please empty your brain below
Since you use the phrase, I suspect you've read Magnus Mills' The Maintenance of Headway - but if you haven't, you'd probably enjoy it.

martin | 19.08.12 - 9:42 a.m. | #

My daily route to work. Great post I assume you have seen this 1915 pic of the 24. http://www.jeffreygreen.co.uk/ted-vass-and-a-zeppelin-raid-london-1915/edmund-vass-driver-24-bus-hampstead-heath-station-2

TonyO | 19.08.12 - 10:32 a.m. | #

Lupus STREET surely, and mounted sentries at HGP wear helmets, not bearskins?

Kim | 19.08.12 - 1:10 p.m. | #

The posh Sainsburys in Wilton Road is where the old Victoria Bus Garage used to be. Another loss of important bus operating infrastructure in return for short term profit. Still the 24 is a route I've used a lot but I've never done it end to end so that's one to add to the list.

PC | 19.08.12 - 2:13 p.m. | #

I'm so glad you didn't do the trip yesterday. You'd have melted in that top seat!

CornishCockney | 19.08.12 - 4:18 p.m. | #

Looking at the timetable does anyone know the reason for the Late evening/through the night Pimlico short journeys?

Colin | 19.08.12 - 4:42 p.m. | #

Churchill Gardens Estate by respected architects, Powell and Moya is actually an extremely fine and early example of post war municipal housing. Pevsner: Imagination based on common sense not poetic seizure.
Human scale, a sense of community still. If all the estates that followed looked like Churchill Gardens. London would be a finer place

russell nash | Homepage | 19.08.12 - 5:47 p.m. | #

So, the old Art Deco cigarette factory (what a facade!) now houses the offices of the British Heart Foundation. Surely not a coincidence.

GAA | 19.08.12 - 11:53 p.m. | #

@ Colin. The route runs in a loop across Pimlico. The route is also run by Stockwell garage so I am guessing that buses swap over late at night so newly fuelled buses come into service at the start of the Pimlico loop and then provide the buses for the all night service. Other buses will arrive from the north and go out of service from Grosvenor Road but a new starter starts behind it. You also get the short trips early in the morning when new buses are coming into service to build up to the daytime frequency.

The 24 has been cursed by switching operators and garages for years. Since Chalk Farm garage closed in LT days the route has been run by garages off the line of route. When the route is disrupted the extreme ends of the route get poor service. Metroline tended to ensure the north end was well served because it ran from Holloway garage. The older residents of Pimlico complained bitterly about long waits for a bus from Victoria St down to Pimlico as they often shopped at Sainsburys on Victoria St (now closed).

Now London General run it from Stockwell the south end gets the service with the peculiarity of buses kicking people off at Parliament Square so they can dash down Millbank to Pimlico to catch up time or else zoom off to Stockwell garage. The route switches back to Metroline next year!

PC | 20.08.12 - 11:31 a.m. | #

Makes sense. many thanks for exp.

Colin | 20.08.12 - 2:33 p.m. | #

Nice post DG. I was born at the royal free and used to live on the maitland park estate close to queen's crescent. The Irish lady could have been my nan, twenty years ago! I then ended up at UCL on gower st so I've got a real soft spot for the 24 bus, it having marked out so much of my life.

rich | 21.08.12 - 10:13 p.m. | #

buses on the 84 with dot matrix displays are currently proclaiming the route to be 100 years old

Paul | 22.08.12 - 10:25 p.m. | #

@ Paul - I think there are quite a lot of bus routes celebrating centenaries this year and next. I think route 43 is an imminent birthday candidate.

PC | 23.08.12 - 9:17 a.m. | #

Route 84, New Barnet Station to St Albans is also claiming 100 years - the buses are displaying the fact on the front

daguerrotype | Homepage | 25.08.12 - 2:59 p.m. | #

The London Omnibus Transport Society's site (LOTS) http://www.kingston.gov.uk/disbayappform_10.pdf reports that some "heritage" buses will be running on the 24 on Sunday Nov 25th to commemorate the centenary of the route. (see "news" entry for Nov 18th)

timbo | 18.11.12 - 2:48 p.m. | #











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