Quirky or quaint practices on buses in the past

[Devon Sunset]

The VHMA ones had the staircase set slightly further back, as these were dual-door, and a 2+1 seating arrangement at the upstairs front.

Thanks for that.

 

[TheSel]

I once read it a book, I can't remember which tramway in Britain it was, a similar tale. The painter asked what colour he should paint the trams, and was told, "See Green," that being the General Manager's name, and he painted them sea green.

Both are plausible, but maybe at least one is just a joke!

It was Wallasey - and the livery was perpetuatued on the bus fleet until Wallasey Corporation was absorbed into Merseyside PTE. Most would argue the 'sea green' shade was really yellow. Ex Wallasey 1 (subsequently then 201) is preserved in this livery. My pic below.



Another 'quaint' fact about Wallasey's bus fleet - although this is more to do with the council's Motor Taxation department - is that initially, all buses registration numbers were odd (i.e. ended in 1,3,5,7 or 9). Thus, in 1920, their first motor vehicles - fleet numbers 1-6 inclusive - were registered HF 589/591/593/595/597/599 in sequence. This was because the Motor Taxation department - with a council's usual accuracy about assumptions of future demand - had decided that all cars, commercial vehicles and buses should be allocated odd numbers, with even numbers reserved for motorcycles. By 1935, when this 'odd' series reached HF 9999 and was exhausted, motorcycles had only used the numbers up to HF 44xx, so from that point, all road vehicles - whether with two, four six or more wheels - were assigned the remaining even numbers up to HF 9998. The first Wallasey buses with even registration numbers were thus the 1935 Leyland Cubs 12 & 13, registered HF 5008/5010 respectively.

 

[DunsBus]

Not quirky, but certainly unique, was the Border Courier network in the Scottish Borders which ran for 28 years (1979-2007), a partnership between the bus companies, Borders Regional Council and the local health board.

It linked outlying areas and local hospitals with Peel Hospital near Galashiels, subsequently Borders General Hospital when that opened towards the end of the 1980s, and was the only bus service network in the UK which carried passengers and goods. The timetables were designed so that all the services converged on Peel, and later the BGH at around lunchtime and goods unloaded/changed over before the buses did the return journey in the afternoon. One service ran up to the Edinburgh hospitals and you could use it to travel to, but not from, Edinburgh as the departure time from there fluctuated.

Each generation of Border Courier vehicles was purpose-built with the passengers being separated from the goods by a partition. Notable were the Optare MetroRiders used on the network by First between 1997 and 2002, which were the only examples built to a passenger+goods layout.

In 2007 the Borders health board decided that it would be cheaper to run vans and dispense with the passenger element, thus bringing this unique service to an end.

Operators were:

Eastern Scottish 1979-1985
Lowland Scottish/Lowland 1985-1992
Austin of Earlston & Munro's of Jedburgh 1992-1997
First Lowland/First Edinburgh 1997-2002
Munro's of Jedburgh 2002-2007.

 

[BVW]

It was Wallasey - and the livery was perpetuatued on the bus fleet until Wallasey Corporation was absorbed into Merseyside PTE. Most would argue the 'sea green' shade was really yellow. Ex Wallasey 1 (subsequently then 201) is preserved in this livery. My pic below.

View attachment 195568

Another 'quaint' fact about Wallasey's bus fleet - although this is more to do with the council's Motor Taxation department - is that initially, all buses registration numbers were odd (i.e. ended in 1,3,5,7 or 9). Thus, in 1920, their first motor vehicles - fleet numbers 1-6 inclusive - were registered HF 589/591/593/595/597/599 in sequence. This was because the Motor Taxation department - with a council's usual accuracy about assumptions of future demand - had decided that all cars, commercial vehicles and buses should be allocated odd numbers, with even numbers reserved for motorcycles. By 1935, when this 'odd' series reached HF 9999 and was exhausted, motorcycles had only used the numbers up to HF 44xx, so from that point, all road vehicles - whether with two, four six or more wheels - were assigned the remaining even numbers up to HF 9998. The first Wallasey buses with even registration numbers were thus the 1935 Leyland Cubs 12 & 13, registered HF 5008/5010 respectively.

Eastbourne's bus fleet was similarly affected. Between 1903 and 1910 East Sussex issued AP marks in the same fashion as Wallasey, which Eastbourne continued with HC when created as a county borough in 1911. The opportunity was taken to issue both odd and even marks to cars etc. when JK was started in 1928, with motorcycles continuing to plough their own furrow in even HC.
The first even numbered Corporation bus was JK 536 which was a 1929 Dennis 30 cwt 14-seater. On completion of JK in February 1948, the remaining motorcycle marks in HC (8056 onwards) were used for general issue before AHC appeared in September 1949. East and West Sussex both used the odd/even system until the mid-1920s before sanity prevailed!

 

[geoffk]

Yes, there was always a mileage-balancing exercise in Bristol to account for Bristol Joint Services (BJS) vehicles being used on a country service and conversely country vehicles used on a city service (those licensed jointly to the company and Bristol Corporation). It was actually a bit more complicated than that, as a BJS bus might operate a summer duplicate to Weston-super-Mare. Similarly in Sheffield, where the split between the Corporation and Joint Omnibus Committee (the latter jointly owned with the railway) meant there were separate similar but distinct fleets. During the summer season, Corporation vehicles were often used to help out with duplicates to destinations such as Castleton and Ladybower. There was a wide range of other joint working arrangements, all of which disappeared with deregulation.

I should add that these joint operations and area agreements were not really quirky or quaint, but the way many bus services were owned and operated from the 1930 Road Traffic Act until deregulation swept it all away 55 years later.

 

[Acathater]

Bristol actually had three fleets:
The city fleet branded as "Bristol" using the same italic font used on Bristol buses and cars (both on NBC livery and before)
The rural fleet which used a plain font
And a third fleet branded as "Bath" in the same plain font which was used for Bath city services but also popped up on North Somerset rural services

 

[Old Walter]

A sad come-down for a route that was half hourly at one point, both in late NBC days and in early privatisation.

Sadly, very representative of what has happened across Hampshire since 2010 due to funding cuts from central government. Look at the network even around the year 2000, compare it to now, and weep.

Agree, looking at what was the Country Rota in Basingstoke c.1998, there was a lot going on. Newbury, Alton, Camberley, plus all the odd day stuff and peak trips such as the 201, 205, 207, 210, 211, 309, 333 etc. There was a separate Alton rota of around five drivers covering some of these plus the 23/24 Alton town services.

Edit: Just remembered the Alton rota did the 13 as well when it started at Alton working through to Haslemere/Liphook, as well as the 2 Hawkley - Petersfield at one point…..

Look at it today - the country rota (or modern equivalent) is the 32 Newbury run and the 13 Bordon, that’s pretty much it.

Apologies NW1 for not acknowledging your recent post (#259) sooner and I was wondering why there was so much experimentation in the mid 1990s - indeed something like the 30/30A Basingstoke - Guildford seems quite bold.
There’s a lot of interesting information there and I appreciate you getting it all sent out : ) Sadly I’m at a loss as how to quote sections from different posts at the moment, hopefully one day I get my head around this and the replies might seem a bit tidier!

Thinking of something a long way away, I’m pretty certain that as a small child I saw a photo in a library book of a Ford Cortina being used as a bus service somewhere very remote (possibly Scotland?). I recall a b&w photo of said vehicle with a slipboard destination/number on the dashboard. Has anyone else heard of this? I’m thinking it was linked in with a section on postbuses but it was many (35?) years ago or so…..

 

[Tom Gallacher]

There was this short lived experiment in Scotland in the early 80's

And the ubiquitous Royal Mail postbus

The story of the Postbus - The Postal Museum

It has been six years since the Postbus took its final journey. Find out how the Postbus came to be, and why it stopped running.

www.postalmuseum.org

 

[Simon75]

After deregulation weren't mini bus drivers pay and conditions different to single/double decker and a different board ?

 

[izvor]

Thinking of something a long way away, I’m pretty certain that as a small child I saw a photo in a library book of a Ford Cortina being used as a bus service somewhere very remote (possibly Scotland?). I recall a b&w photo of said vehicle with a slipboard destination/number on the dashboard. Has anyone else heard of this? I’m thinking it was linked in with a section on postbuses but it was many (35?) years ago or so

Several Postbuses were cars, especially towards the end of their lives as passenger numbers dropped. Four of us crammed into one while on holiday in Sutherland (luckily there were no other pax!). The Oxted - Lingfield Postbus ended up as a car, as did some in Kent, and no doubt elsewhere.

@Tom Gallagher thanks for the Postbus link, a nice reminder of a very useful service.

 

[nw1]

Agree, looking at what was the Country Rota in Basingstoke c.1998, there was a lot going on. Newbury, Alton, Camberley, plus all the odd day stuff and peak trips such as the 201, 205, 207, 210, 211, 309, 333 etc. There was a separate Alton rota of around five drivers covering some of these plus the 23/24 Alton town services.

Presumably also the (as-was) 28 Alton-Basingstoke as well?

Edit: Just remembered the Alton rota did the 13 as well when it started at Alton working through to Haslemere/Liphook, as well as the 2 Hawkley - Petersfield at one point…..

The 2 Hawkley-Petersfield, I don't remember that one. ISTR it was a postbus route (funnily enough) for a while in the 90s, don't recall Stagecoach doing it but I guess they must have.

Look at it today - the country rota (or modern equivalent) is the 32 Newbury run and the 13 Bordon, that’s pretty much it.

In fact last time I looked the 13 interworks with Basingstoke town services at certain times of day, though whether that is the drivers or just the vehicles, I don't know.

Apologies NW1 for not acknowledging your recent post (#259) sooner and I was wondering why there was so much experimentation in the mid 1990s - indeed something like the 30/30A Basingstoke - Guildford seems quite bold.
There’s a lot of interesting information there and I appreciate you getting it all sent out : ) Sadly I’m at a loss as how to quote sections from different posts at the moment, hopefully one day I get my head around this and the replies might seem a bit tidier!had

No worries!

In fact I think I've found the missing link on a bus trip (Explorer) that I did on, I believe 6 August 1996. I went from Liss-Aldershot on the 38, and then headed west to Basingstoke and Salisbury before heading back east on the X7 to Pepperbox Hill and doing an evening walk before picking up another bus heading towards Southampton. I had completely forgotten how I had reached Basingstoke from Aldershot, but it appears that I must have used the 30/30A.

 

[Old Walter]

Presumably also the (as-was) 28 Alton-Basingstoke as well?

The 2 Hawkley-Petersfield, I don't remember that one. ISTR it was a postbus route (funnily enough) for a while in the 90s, don't recall Stagecoach doing it but I guess they must have.

In fact last time I looked the 13 interworks with Basingstoke town services at certain times of day, though whether that is the drivers or just the vehicles, I don't know.

That’s the one! 28/X28 Alton, 32/32A Newbury and 200 Camberley. Three main parts of the ‘out of town’ Basingstoke workings with the 28 acting as a feeder for other routes as well. The ex-Basingstoke 28 journeys at Alton not matching up with a return leg help the indication. Sadly, my Basingstoke area guide from the time doesn’t contain the details of the more rural routes or the full detail to Haslemere/Liphook but I do remember these running (and this might be a little job to do on Timetable World at one point soon!).

It transpires the 2 was a legacy of the old Liss & District. I had no knowledge of this until looking on the net a short while ago - I was looking for photos of the route on the off chance. I can see where the Postbus would have fitted in, but by the late 1990s it’s indicated as a Stagecoach service (again, good old Timetable World - such a excellent pointer) and there’s a mention on the Liss & District here: http://www.countrybus.co.uk/liss.htm

Basingstoke country rota did then (as now) cover town work as well but it seems such a change going from all those rural routes to just two these days. Even then they’re quite straightforward and without the level of variation that existed before.

I’m having a look at BusTimes at odd moments to see the Basingstoke changes as of yesterday. The 5 & 9 are interworked as is the 7 & 8. Interestingly it seems the 14 is mixed in with the 5 & 9 as well at some points. I can’t help thinking that lots and lots of 6s and 20s (they’re standalone) would be very monotonous but that’s the way things are done these days - in contrast to the practices of the past.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 12 Jan 2026 ==

Several Postbuses were cars, especially towards the end of their lives as passenger numbers dropped. Four of us crammed into one while on holiday in Sutherland (luckily there were no other pax!). The Oxted - Lingfield Postbus ended up as a car, as did some in Kent, and no doubt elsewhere.

@Tom Gallagher thanks for the Postbus link, a nice reminder of a very useful service.

Apologies to double post - but to acknowledge this info on the Postbus - very much appreciated: )

 

[Mark L]

It was Wallasey - and the livery was perpetuatued on the bus fleet until Wallasey Corporation was absorbed into Merseyside PTE. Most would argue the 'sea green' shade was really yellow. Ex Wallasey 1 (subsequently then 201) is preserved in this livery. My pic below.

View attachment 195568

Another 'quaint' fact about Wallasey's bus fleet - although this is more to do with the council's Motor Taxation department - is that initially, all buses registration numbers were odd (i.e. ended in 1,3,5,7 or 9). Thus, in 1920, their first motor vehicles - fleet numbers 1-6 inclusive - were registered HF 589/591/593/595/597/599 in sequence. This was because the Motor Taxation department - with a council's usual accuracy about assumptions of future demand - had decided that all cars, commercial vehicles and buses should be allocated odd numbers, with even numbers reserved for motorcycles. By 1935, when this 'odd' series reached HF 9999 and was exhausted, motorcycles had only used the numbers up to HF 44xx, so from that point, all road vehicles - whether with two, four six or more wheels - were assigned the remaining even numbers up to HF 9998. The first Wallasey buses with even registration numbers were thus the 1935 Leyland Cubs 12 & 13, registered HF 5008/5010 respectively.

Hants & Dorset only used even numbers for its fleet numbers until 1939. I can only assume it was a bid to make the fleet look bigger!

Red & White had a quirky fleet numbering system (that survived into National Welsh days) insofar as buses carried a sequential number that started with one followed by the last two digits of the year so the first bus delivered in 1963 was 163 then 263 etc. The fleetnumber also had an alphabetic prefix to signify vehicle type - these were more generic than the class types used by LT. I’m sure someone can shed more light on their significance.

 

[MotCO]

I always found The Kings Ferry fleet numbering system unusual. The first two characters specified the seat capacity, followed by a sequential number. Did any other operator do likewise?

 

[joieman]

I always found The Kings Ferry fleet numbering system unusual. The first two characters specified the seat capacity, followed by a sequential number. Did any other operator do likewise?

During Hulley's of Baslow's brief acquisition of Go Coach, they began renumbering their buses by affixing the capacity to the front of their buses' old fleet numbers.

 

[Fawkes Cat]

I always found The Kings Ferry fleet numbering system unusual. The first two characters specified the seat capacity, followed by a sequential number. Did any other operator do likewise?

I can't help but think that this is quite a good plan. In normal circumstances, if your want to get the right bus on the right job surely seating capacity is the most important thing to know about a bus? Having it upfront in the vehicle number should make sorting which buses are suitable really easy on a spreadsheet.

 

[MotCO]

I can't help but think that this is quite a good plan. In normal circumstances, if your want to get the right bus on the right job surely seating capacity is the most important thing to know about a bus? Having it upfront in the vehicle number should make sorting which buses are suitable really easy on a spreadsheet.

Yes, I did wonder about that, which is why I suggested it was 'unusual', rather than strange. Except it must cause chaos if buses are upseated!

 

[Flange Squeal]

I always found The Kings Ferry fleet numbering system unusual. The first two characters specified the seat capacity, followed by a sequential number. Did any other operator do likewise?

The Lucketts Travel Group of companies (Lucketts Travel, Coliseum Coaches, Mortons Travel, Solent Coaches, Worthing Coaches) adopted this system, even prior to the group's purchase by National Express which ultimately brought them under the same ownership as The Kings Ferry.

In the earlier days of Lucketts' system, vehicles had simpler numbers like 4803 on YN08 DFF (a Scania coach) - 48 denoting the seating capacity and 03 denoting it was the third 48 seater to be numbered from the introduction of the system.

This was later adapted to factor in changes of seating capacity which, particularly when combined with the acquisition of Mortons Coaches and its numerous tri-axle double deck buses, made for some very lengthy fleet numbers! For example 10601106 carried by an East Lancs Myllennium Nordic-bodied Volvo B9TL. 106 denotes 106 seater vehicle, 01 denotes the first 106 seater to be numbered, then 106 on the end confirms the current seating capacity (in this case unaltered during their ownership hence repeating 106).

But in the case of a former National Express Levante that got upseated, FN62 CAO has carried 480870. This denotes it was built as a 48 seater, was the eighth 48 seater to be numbered, and had been upseated to 70 seats.

 

[AndrewP]

Apparently OK Motor Services in the north east didn't have fleet numbers for their buses but used numbers from registration numbers even re-registering buses if there was duplication.

Not sure it's true but have read it several times

 

[DunsBus]

Apparently OK Motor Services in the north east didn't have fleet numbers for their buses but used numbers from registration numbers even re-registering buses if there was duplication.

Not sure it's true but have read it several times

I remember the re-registrations came about when a computerised ticket system was introduced at OK in the early nineties.

 

[Andyh82]

TLC Travel of Bradford use the last 4 or 5 digits of the bus’ chassis number as their fleet numbering systems which is a tad odd

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Apparently OK Motor Services in the north east didn't have fleet numbers for their buses but used numbers from registration numbers even re-registering buses if there was duplication.

Not sure it's true but have read it several times

It was true but only in latter years - its why certain vehicles had to gain cherished plates to avoid duplication.

Meanwhile, Weardale had their registrations ending with a 6 (but not all) and this focus on 6 as a last number is perpetuated to this day

 

[Ballyheigue]

TLC Travel of Bradford use the last 4 or 5 digits of the bus’ chassis number as their fleet numbering systems which is a tad odd

Even worse, they had a spell where they ran out of number 3s so used the number 8 cut in half, looked quite strange

 

[Roger1973]

Thinking of something a long way away, I’m pretty certain that as a small child I saw a photo in a library book of a Ford Cortina being used as a bus service somewhere very remote (possibly Scotland?). I recall a b&w photo of said vehicle with a slipboard destination/number on the dashboard. Has anyone else heard of this? I’m thinking it was linked in with a section on postbuses but it was many (35?) years ago or so…..

I've seen pictures of estate cars as buses / post-buses in Scotland, so quite possible. A brief search on Flickr came up with a Chrysler estate or two, example (not my flickr account or photo) here but no Cortinas - although that of course doesn't prove they didn't exist.

Eastern National had a small network of rural routes operated with at least one Peugeot estate as 'Countrycar' - photo (not my photo or Flickr account) here - the B registration suggests 1984/85 onward, I'm not sure if this replaced an earlier car.

The rules about operating a car on a PSV Operators Licence have been a bit fuzzy (I think it depended what Traffic Commissioner's region you were in) but have been tightened up - but I think it's still legal some circumstances, but increasingly rare. There's also a concept of being able to operate a registered local bus service with a licensed taxi in some circumstances, although not sure I've encountered one.

Lincoln City Transport in the early post-deregulation era had a number of London style taxis which operated flexible bus services (I'm not sure how they were registered) as 'Limo' - photo (again not my photo or Flickr account) here. Potteries also had a couple of London style taxis under the 'Flexi' fleet name, photo (same basis) here in the pre-deregulation era.

After deregulation weren't mini bus drivers pay and conditions different to single/double decker and a different board ?

As with all things after deregulation, there's no single answer to this, but generally, yes, mini bus drivers were either new recruits or 'downgraded' bus drivers on considerably worse pay and conditions as an alternative to redundancy, and there were usually separate pay grades (and rotas / links or whatever each operator called them) for mini and 'big bus' drivers. At some operators, there were three grades, one for mini, one for midi and one for 'big bus' - again, the local definition of each varied a bit.

I'm aware that now there's the PCV driving licence class D1 which is maximum 16 passenger seats, before about 1990 (it was just before I got in to bus related work) the licence was PSV - class 1 was double deck, class 2 was full size single deck, class 3 was effectively mini-bus (and think there was a rare class 4 for even smaller mini buses) but I can't remember the exact limits of each was - I have an idea PSV 3 may have related to vehicle length rather than number of seats, and that on some operators at least, mini-bus drivers only got PSV 3, and if so they would not legally have been able to drive a 'big bus' in service.

Now that the standard PCV licence covers everything over 16 seats, there's not the same licence distinction, and operation of buses of 16 seats or less is much rarer now. While some operators still have different pay grades for different rotas and / or midi bus work, other operators have pay rates that go up with length of service rather than type of bus.

Apparently OK Motor Services in the north east didn't have fleet numbers for their buses but used numbers from registration numbers even re-registering buses if there was duplication.

East Kent also historically didn't do fleet numbers, and made sure that buses had unique registration numbers. I don't think they bought many second hand buses so not sure the need to re-register anything came up. I think this ended during National Bus Company days when these things were computerised and 'the system' needed a fleet number.

 

[trentside]

(Lincolnshire) Road Car went in for 10 journey tickets in at least some of their patch in the 1990s. After they took over the Lincoln City Transport operation, and installed Almex Eurofare / A90 ticket machines, buses (in the Lincoln city area at least) had a magnetic card reader for these - the tickets were similar in size and shape to an APTIS rail ticket - this was a bit before smart cards were a thing.

I think they had previously issued them on card (LRC hung on to manual Almex machines quite late - I can't remember if the issue involved them, I'm aware some manual Almex machines could have a card inserted.) City Transport had previously just done weekly tickets.

(Lincolnshire) Road Car went in for 10 journey tickets in at least some of their patch in the 1990s. After they took over the Lincoln City Transport operation, and installed Almex Eurofare / A90 ticket machines, buses (in the Lincoln city area at least) had a magnetic card reader for these - the tickets were similar in size and shape to an APTIS rail ticket - this was a bit before smart cards were a thing.

I think they had previously issued them on card (LRC hung on to manual Almex machines quite late - I can't remember if the issue involved them, I'm aware some manual Almex machines could have a card inserted.) City Transport had previously just done weekly tickets.

If I remember correctly they were actually 12 journey tickets in the Lincoln area. The ticket card had green strips along the edges, with a white(ish) middle section. The idea was you popped them into the reader and it would print the date and time of the journey onto the ticket. When this didn’t work there were marked punch holes on the ticket for the driver to manually clip them. The tickets would invariably have a bit of both. The printers survived into the Stagecoach era as I remember the first MAN 18.220 single deckers to arrive being fitted with them. By this stage they were even more temperamental.

 

[Roger1973]

If I remember correctly they were actually 12 journey tickets in the Lincoln area. The ticket card had green strips along the edges, with a white(ish) middle section. The idea was you popped them into the reader and it would print the date and time of the journey onto the ticket. When this didn’t work there were marked punch holes on the ticket for the driver to manually clip them. The tickets would invariably have a bit of both. The printers survived into the Stagecoach era as I remember the first MAN 18.220 single deckers to arrive being fitted with them. By this stage they were even more temperamental.

Now you remind me, I'm fairly sure you are right. It may have been 12 journeys for the price of 10x a standard single, which may have been what I was thinking.

Yes, I also remember tickets getting punched if the card reader didn't like them or wasn't working. I don't know if the card readers would have been able to detect the punch holes and give you an unauthorised 13th journey if that happened.

I also remember seeing 12 journey tickets issued on standard ticket roll - this may have been from buses where the machine wasn't working, or there may have been buses from other depots that did odd journeys in Lincoln (Lincs Road Car went in for that sort of thing at the time*) and the buses didn't have the machine at all.

* - as an aside, I remember one schedule change where one odd journey on a city route in Lincoln had been worked by a Newark bus off the 7 (or maybe 87 by then), and at the next schedule change it fell off the Newark duty. Newark assumed Lincoln would be doing it. Lincoln weren't. Oops.

 

[Lewisham2221]

A few years ago, in the Potteries, evening buses were all timed to arrive and depart the city centre at the same time (xx55 arrival, xx00 departure) to improve connections for people travelling across the city. However this did mean that some shared sections of route saw a reduction in frequency, as it meant that buses now followed each other along shared sections, rather than being spread out across the hour - although services with a significant amount of shared route were treated as having a 30 minute frequency instead, with additional xx25 arrival, xx30 departure. It also meant some routes having rather optimistic running times in order to complete the journey within the constraints of the departure and arrival windows. A good concept with poor execution (First all over, isn't it?), it lasted a bit longer than it probably should have done before being done away with.

 

[trentside]

Now you remind me, I'm fairly sure you are right. It may have been 12 journeys for the price of 10x a standard single, which may have been what I was thinking.

Yes, I also remember tickets getting punched if the card reader didn't like them or wasn't working. I don't know if the card readers would have been able to detect the punch holes and give you an unauthorised 13th journey if that happened.

I also remember seeing 12 journey tickets issued on standard ticket roll - this may have been from buses where the machine wasn't working, or there may have been buses from other depots that did odd journeys in Lincoln (Lincs Road Car went in for that sort of thing at the time*) and the buses didn't have the machine at all.

* - as an aside, I remember one schedule change where one odd journey on a city route in Lincoln had been worked by a Newark bus off the 7 (or maybe 87 by then), and at the next schedule change it fell off the Newark duty. Newark assumed Lincoln would be doing it. Lincoln weren't. Oops.

I’m pretty sure you’re correct that it was 10 for the price of 12. Stagecoach retained them for a time as the “Flexirider” - just issued on standard ticket roll, but a longer ticket for it to be punched.

There were lots of those workings. A Grimsby bus would do some 15s after working in on the 23, Gainsborough did various runs on the 17/18 North Circulars. Scunthorpe did some local work in Lincoln too between 353 journeys. I’ve seen a duty for Walcot outstation that involved visits to Sleaford, Grantham, Newark and Lincoln in the course of a single days work.

 

[Roger1973]

I’ve seen a duty for Walcot outstation that involved visits to Sleaford, Grantham, Newark and Lincoln in the course of a single days work.

I suppose outstations are now largely a 'quaint practice from the past'

From memory, Walcott (was this (street view) it?) didn't have provision for fuelling or maintenance or paying in, so I think the bus workings were arranged so that every bus would get to either Lincoln or Grantham depot at least every other day, possibly with the option of being swapped over for maintenance. I think there was one bus working that did something different every day between the peaks - a collection of once or maybe twice a week routes to Sleaford, Newark, Lincoln (and possibly Boston) depending on which market day it was.

Another difficulty was if the last bus in at night wouldn't start in the morning, nothing could get out. And then a fitter had to be summoned from Lincoln or Grantham. I also remember one of the older drivers there as one of the few people I ever saw wearing an octagonal shaped National Bus Company peaked cap - this was some years after the NBC had ceased to exist.

LRC had a few other outstations south of Grantham - there were a few buses that lived at odd locations between Grantham and Stamford (I will assume they were declared as operating centres) - one driver transferred to Reliance after LRC decided he couldn't keep a bus at (or near) home so wherever he kept the bus became a Reliance outstation instead.

Before the NBC, Eastern Counties were probably the biggest when it came to outstations (there's detail of them on this ECOC website) - a few of them hung on in to Stagecoach days, from memory, there were 2 or 3 buses outstationed to a yard behind a pub in Market Deeping (the small shed had closed and been sold but was still there in the 1990s) and another 2 or 3 were outstationed somewhere in Crowland (?) for the Peterborough - Spalding route.

 

[trentside]

I’m only just down the road from Walcott and that is the outstation. The roller shutter door has only recently been fitted, prior to that it hadn’t been touched since it closed (IIRC 2002?). Afterwards I believe a bus was still out stationed at the Red Lion in Digby - though I might be remembering the wrong pub.