please empty your brain below
You have a lot to learn about night buses, DG!

I think the most genuine experience is taking a bus leaving central London after 4am. Most sensible people leave by about 1 or 2, so you get the real (insert favourite derogatory term here). And as you have rightly noticed, everywhere outside inner London is basically shut down by 2am because there aren't enough people to make it worthwhile staying open.

Now the 25 is a special case, but it's not an N bus (any more). The N15 is one of the few buses where one can see almost every TfL bye-law being flouted after 4am, including by the driver. I don't know what it is about parts of London that were formely in Essex, but I have never felt threatened on night buses south of the river, or heading west.

Also, should you ever want to catch the 0508 N15 from Trafalgar Square, be advised that the 0523 will arrive at Becontree earlier due to the driver frequently being drunk or sleeping. Nobody does anything about it because they are also drunk, stoned or sleeping, and the decent passengers are too nice. I did complain to TfL once but don't know if anything ever came of it.

I've heard those "You are now entering" since April this year, on the N18 where they are not very useful due to occurring approximately every 3 stops, shortly before a station with the same name as the area.

John3 | 05.12.14 - 6:11 a.m. | #

I've also done that route going the other way. Surprisingly some people seem to go out in Romford who live in Newham and Tower Hamlets. But most of the people on the bus were low wage people going to work.

Steve | 05.12.14 - 7:24 a.m. | #

Have always thought the best night bus journey is the one done in the summer, when it starts off in darkness but an hours later when you get to your destination, it is now broad daylight.

well, that a puddle of sick that slowly drips down the stairs of course is an 'N' classic. Shame you didn't get that.

Geofftech | Homepage | 05.12.14 - 8:57 a.m. | #

I was a Night Bus Driver for over two years and worked out of what was then Victoria Bus garage in Gillingham Street SW1, in those days the Night Bus routes were being expanded and increased in frequency and a new idea was bought in to have a "Spare Bus" that would be based at Victoria garage and would cover for every route as and when it was required, this meant I had to learn 37 different night routes and be ready to slot into schedule at a moments notice, I have in the past worked four different routes in one night doing half a rounder on each, it got very confusing sometimes but was great fun and I really enjoyed it, some Union reps at other garages were very anti the idea and nicknamed us "The Ghost Bus" but it actually worked very well.

Fishislandskin | 05.12.14 - 9:00 a.m. | #

I took the 0421 departure (Saturday morning) about a year and a half ago, all the way to Romford - allowing me to reach there before 6am, even with the inevitable delays. It was a battle to get on. I was lucky enough to bag one of the top deck front right seats (the person who immediately settled next to me went to sleep all the way to Becontree). We were already packed by Aldwych, yet somehow the bottom deck managed to fit more people on at every stop all the way to Limehouse.

Nobody threw up at the front of the top deck, and the guy at the back gave me several seconds notice to lift up my feet.

As Geoff says, it was quite nice to be in daylight when it finished. I also once enjoyed this with the 0501 N279 to Waltham Cross (which is something special in the fresh and early hours of daylight). Unfortunately I had spent the total of Holloway to the Spurs ground ignoring a guy trying to chat everyone up.

I'm glad you did a proper night route. I think I might have been quite annoyed if you had chickened out with the N205.

the orange one | 05.12.14 - 9:25 a.m. | #

This route is the longest in distance, duration and longevity: the modern-style number disguising a very long history, having been the 611 in London General days, then successiveley 295 and N95, before taking its present number in 1995.
Although the route is old, the bus is quite new: another "11" reg: only the C2 has been newer.

It is a long time since I've used a night bus (as a student, I used the N89 (now N207) and N97 (on a section now replaced by the N9) but things don't seem to have changed much, execpt the frequency. The "history" link shows the then-285 was operated by just two vehicles in 1934 - it now uses eighteen.

| 05.12.14 - 10:15 a.m. | #

John3 in the first post is libelling an N15 driver. There is a small number of them and if anyone in the depot, or anyone else in TfL, reads this it's possible the driver will sue -- not John3 but DG. Wise to delete it, I think.

Alan Burkitt-Gray | 05.12.14 - 11:21 a.m. | #

As Geofftech said the sick dripping down the stairs is a strong feature of nightbuses. I particularly remember one journey where someone started to leave the top deck of the bus, vomited, fell down the stairs into his puddle and then left the bus with his friends. This was only 3 stops from where they got on, surely if you have already been sick you might as well stay on the bus!

Jon | 05.12.14 - 11:34 a.m. | #

For those of us daft enough to photograph night buses then we're used to the "outside the Coop" crowd and the vast numbers squashing inside various night buses. I usually get an early N bus in to town and late one home when on a photo shoot but have rarely seen or experienced problems. That's not to say there aren't any issues - the Route Masters programme clearly showed problems of various sorts. I still think DG should try some more night routes - the N87 and N207 are suitably "quiet" (ahem!) ;-)

PC | 05.12.14 - 11:43 a.m. | #

Night buses should have both a marshal and cleaner on board and charge a surcharge to cover those costs.

david | 05.12.14 - 12:34 p.m. | #

The longest LT-run night bus journey must have been the early-mid 90s N81 projections into Kent - one journey made it all the way to Gillingham, taking an hour and 50 minutes to cover 35 miles of tarmac from Victoria. I think 90s DG, had he been a blogging Londoner, would have made a point of covering this at some point.

Nico | 06.12.14 - 10:18 a.m. | #











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