Monday Variety - mini blog

From PTE To First

The arrival of South Yorkshire PTE did not bring much detail change for Sheffield. The county-wide route numbering, later abandoned under privatisation, left most Sheffield City services unchanged with inter-district routes gaining and extra 200. So the residents of Wybourn got brown and cream buses on route 56 instead of blue and cream.

The PTE's drive for innovation came to Wybourn, first with a few runs with the experimental articulated bus ...

... followed soon by an experimental service for real with real paying passengers.

This was fully covered in the excellent book subtitled "Coffee and Cream".

The privatised PTE first gained an apostrophe as South Yorkshire's Transport with the Coffee and Cream replaced by a large splodge of red.

The Employee buyout began branding key routes as "Mainline" in rather garish red and yellow but this startling livery eventually spread to all routes including Wybourn.

Competition was fierce and chaotic so that for a while, Wybourn's frequency was increased as route M11 replacing the 56.

But the vultures were circling ...

... and "the lads" decided to take the money and run - a lot easier than running buses. Mainline became First Mainline.

The PTE had bought out most competitors and those remaining became Stagecoach and, over time, the city bus business was carved up with a batch of joint services for First and Stagecoach and mostly undisturbed operations of the rest of First (formerly) Mainline.

Wybourn remained much the same as ever with a few blips that we will examine tomorrow.

Fellowship Meetings

Heres's this month's quiz!

Can you identify well known phrases which can be found in the Bible, compared with similar from other sources.

The graphics can be enlarged with a click! No prizes/

No Surprise, Then?

It is not yet clear where this leaves the currently "suspended" VLR experiment in Coventry.

Goodbye St James'

News at last that the disused Northampton Tramways, a k a Northampton Corporation Transport, a k a First Bus depot is to be demolished and redeveloped. It is just a pity that the headline ...

... should show the former office block which is a listed building and will NOT be demolished!

It Could Have Been Granny

This picture shows passengers queuing at the Mercers Row bus stop in Northampton.

It was shared by routes 14 (circular via Abington) and Gran's route home by service 1 to Weston Favell. She could easily have been the eighth person in the queue.

Buses do not stop on Mercers Row any more and the corner looks like this ...

... from a slightly different angle.

Spot The Difference?

Two apparently identical milk tank wagons. Which is "the best"?

More tomorrow.

Coming Soon

What is this and what is it used for?

As a helpful clue (?), it would cost you £60 and is illustrated in a magazine article about Flock and Sheep.

 Interruption of Normal Blog Quality. 

Today's blog is not the best compilation due to shortage of time. fbb had serious technical problems with the presentation at yesterday's Fellowship meeting which drained both brain power and energy. Hopefully a better selection tomorrow; including the "world's longest bridge" which isn't a bridge at all! That's China for you.

 Next Variety Plus blog : Tues 8 July

Sunday Variety

Velvet? Lumo?

Although the buses were purple and pink, the original PR called the operation "Black" Velvet but "black" was never actually used. The company, under the leadership of Phil Stockley. operated buses in the Eastleigh area.

It was a smart and well-run operation which ultimately did not make enough money to survive. Tough for Phil, who moved on to other things including, for a while, writing a column in Buses magazine.

Now a new "Velvet" has appeared with absolutely no connection to Phil or his pink buses. For this Velvet we need to go to France.

The word "Velvet" does not exist in French, where the translation is "Velours". But, undaunted, this new company is using an English name for its optimistic project.

Currently the only pictures are of the front half of a locomotive - there are no signs yet of the rear half or any carriages.

Make of that what you will!

The new-start company is, if nothing else, ambitious!

fbb is a bit woolly on understanding how much 1.5 billion Euros will buy, but he suspects not enough for all those potential services.

Has the company yet got the permission of the various arms of the French government that, effectively controls almost all public transport in the country? Whilst the EU is keen on opening up rail markets in Europe, La Belle France is not!

Maybe the front half of a loco wrapped in dark gren and pink is all that will ever appear.

The set-up and aspirations seem similar to Lumo ...

... which, looking at recent disappointment, isn't loom-o-ing as large as it had hoped.

In the UK, open access is currently NOT the flavour of the month with the embryo Great British Railways and some recent applications have been turned down flat, notably Virgin on the West Coast main line and a resurrected Wrexham and Shropshire ditto.

The argument is that extra trains on the main line will depress reluibiloty. But wasn't High Speed 2 designed, in part, to release capacity for "innovative new operators"?

Of course it was, but things change in politics where transport policy and transport ministers are but a fleeting will'o'the wisp to be batted about at random.

Who remembers the cartoon character beautifully voiced by Kenneth Williams?

Irrelevant, of course, but sweet!

Back To Wybourn : Episode 3

For reasons that are unclear to fbb, the interwebnet is absolutely littered with pictures of buses to Wybourn. Indeed, the range is a microcosm of bus types operated over many years in Sheffield. 

fbb is less interested in rolling stock and more interested in why buses go where they go. But this blog and tomorrow's will give the bus watchers much delight as they remember their favourite (and non favourite) steeds of old.

Note that the bus turning into the estate has its traditional three blue stripes and one very fine red one below the bottom stripe; but the service 46 has just one broad band round bottom deck windows and similar up top.

This style was used, for a while, for Roe bodies buses ...

... but, eventually, stripes won the day! The bottom stripe was thinner than "normal" to match the body side moulding ...

One Sheffield oddity which appeared from time to time on the 56 was an ECW bodied Leyland.

At the time the ECW bodywork was only paired with the Bristol chassis. Sheffield's unusual pairing was for a good reason which fbb cannot remember!

Eventually the 56 succumbed to front entrance double deck buses as did almost everywhere else in the city.

The occasional Swift put in an appearance but these long vehicles would have struggled a bit on Wybourn estate corners which were quite tight for the Swift's length.

If you home was at Wybourn, you would certainly experience plenty of variety on the humble 56.

More on vehicle history tomorrow.

Three Milk Tankers?

fbb was aghast to see an advert for a Wrenn milk tank wagon a few days ago, aghast because of the price and aghaster because he did not know that Wrenn produced a 6 wheel milk tank wagon. There appeared to be several adverts on line for these vehicles - one advertised a wagon for £20 which seemed a better deal ...

... and the other was priced 42 US dollars, which seemed a bit much. The photos looked remarkably similar!

So fbb sent off his payment expecting only one wagon to arrive - but ...

... he got all three. The low price might be caused by the badly faded paint on two if the tankers, but one was OK.

Good value, or  one of these?

[a "poke" is scottish patois for a "bag"]

In the end it is called "the market" and, if you are daft enough to buy the wrong thing it is your own fault. EBay purchases usually allow "returns" but fbb did want to keep one, at least

fbb will use the two damaged tankers to create a diesel refuelling point for Peterville Quarry Railway. The better blue tank will join his collection.

Talking Of The Market

EFE has, in the past, produced a model of an RML bus (That is RouteMaster Long). Originally you could have a red RML ...

... or a green Country Bus RML ...

... both priced at about £25. Expensive for a "toy" but not a bad model.

But things have changed. EFE is now part of Bachmann, the model railway guys, and the RML has been (re)introduced with much hype. Are they a new tooling or just a reissue of the old.

Three versions are on offer.

One that found its way to Southend Corporation Transport ...

... joins another in bog standard Routemaster guise.

This third version is from of one of London Transport's half hearted attempts at route branding. It shows a black on yellow panel for route 15 ...

... with black on yellow blinds for the 15A. It has a yellow cant rail stripe - not cream or white - but also displays a second stripe above the top deck windows. Note the non discounted price!!

Did this top stripe adornment ever exist? The Ian Armstrong London Bus Routes web site has a picture showing the 15/15A combo but no roofline band.

Has EFE got it wrong? Was the extra stripe a one-off, and, if so, why is there no picture of the offending extra stripe anywhere on line.

Any answers to:-

fbb@xephos.com

Thanks!

 Next Variety Plus blog : Mon 7 July 

Saturday Variety

Why Wybourn - And Now ...

There have been several more recent additions on he edges of the Wybourn estate. On the southern boundary ...

... we have a strip of new housing called Sky Edge, served by the complex circular service 10/10A with no easy way through from Wybourn.

On the western boundary, under the shadow of Park Hill flats ...

... we have an in-fill block of housing which probably doesn't have a name but fbb will call it "Manor Oaks" ...

... for obvious reasons.

Then there is new and/or replacement housing going up to the east, just beyond Mary Queen of Scots Sheffield sojourn!

In layout, at least, Wybourn is unchanged since its creation in the 1920s. There have been some little bits of infill ...

... but there was a problem with the housing stock. Much of the property had only two bedrooms. considered less that ideal for post WW2 occupancy. The upshot of this is that some of the estate has been demolished ...

... with the remaining properties being refurbished and updated, now in the hands of a private commercial landlord rather than the council.

What has suffered is the estate's "facilities". Pubs have become residences ...

... shops have been closed and demolished ...

... whilst some have been replaced with alternative facilities. The row of retail on Manor Oaks Road ...

... is replaced by one general store ...

... and the estate's "Children's Centre."

The most significant change observed by an explorer by bus is at the Southend Road Boundary Road bus terminus.

Here was a pub flanked by four shop units, two each side.

The pub, a typically large establishmemt of its age ...

... was closed and boarded up ...

... only to be reborn as posh flats!

The bus stop, which used to be right outside the front door, has been moved back so waiting buses do not overlook the residents.

To the pub's left, the two shops are now closed ...

... and to the ex-pub's right, two shops ...

... have effectively become one.

There is no sign of the "Beef King" still plying its burgers and chips! To be fair, the establishment does have a presence on line ...

... so perhaps ot bursts into beefyness late in the day as the hub of Wybourn's nite life?

But, through all this change, the bus route 56 has remained remarkably constant, but iccasionally dramatic.

Sadly, Wybourn folk never got to ride on a left hand drive right hand loading articulated bus running on trade plates. The strange vehicle is pictured above outside the Windsor Hotel on a test run

More on the buses in tomorrow's blog!

Let There Be Lights

Peterville carriage shed, made of two bits of gash second-hand plywood and five Airfix/Dapol platform canopy kits ...

... which finally fell to bits as the ply disintegrates in the weather!

It was rebuilt with plastic walls but reusing the original roof.

But it neeeded some treatment when it was re-installed inside. ...

... notably to the roof!

The work has taken ages, due to fbb's ineffectiveness and a run of other commitments, but, at last, it is almost ready to install properly. Much of the rebuild has featured in this blog, but the final stage was to fit lighting. 

Internal lights were joined by wall lights illuminating a nearby siding. Lights do not photograph well with exposed LEDs taking over the exposure. But this is a view in the dark.

Here is the building in "daylight" ...

...with a sweet little bracket light over the entrance.

Along the wall there are six over-scale bulkhead lights.

They consist of slices of Bic pen with the LEDs poked down the tube. The black "hoods" are a bodger's attempt to (a) reduce the visual impact of the over-scale fittings and (b) to disguise fbb's incompetent sawing of the brittle Bic! Neither bodge is overly successful, but from the normal viewing distance it will do!

For Tomorrow's Blog ...

What links a blue train in the UK ...

... with a pink bus that once ran in Eastleigh ...

... an a dark green train with pale pink bits n France?

All will be revealed tomorrow!

NO Thanks, First, For The View

The great thing about windows is that you can see though them. On a lengthy trip from Doncaster to Rotherham via Edlington and Maltby, fbb's enjoyment of the ride was partially impaired by this mega sticker on the top deck of his First Bus bus.

What was more upsetting to fbb was that it was promotion for "Pride". As a committed and Biblical Christian fbb simply cannot accept the promotion of the "gay" life-style. It is contradictory to 4000 years of Holy Scripture.

Please keep your "Pride" private allowing personal choice to remain personal.

Stop offending those who wish to see a Godly nation with Godly morality upheld in this sadly broken world.

At least let us have a few buses bedecked with helpful and uplifting extracts from Scripture as an alternative.

But don't plaster the Words across a window.

 Next Variety PLUS blog : Sun 6 July