Today nearly 50 buses of various vintages from exceptionally old to so young the paint was barely dry filled Regent Street for a display that felt as static as a normal rush hour, except that frustrated faces were replaced with happy smiles.
The Year of the Bus took a departure from transport geeks and came storming into the middle of town where the general public were more likely to turn up, by design or accident.
No stands filled with arcane collectables here, it was family-friendly fun that dominated.
Some photos:
Regent Street full of buses, and flower arrangements.
Plenty of seating for the tired, or, in a reversal of the usual shopping trip, wives waiting for husbands.
A street full of buses, and tourists.
The prevailing view — people holding cameras.
Some younger visitors might have been surprised to learn that buses aren’t always painted red.
Queuing to sit in the drivers cab.
A long line of buses down Regent Street
I might need to update my list of TfL roundels!
Crowds mingle around Hamleys less interested in the small toys within than the big toys outside.
Long term readers will know the significance of Route 23A to Imber.
Transport Museum deployed their mobile shop to sell suitable branded wares — including a new Battle Bus moquette.
The buses with the longest queues to go inside, were the three New Routemasters.
Each had queues as long as any other bus on display, and had there been just one of them, the queues would have been exceptional.
The buses may be loathed by some vocal commentators, but put them on display and they always top the interest level at events.
The traditional way to greet a vintage bus these days.
Bus stop turned into some sort of art form.
Old bus with WW2 blackout covers over the headlamps, and white paint to make the bus easier to see by other motorists.
The Year of the Bus
Time for a gin. More importantly, notice the power coupling at the top for this tram/bus.
Really long queues to go inside one of the few buses with an open top — to get better photos of the street.
A bus stop made out of Lego.
How many of us saw the buses on display — though little display screens.
And finally, one of the stars of the show, the oldest bus on display with replicas of the original “engine” in place.
We were amazed at how still the horses stood, they must have been there for hours without moving. Excellent training!
As for the Boris buses, my daughter and her sons hadn’t been on one before so were very keen to see one – and then they caught one from Oxford Street to King’s Cross to get home! I don’t find them very impressive inside – all the worst features of the Routemasters – but they are lovely to look at!
Lucky you! Looks like a great time was had by all.
Surely a bus with an overhead power pick-up is a trolleybus, not a tram?
Hear hear, Andrew; a clean non-polluting electric bus which collects its power from twin overhead wires is indeed a trolleybus.
I am stunned that Ian did not know this!
Unlike battery buses which either need to keep stopping to recharge their batteries (as per the induction-charged buses on the H98) or have batteries which are so heavy that passenger capacity is reduced (as per London’s BYD buses) the trolleybuses can operate a full 18+ hours day without ever worrying about running out of power.
Their zero tailpipe pollution makes them even cleaner and greener than the new buses recently introduced by Mayor Boris Johnson.
London used to have over 1800 trolleybuses. With air pollution a serious issue we would do well to have that many again (if not even more!)
btw, it was a lovely event, very well attended, only spoilt because for most buses the direction of the sun made it easier to photograph their backs than their fronts!
Simon
“I am stunned that Ian did not know this!”
I did, but prefer to avoid unfamiliar technical terms on a mainstream blog.
^not the real Simon. An impostor.
The real Simon is a great deal more polite.
“Tram/bus”? How ridiculous. It’s not a tram – it doesn’t run on rails. It’s a bus that uses two trolley poles to collect electric power from overhead wires – hence trolleybus.
Well clearly there is more than one person named Simon.
It was not intended to be rude, judgemental or anything like that and I apologise if I came accross in that way.
But I was forthright in what I said.
Possibly my comment showed frustration in whats going on here in London. We have severe air pollution, we all know this.
We also know that people are suffering ill health and premature death because of this, and that diesel exhuast fumes are a significant part of the problem. Whilst its from liquid fuels rather than coal, the people behind the clean air acts of the 1950’s must be turning in their graves because of this.
Trolleybuses offer a way to reduce the portion of the air pollution that comes from buses. In sofar as they are electrically powered they are indeed like trams, and London’s electric railways. No-one would ever consider diesel powered Underground trains!
The issue is that TfL seem to want to use anything except the only proven viable bus solution to air pollution. At Sunday’s cavalcade I saw new induction charged battery electric buses. I wonder how many people know that when similar buses were introduced to Milton Keynes earlier this year (2014) they found that to maintain the same schedules (and give the buses time to top-up their batteries between journeys) they need 9 battery electric buses (plus drivers) to replace 7 diesel buses. This would not be so with trolleybuses.
Simon P. Smiler, webmaster of the citytransport.info website.
Quote: Time for a gin. More importantly, notice the power coupling at the top for this tram/bus. End Quote
Personally I like to see a spade called spade. You may not know what it is, or how it’s use, but if that’s what you need in the hardware store, that’s what you have to ask for!
No pubic trolleybuses systems in the UK [yet], but these vehicles are used extensively throughout Europe and far beyond. To suggest trolleybus is an unknown word is clearly a stupid statement to make. Change your caption straight away!
Great photos. I was one of the volunteer stewards on the trolleybus and was kept busy repeatedly telling people that it was not a bus, and explaining that it had to be towed to Regent Street as it could not move on its own without overhead power lines. All the ‘oldies’ who remembered trolleybuses loved it, as did younger visitors..