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old routemasters

few pictures from Saturday's event at Guildford - the Safeguard Coaches heritage fleet was on display rather than running, buses connecting Guildford Cathedral with town centre, park + ride etc were from the Friends of King Alfred Buses, Winchester, London Bus Museum, or the Aldershot + District Group. And with quite a few of Safeguard's current fleet helping out, as think they had rather more people than they expected...

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Reminder for this Saturday (23 March) event in the Barking / Ilford patch, including open day at Stagecoach's Barking garage.

Historic buses on routes 62 (Barking - Becontree - Chadwell Heath) and 145 (Redbridge - Ilford - Barking Garage - Dagenham) - both about every 10 - 20 minutes from about 9.30 am to 5 pm. Currently 28 buses listed for service - mostly the 1940s / 50s RT generation, some Routemasters, and a handful of older and newer buses. Timetables and bus lists and more info here - timetables are currently 'version 3' but there's a chance of a final version before the weekend.
 
I've got a bit out of keeping this thread up to date, but a couple of things on this weekend -

Friday 21 to Sunday 23 June is the 'Royal Blue' run, a 3 day event with coaches covering chunks of the old 'Royal Blue' coach network in the south west, Oxford - Bournemouth - Eastbourne - Basingstoke this year. (This is more for vehicle owners and their guests rather than something the general public can travel on)

Sunday 23 June is summer festival at London Bus Museum, Brooklands, with a theme round the 'windrush generation' who became transport workers in the 1950s onwards. Usual connecting bus service from Weybridge station.
 
Again, I've not been keeping quite up to date, but a few events the next week or two -

Saturday 20 / Sunday 21 July - 70th birthday of Routemasters event at Chiswick Business Park (site of London Transport's Chiswick Works) - details are a bit vague, but from what I gather it will be static display rather than buses running anywhere.

Note that both District and Piccadilly lines have major engineering work over the weekend, the Overground line Richmond - Stratford is recommended.

Sunday 21 July - Alton Bus Rally / running day. This is at a new site (Alton College) not the park of past years - not sure of all that's gone on, but aware the park event had to be called off once or twice due to waterlogging (and getting buses out of muddy fields is not fun) - sounds like it's going to be a bit smaller than past years, and note that there's no car parking on site.

Sunday 28 July - Windsor bus running day. Will be a mix of London Transport (country area) / London Country and Thames Valley / Alder Valley buses this time (Slough and Windsor were boundary towns between the two.)
 
Puddy_Tat said:
Again, I've not been keeping quite up to date, but a few events the next week or two -

Saturday 20 / Sunday 21 July - 70th birthday of Routemasters event at Chiswick Business Park (site of London Transport's Chiswick Works) - details are a bit vague, but from what I gather it will be static display rather than buses running anywhere.

Note that both District and Piccadilly lines have major engineering work over the weekend, the Overground line Richmond - Stratford is recommended.
Click to expand...
Was anything happening this weekend, cos a lovely old green, single decker bus went past me at the lights in Winchester this morning?
 
mx wcfc said:
Was anything happening this weekend, cos a lovely old green, single decker bus went past me at the lights in Winchester this morning?
Click to expand...

there was an event in Southampton today - possibly one of the King Alfred group's on their way to that?

i tend only to mention things reasonably close to london. there is a national events listing page here.
 
What a great day out today for the 70th anniversary of the routemaster in Chiswick. Disappointed it was flagged up 😓
IMG_20240720_161003_1.jpgIMG_20240720_161012_1.jpg
 
Saturday 14 September - Bromley event seems to be growing, will now include open day at Bromley Bus Garage (it's at Bromley Common, about a mile south of Bromley town centre) and buses on route 61 (Chislehurst - Orpington - Bromley) and 261 (Grove Park - Locks Bottom, odd journeys extended beyond Grove Park to Lewisham) and now some country buses / Green Line coaches on short chunks of routes 402, 471 and 725, and a journey through from Dalston as route 47.

Timetables are still draft and full list of buses hasn't been released yet, but looks like 20+ buses on what's been released.

Weekends of 7/8 and 14/15 september are the national 'Heritage Open Days' event - there's a few other places around England where there will be aged buses involved to some extent.
 
another couple of events in that north london have been announced, although few details yet -

centred on Archway on 3rd November (routes 4, 17, 43, 210, 271 and 390) and Camden Town on 17th November (routes 24, 29, 31, 134 and 214). More details nearer the time.
 
Puddy_Tat said:
Saturday 14 September - Bromley event seems to be growing, will now include open day at Bromley Bus Garage (it's at Bromley Common, about a mile south of Bromley town centre) and buses on route 61 (Chislehurst - Orpington - Bromley) and 261 (Grove Park - Locks Bottom, odd journeys extended beyond Grove Park to Lewisham) and now some country buses / Green Line coaches on short chunks of routes 402, 471 and 725, and a journey through from Dalston as route 47.

Timetables are still draft and full list of buses hasn't been released yet, but looks like 20+ buses on what's been released.

Weekends of 7/8 and 14/15 september are the national 'Heritage Open Days' event - there's a few other places around England where there will be aged buses involved to some extent.
Click to expand...
Used to get the 61 a lot when I lived in Orpington :)
 
Puddy_Tat said:
Saturday 14 September - Bromley event seems to be growing, will now include open day at Bromley Bus Garage (it's at Bromley Common, about a mile south of Bromley town centre) and buses on route 61 (Chislehurst - Orpington - Bromley) and 261 (Grove Park - Locks Bottom, odd journeys extended beyond Grove Park to Lewisham) and now some country buses / Green Line coaches on short chunks of routes 402, 471 and 725, and a journey through from Dalston as route 47.

Timetables are still draft and full list of buses hasn't been released yet, but looks like 20+ buses on what's been released.

Weekends of 7/8 and 14/15 september are the national 'Heritage Open Days' event - there's a few other places around England where there will be aged buses involved to some extent.
Click to expand...

bus list and latest timetables are now up, although there may be a further update or two before the day. i make it 25 buses (the list looks longer, as buses that do more than one route are listed under both) - mostly Routemasters on 261 (the route didn't appear until 1983 so anything older wouldn't quite be right), more varied on route 61 including RT 1, a single GS on route 471 and a single RF on each of the 402 and 725.

there are ongoing roadworks between Lee Green and Lewisham, so the Lewisham 261 journeys may get delayed or curtailed - there isn't really a turning point between Grove Park and Lewisham, though.
 
a couple from today (neither is a routemaster - having them on route 61 was a slight anomaly, as the route went to one person operation in the early 70s, before Bromley Garage had any routemasters)

140924-30.jpg

1954 AEC 'RT' at Chislehurst

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1953 Guy 'Special' small single decker at Orpington.

Don't think I have travelled on a GS before - they tend to have a long queue at most running days, and they only have 26 seats...
 
Puddy_Tat said:
a couple from today (neither is a routemaster - having them on route 61 was a slight anomaly, as the route went to one person operation in the early 70s, before Bromley Garage had any routemasters)

View attachment 442715

1954 AEC 'RT' at Chislehurst

View attachment 442716

1953 Guy 'Special' small single decker at Orpington.

Don't think I have travelled on a GS before - they tend to have a long queue at most running days, and they only have 26 seats...
Click to expand...
Those Guys were always rather "foreign" - I don't think they plied the south west corner, and they were all gone by 1972. I always thought they looked strange, having an actual bonnet and looking quite car-like, to my young mind.
 
existentialist said:
I don't think they plied the south west corner, and they were all gone by 1972.
Click to expand...

Dorking, Crawley, Chelsham, Windsor and Leatherhead garages all had some at one time or another, but they tended to be fairly small numbers on more obscure routes. More GS here.
 
Slightly outside London -

Sunday 22 September - bus show at Amberley Museum, Sussex (this is another one of those places I keep thinking I want to go to but haven't quite got there yet)

Sunday 29 September - Showbus event at the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre, Quainton

Sunday 6 October - Chesham bus running day

Sunday 13 October - Gravesend / Dartford bus running day. All a bit vague about who's running this, and little on the web. Original plan was for it to be based on the car park at Ebbsfleet Station - latest is it will be based at the coach park (which is different to the bus station) at Bluewater shopping centre. An added complication is that it looks like the railway line through Gravesend is closed for engineering work that day. Bugger. (Arriva / Fastrack buses run via Bluewater from Dartford. Also TFL buses 96, 428 and 492 - despite this bit of route being outside London, standard TFL bus fares apply, Travelcards and Oyster Cards are valid on them but not the Arriva / Fastrack routes.)
 
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Nothing yet confirmed for the Dartford / Gravesend thing and much of what's on the web still says ebbsfleet station...

On the Kent / Essex patch, it's been confirmed that there will not be an Ensignbus event this year (usually first weekend in December) - this may be following the sale of the 'ordinary bus' bit of the business to First Group - understand the Newman family are setting something up in the Essex patch for the future...
 
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