London Transport T31, Paddington, 1979

            This picture is not quite as it first may seem, especially for those with an eye for London bus matters. The brand new Leyland 'Titan' is not working the 165 service from Romford to Rainham, but is instead in Central London on special duties. 

In 1979, London Transport celebrated 150-years of bus services in London, by holding  a special road-run through the Capital. The parade of both historic buses and modern buses followed (as closely as possible) the original route taken by George Shillibeer's horse bus service of 1829. Indeed, a replica of Shillibeer's original horse bus took part in the parade.

Having travelled in the procession from the Tower of London to Paddington via Islington and Kings Cross, Titan T31 is captured on Sussex Gardens (junction Talbot Square), heading towards nearby Hyde Park. At Hyde Park the road-run ended, and the public invited to look around the parked vehicles.   

The Leyand Titan (aka the B15) was a technically advanced bus for its time. It had been designed by British Leyland in co-operation with London Transport, as a replacement to Leyland's AN68 Atlantean bus. London Transport on the other hand were keen to phase out their troublesome Leyland Fleetline DMS buses, but also to further convert crew-operated routes over to one-man-operation. The Leyland Titan went some way in fulfilling this requirement, but production of the Titan ended in 1984, due to industrial unrest within the Leyland Bus Group. By that time, 1134 Leyand Titans had been built and delivered to London Transport.
  
When this photograph was taken, T31 had not yet entered public service, and was officially unallocated to any service garage. Instead it was stored with other new Leyland Titans between Clapham and Stockwell garages. During its life in storage, T31 was used by enthusiastic LT staff to also attend the Brockwell Park bus rally at Herne Hill in the summer of 1979.

In November 1979, T31 was taken out of storage and transferred to Barking Garage to familiarise drivers with this new type of vehicle. Later that same month T31 was allocated Hornchurch bus garage, where it began its service life and was initially used on the 248 route. On the closure of Hornchurh in September 1988, T31 was transferred to Romford (North Street) bus garage, where it would eventually get to regularly work the 165 service.

Photo - 8th July 1979.
  
Thanks to the encyclopaedic  'Ian's Bus Stop' website for T31's allocation information, and to Philip Hambling for information on Hornchurch bus garage.

Taken on: March 11, 2022

Tags:

London

LTE

Leyland

Titan

B15

Park Royal

Talbot Square

Paddington

London Transport

Romford

Hornchurch

165

route

service

Rainham

1979

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Sets appears in: • Britain in the 1970s • England, this England more » • London • This and that « less

Camera: Plustek OpticFilm 7600i (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Plustek OpticFilm 7600i
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