Transpora Group-owned Londoner Buses, based in Wandsworth, choose Showbus as the day to announce the details of its new London heritage bus route. Regional Manager David Brundrit told CBW: “We are pleased to announce at Showbus that we will commence our new heritage bus route from 15 October. It will operate daily from 0900-1700hrs.
“The service will start at Waterloo and operate to Piccadilly Circus, serving Westminster Bridge, Trafalgar Square, Parliament Square and Whitehall. Part of the philosophy of the route is to gives tourists a taste of what travelling on a Routemaster used to be like. A round trip will take 40 to 45 minutes, depending on the traffic.
“We have acquired RML871, RML887, RM1583, RML1941, RML2290 directly from Transport for London. The vehicles used to operate on heritage route 15H. Our peak vehicle requirement for the service will be three.
“In terms of recruitment, we were overwhelmed with applicants for customer assistant roles, and the same for drivers, but we were looking for a certain calibre of driver for our service and we have found some former Routemaster drivers who are happy to get back behind the wheel of them again.
“With the way the economy is at the moment, we wanted to launch the heritage bus route at a price everyone could afford, and for £5 per adult you can use the service all day. A family ticket for four will be £15, which means a they can jump on and experience a Routemaster and see some of the key tourist attraction at the same time.”
Service Delivery Manager Raksha Thakore added: “I have worked in London with buses for 10 years in various roles including training, but this is the first time I have had the opportunity to work with Routemasters. The idea has gone from a seed, and I want to make sure it succeeds and grows into a tree.
“A lot of people have been asking why no one is running Routemasters in London for people to enjoy, and the answer is because it takes a lot of time and investment. We should have started operations on 1 July, but there was a lot of red tape to get through with Transport for London. Perseverance got us here today, and now we are ready to go.”
Rhys Hand, Operations Director at Transpora Group, added: ‘’We think locals and tourists alike will be delighted to see these iconic vehicles return to regular public service. Our team has worked incredibly hard to get this far
and they can’t wait to welcome people aboard.’’
