The Glasgow Vintage Vehicle Trust has had its most successful year yet, with increasing visitor numbers and the post-pandemic resurgence of its community and social outreach programme, reports Nick Larkin
The Glasgow Vintage Vehicle Trust’s members have more than the organisation’s 20th anniversary to celebrate. “In fact, 2022 has been our most successful year ever,” says Trust chairman Steven Booth. Everything from visitor numbers to the Trust’s Bridgeton Bus Garage to its efforts to reach out to the community have been a major success. “This was especially heartening for us when considering the difficulties of Covid-19 and the cost of living crisis more recently,” said Steven. “Our total number of visitors to the garage and passengers on our buses have smashed our previous record in 2019.
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“The Open Weekend, the Family and Community Day and the West End Bus Fest in particular all hit high watermarks in terms of visitors and passengers. The guided tours of the garage that we introduced late last year have also been a big hit and now include a kids-focussed family tour as part of the programme.”
He added: “We’ve reached out more into the community this year than we ever have by supporting others at their events while at the same time spreading the word about the Trust.”
The Trust’s ‘Back on the Road’ social inclusion programme is also now fully functioning to pre-pandemic levels, helping some of the most vulnerable in the local community to learn useful skills.
“And finally, work continues on the vehicles themselves with many of them hitting the road at one time or another during the year,” Steven added. “It’s always a pleasing sight! But we couldn’t have done it without the fantastic voluntary support we’ve had from GVVT members. We are very grateful to them.”
The Trust turned 20 years old on 9 December.
Ailsa celebration
The Glasgow Vintage Vehicle Trust’s many events of 2023 will include celebrating anniversaries such as 50 years since the formation of Greater Glasgow PTE and 50 years since the Ailsa-Volvo double-decker was unveiled and hit the road.
Ailsa Trucks, which was 75% owned by Volvo, developed the model which was powered by a front-mounted turbocharged 6.7-litre Volvo engine and featured straightforward mechanics as a response to the rear-engined double-deckers of the period which were seen as over-complicated. Most had Alexander bodywork and the bus became a favourite with the Scottish Bus Group, but operators such as West Mldlands PTE and Cardiff took sizeable numbers too. Derby City Transport bought a low-height example. The vehicle was replaced in Volvo’s range by the mid-engined Citybus in 1985.
The Trust is planning to gather as many preserved Ailsas together at its open weekend on 14 and 15 October as possible, and invites anyone interested in attending with their vehicle to get in touch.
