[41235]

Talking of which, did you know that BRITISH RAILWAYS actually had controlling shares in some bus company"s the old MIDLAND RED being one of them.

 

[alastairq]

very commonplace .....especially pre-nationalisation....fingers-in-pies?

 

[John Webb]

Railway companies had been allowed by an Act of 1928 to run their own bus services, although many, especially the GWR, had been running buses well before then. Some railways invested in existing companies but after objections from road transport interests agreed not to take up more than 50% of the shares of any company. The Big Four railways and many bus companies were absorbed by the British Transport Commission on nationalisation in 1948. Many of the bus companies eventually went to form the National Bus Company in 1968 which ran completely independently from BR.

Regards,
John Webb

 

[41235]

Yes thanks John, very interesting.
Overall the transport of the uk has over the years undergone many change arounds, some good some bad and some really awful, I look at the West coast main line every day, I only live yards from it, and after all my years on the railway, first on the footplate until the end of steam and later as a guard, I honestly see nothing in todays modern railway that would or could entice me back on there and the railway was my life for a good many years.But today the old atmosphere has gone, even the locos and rolling stock of these modern trains does absolutely nothing for me.
Perhaps I am getting old.
But it is the same on the buses, one man operation, no conductors, and wherever you go in the country and see a bus, it is probably the same as the ones that run around your town, there is just no interest any more.
I will pursue my "new career" with my model railway, albeit slowly, but couple it with my memories and enjoy it into the bargain.

 

[John Webb]

I only used the railways for holiday travel when small, but in my early teens (late 1950s) was allowed to get a week's 'Rover' ticket and spent much of my time roaming around parts of the Southern Region. Later I became a cross-London commuter until 1977 when my season ticket had become so costly I could use it to pay off a mortgage to live nearer my work! After that it was mostly occasional trips into London for meetings, etc.

I never joined the railways, but in my (early) retirement have resumed railway modelling, and also got involved with restoring the St Albans South signal box.

Regards,
John

 

[41235]

QUOTE (John Webb @ 10 May 2008, 19:44) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>I only used the railways for holiday travel when small, but in my early teens (late 1950s) was allowed to get a week's 'Rover' ticket and spent much of my time roaming around parts of the Southern Region. Later I became a cross-London commuter until 1977 when my season ticket had become so costly I could use it to pay off a mortgage to live nearer my work! After that it was mostly occasional trips into London for meetings, etc.

I never joined the railways, but in my (early) retirement have resumed railway modelling, and also got involved with restoring the St Albans South signal box.

Regards,
John

Nice one John that must be a real enjoyable spare time activity. Good "on yer".

 

[SRman]

As several others have said above, the historic links go way back. The GWR buses became part of Western National wit the GW having a stakeholding, similarly with the Southern Railway and Southern National. The LMS had holdings in Crosville, amongst others.

British Railways inherited many of these holdings. One of the more interesting ones was the City of Sheffield bus fleet ... or more correctly, fleets! They had an 'A' fleet of their own buses and a 'B' fleet which was jointly owned with BR, This meant that they could rder bus and body types only normally available to the nationalised Tilling fleets, so thay had quite a lot of "oddball" chassis and body combinations, one example of which that comes straight to my mind was a Leyland Leopard with ECW body (ECW only supplied nationalised fleets). There were many other such combinations.

Another jointly owned fleet was that of Todmorden, which had an LMS then BR stakeholding.

 

[7113]

Other companies that I know yhe Southern Railway had an interest in were Southdown, Maidstone & District and East Kent, I think these were all BET companies.

Regards

 

[SRman]

They were indeed BET group companies. East Kent and Maidstone & District later came under one management, and all three had joint services into each others territories.

I used to live in Crawley (Pound Hill, actually) where Southdown and London Transport country buses met in the sixties.

 

[7113]

Perhaps we should have a return to this - judging by some of the vehicles that can be seen on rail replacement services on occasion. Then again it appears that we have a reversal with bus companies running rail services!

Regards

 

[41235]

With the amount of times the modern railway is closed for engineering works these days we would need a bigger forum LOL LOL

 

[Brian Considine]

QUOTE (41235 @ 13 May 2008, 21:43) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>With the amount of times the modern railway is closed for engineering works these days we would need a bigger forum LOL LOL
It does seem that "Rail Replacement" buses are far more common these days - why is this ? - I can think of a couple of things including Health & Safety requirements or the need to use heavier equipment that needs time to get into place & set up perhaps.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

QUOTE (Brian Considine @ 14 May 2008, 05:53) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>It does seem that "Rail Replacement" buses are far more common these days - why is this ? - I can think of a couple of things including Health & Safety requirements or the need to use heavier equipment that needs time to get into place & set up perhaps.

Railtrack had let the tracks get into a totally inadequate state, and Network Rail are getting the raw deal in trying to fix it. I am lead to believe that some of the newer trains wear the track down more than the older trains before them and lets not forget that some TOCs, like Virgin, want improved tracks and equipment to run their trains on.

The equipment needed for a possession should be close by before the works start so that the time the line is shut is reduced to as little as possible.