Aviation Specials – June 2018

Celebrating a British icon 103

RTs, Routemasters and

Wright Gemini 2s

One other major Scottish bus

fleet turned to London Transport

in the 1950s for relatively young

and inexpensive double-deckers.

Dundee Corporation, working

towards the final withdrawal of

its tramway system, invested in

10 early postwar STL-class AEC

Regent IIs with Weymann bodies

and 30 Cravens-bodied AEC

Regent RT types in 1956.

London Transport’s 120

Cravens RTs were non-standard

in an increasingly standardised

fleet and were sold in 1956/57

when they were barely seven

years old. Others went to Scottish

independent operators and when

the mainstream RTs and RTLs

were withdrawn some years later,

Scottish companies were equally

quick to snap them up.

It looked as if London as a

source of secondhand double-

deckers might have dried up

until Western Scottish bought

33 fairly new Daimler Fleetlines,

while Highland Scottish bought

two former London Fleetlines

third hand. The most unexpected

purchase of former London buses

by Scottish Bus Group companies

followed between 1985 and 1988

when the group’s Clydeside,

Kelvin and Strathtay companies

bought 168 Routemasters

at the time of bus service

deregulation. These iconic but

elderly buses were

used on competitive

services in the initial

post-deregulation

skirmishes but had

been withdrawn by

1990.

History vaguely

repeated itself in

2018 when Lothian

Buses, successor

to Edinburgh

Corporation

Transport, bought

50 six-year old

Wright Eclipse

Gemini 2-bodied

Volvo B9TLs from

London to speed

withdrawal of older

double-deckers and increase

the proportion of low-emission

buses in its fleet. All were new

to FirstGroup, two coming after

service with Tower Transit and

48 from Metroline.

They have been heavily rebuilt

and refurbished, losing their

centre doors and gaining new

seats, and like the 60 Guys have

also been given new registrations

that disguise their age.

Sixty-five years after the

former London Guys helped

Edinburgh Corporation embark

on its tramway replacement

programme, London is still

providing buses for operators

throughout the UK. ● GB

Lives after London

LEFT: Five of the

23 30ft-long single-

deckers converted

by Scottish

Omnibuses from

former London

Transport Guy

Arab double-

deckers remained

with Scottish

Omnibuses,

while the rest

went to Highland

Omnibuses.

This one was

photographed in

Edinburgh later

in its life. JASPER

PETTIE COLLECTION

BELOW: History

turns full circle.

Lothian Buses

1002, one of two

Wright Eclipse

Gemini-bodied

Volvo B9TLs

bought ex-

Tower Transit in

London in 2018,

on Edinburgh’s

Princes Street

where trams

returned in 2014,

58 years after the

city’s previous

generation tram

system closed,

hastened on

its way by the

purchase of 60

ex-London Guys.

GAVIN BOOTH