London Transport Buses-Routemasters on Routes 6, 8, 28, 31 & 36 in 1987 

Yes, i have listened to Colin Curtis give a speech on the development of the Routemaster. LT put a lot of effort in to getting them right for both staff and pasengers.....

The vehicles are somewhat different though!

Thank you! I have a lot more like this, as soon as I'm home again next week my next bus upload will be RM's from 1986!

@@SoiBuakhaoRoutemasterbus more white roundel action to come! Got any red arrow National 2 stuff as well?

@@jamesfrench7299 there is a bit more. Check out my London Buses Aldwych 1985 upload, ther's' a few on there.

They would have been RT buses, the ones running before Routemasters came along. London had nearly 7000 of them! Happy days......

My pleasure....I thought the allocation was evenly split with AG...When the OPO'd the eastern end as a 26, i assume Willesden then gained work?.....

@@SoiBuakhaoRoutemasterbus thanks for the reply. I left in 1990 for Northern General in Newcastle (back to London Underground in ‘97). We only had a small RM(L) allocation at Willesden back then, AG had the lion’s share of the route. Most of the AC RML’s had yellow blinds, so you could tell. When the 6’s split it was, I believe OPO at AC, the RML allocation increased ironically as AC gained the route 98, when the 8’s split.

You never know you might be on there (or other vids i have of 36's ), a guard has seen himself on one of my Isle of Wight vids taken in 1988!

@@SoiBuakhaoRoutemasterbus really? I will have a look thru your other stuff, really bought back memories, I was in my early twenties , working from Peckham, driving like a nutter!

Back in the 60's routes travelled much further than that. On a Saturday the 6 went through to Walthamstow and drivers from that garage worked through to west London. For years LT have been cutting back route lengths, the 12's once went from South Croydon Garage through to Wembley. It had a route allocation of around 120 buses and worked from about 5 garages!

@@SoiBuakhaoRoutemasterbus Yes, naturally due to fewer bus services and Bus Companies

Well, there was only one bus company.....London Transport! But, yes from the late 1950s after the busmans strike, the services were cut year on year as passenger numbers dropped.

Well Street had shut around 1981 if i remember correctly along with Dalston......

Hi Steve, yes i do have quite a bit more, lots of Routemasters 1985-2005 and some Titans, Nationals, Metros and Olympians. I am out over the Bank Hol weekend and away from home for a week or so after that but i will sort out getting some bus vids up then-happy viewing!

Excellent, looking forward to it!

We still had the 15/23s to East Ham and 8s to Bow. A bit further north was the 6 at Hackney Wick and west the 38s at Clapton. But yes, compared to growing up in East London we had lost our Routemasters. Compared to the RTs where of course we had them until the end in 1979, with Seven Kings being the last all RT garage until it was rebuilt in 1977 then the withdrawl of them was quite rapid.

I have just uploaded a bus vid with Stamford Hill in it and just one route 73 on a garage run passing by. How do you like driving them for a living? I have done Rail Replacement driving in the Putney area 10+ years back, various lines from Clapham Junction out to Surrey and beyond....not a bad area to drive in compared to east London where i did route work.....

Soi Buakhao yes not a bad area at all, I originally started driving in my home town (Tottenham) because i was the Northumberland park garage behind the railway station, but im a person who loves variety and the city mainly, so i got a transfer to putney snd yeah i love it, but I still get loans all of the place to Go-Aheads different garages so i can drive other routes too.

Soi Buakhao whats the name of the video in Stamford hill?

Yes, i have known some 28s get a turn at West Hampstead, at the 159 stand.

Modern vehicles spoil the streetscape. RMs and other older looking vehicles look like they belong there.

It seemed crazy at the time, replace a Routemaster with 3 smaller buses, clogging up the streets. In the end they went back to double deck. Our transport planners never learn anything here in London, we had long Merlin & Swift buses i the late 60s/early 70s clogging up the streets. So we went back to DD, then the midibus chaos, 3 of those in a row, longer than a Merlin! Then the Bendy-bus lunacy! Every one ended in tears, London just doesn't have the road space for this nonsense, plenty of space above so use double decks, bridges permitting!

She had a nice, quality bus service then, lucky lady....

@@SoiBuakhaoRoutemasterbus I guess so.

Yes, i'll make my next bus upload from around that area!

Ah, I shall look forward to that, thank you.

Soi Buakhao of RMs operating around Romford such as 86, 87, 174, 175 or 193?

Sadly no, i didn't get a vid cam until Aug 1985 and the RMs had gone from Romford by then. I have some on the 5s at Becontree Heath, that's the nearest i got!

Soi Buakhao sounds good as I remember taking the no. 5 in the early 80s.

They were on strike that day! I had to go back to the area again to capture them!

Yes, all the amature footage has been filmed by myself. I got around quite q bit!

@@SoiBuakhaoRoutemasterbus I really appreciate the time and effort you made to capture a time that has sadly passed.

@@bigbreadeaterellis I chased about filming things that i grew up with were being withdrawn rapidly. The Routemasters especially, but now i wish i had just filmed every bus or train that i saw.....

That one ended up with Timebus Travel....goes out on private hire work now.....

Well, the white roundal came in, in the mid to late 1970s so long before 'Red Ken' got involved! The standards of bus maintainence went downhill in the late 1960s/early 70s when LT were tring to play catch up with all the modern, unknown types that were foisted upon them (MB, SM & DMS classes). As the RTs & RMs would keep going no matter what (in general) they lost the TLC that all London buses had had while the engineers tried to keep the modern stuuf mobile to some extent! (this i heard from various people i worked with back in the early 80s as a trainee bus mechanic so it was first hand information when passed to me).

@@SoiBuakhaoRoutemasterbus Never knew your were on the spanners. Did you complete the training?

@@jamesfrench7299 No, i wasn't the most mechanical person going! Ended up as a Generalhand before transfering to the tubes a few years later.....

@@SoiBuakhaoRoutemasterbus I guess it's like living in Los Angeles...not for everybody.

And when we had the 36B and peak hours 36A as well!

Soi Buakhao oh yes, very long routes. Never saw a 36A though.

A rush hour only route from Victoria to Brockley Rise.

It used to run through to Willesden Garage and at this point in time was totally run by Bow Garage. It was split in the early 90s (route 98 took over the western section) ready for privitisation of London Buses.

Soi Buakhao makes sense. And to this day bow garage (stagecoach) still operates the 8. If i was at metroline i would so drive the 98 7 6 295 and a few others that go to Heathrow. I like how history always chose to use the same digits when altering a route but just stick a random number in the front, i.e 8 = 98 76=46, you get me, and so many more of that type

No way loves them! Kilburn.looks so different now

There was no electronic control of buses back then, it was all done by point inspectors out on the road. Much easierto see the whole route on a screen and work out how to space them properly.....

Soi Buakhao yh true