibuses for my stage carriage career until 2012!).

I still try to provide a smiling face on my London spells but when the warcry of today is "I ain't got no oyster what you gonna do about it fam?" - fare evasion is rife - and people won't even look at you getting on the bus, plus the mandatory spit kits, voice recording in the cab, over a dozen cameras in the bus including one pointing at your feet... yeah. Not a great gig these days.

The 87 is now Wandsworth to Aldwych and operates from Stockwell; the 87 as your father would have known it has now disappeared into the 5 and 287, the latter still running from Barking to Rainham, while the 5 covers the Romford to Barking section.

[wesacosa]

Priscilla, Queen of the Desert found after 30 years 

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2024/apr/11/the-30-year-hunt-to-find-the-priscilla-queen-of-the-desert-bus-my-jaw-was-on-the-ground

[willswitchengage]

Just seen this on TheFacebook, green laning in a midibus.

[High Jetter]

I bet it arrived late...

[LightBulbFun]

5 hours ago, willswitchengage said:

Just seen this on TheFacebook, green laning in a midibus.

Pffft, how about a triaxle leyland Olympian

3:15ish for the green lane in a yellow bus action