please empty your brain below
Hi dg - great post, as usual. I was just wondering, where would you say is the optimum place to sit on a single-decker bus to enjoy the journey the most?

anon | 04.10.19 - 7:08 a.m. | #

If that is the bus in which DG traveled, he was lucky. Some of that 410 fleet (the ones with a curve on the lower part of the windscreen) have an engine cutout linked to the doors opening. The journey is punctuated with the engine dying and re-starting at every stop. Since the doors are only open for a few seconds each time the environmental saving is negligible and the effect is very irritating for the passenger.

RayL | 04.10.19 - 7:29 a.m. | #

I appreciate the time you posted this entry.

Jamesthegill | 04.10.19 - 7:44 a.m. | #

Beat me to it James!

I love DG's bus trips. Observational writing that is a delight to read.

Thanks very much.

Chris | 04.10.19 - 7:47 a.m. | #

Nice post. Thank you.

Your article gets an A* from me.

Jon Jones | 04.10.19 - 8:26 a.m. | #

That was a great read this morning,DG. Your observations are so good,I could smell that egg and cress sandwich.....(turns away,heaves).

You have certainly showed us a different way of thinking of buses too, but our local bus....we can't think of in terms of a thirty sixth of July,no matter how we try.

Jo W | 04.10.19 - 8:41 a.m. | #

This is the only week of the year that a Bus Route Of The Day ends in zero.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 04.10.19 - 8:42 a.m. | #

I know TfL has embraced the idea of hopping on and off buses, but "hops on clutching two hot coffees" doesn't sound feasible.

Ian | 04.10.19 - 8:54 a.m. | #

Just thought many of us could take this one step further. There is probably a bus for your birthday. Unlike dg's bus for your age every birthday, this would be a one off experience in most people's lifetimes, unless TfL start withdrawing and re-introducing numbers more frequently than at present.

ap | 04.10.19 - 9:36 a.m. | #

Interesting to see the "ladies who bus" have started again.

PeterI | 04.10.19 - 9:38 a.m. | #

Very well written and very entertaining. The word pictures are just so evocative. And all the little stories seem to have happy endings. Will Richard be ok with his bikes? Will the lady get out with her shopping? Will the pupils behave? A really cheerful getting up time read. So unlike the national news.

Malcolm | 04.10.19 - 9:39 a.m. | #

"who really wants to go to Wallington?"

*raises hand*

Granted, that's because I live near the Green. I can't imagine any other reason to be around these parts. The 410 is my late night lifeline home, since the buses and the trains to E.Croydon go on far longer than the local trains do. I could do Morden/157, but the 410 very nearly drops me outside my house so it's preferable unless I'm *really* late. Which I'm too old for these days.

Chz | 04.10.19 - 9:42 a.m. | #

So, New Year's Day must be the 11.

OnTheBus | 04.10.19 - 10:05 a.m. | #

I have just spent 10 minutes assuming that A*s represented a rude word before it dawned on me that you were referring to exam results. Silly me.

Arlo | 04.10.19 - 10:08 a.m. | #

What a great read - full of drama and
interest.
Loving this idea of 'dating' buses! I'm off out to get the 11th April to do my weekly shopping (ooh, also my youngest's birthday!). Sadly I doubt there's a 25th October for me to ride on in 3 weeks time!

Cornish Cockney | 04.10.19 - 10:22 a.m. | #

Bus routes of the day can end in zero at other times of the year in America.

Malcolm | 04.10.19 - 10:29 a.m. | #

Thanks DG - this post brings back lots of memories!

I was born in Tennison Road just east of the junction with Davidson Road - the brickworks (now a small lake and park, and where many of the houses to the east of Davidson Road were built) were just beyond our back fence and many a ball went over the edge!

I then spent the second half of my childhood living in a house on South Norwood Hill; there was a bus stop for the northbound 19th June almost outside.

The 4th October didn't run that long ago, but I know the route well because we follow it from where my mum now lives up to Crystal Palace Parade where we sometimes go for lunch when we visit her.

I also walked along some of the Selhurst Road section of the route last Saturday when visiting my mum and going to watch Palace beat Norwich - up the Palace!!

My first and only appearance on stage was at the Stanley Halls in a local Scout "Gang Show" - must have been in the early 1960s.

I went to Trinity School when it was where the Whitgift Centre now is - only for 2 years though before we moved to Shirley. The school playing fields were between the school and Wellesley Road.

John Simmons | 04.10.19 - 10:36 a.m. | #

I used to get the 26th February to work and the supermarket.

scrumpy | 04.10.19 - 10:37 a.m. | #

I can get the 3rd of January,the 9th of May the or the 5th of February for most of my Sheffield needs, but if I want to go up the Fullwood Road then that's the twelfth of never.

Sarah | Homepage | 04.10.19 - 11:01 a.m. | #

The buses around my place are either 3rd or 23rd of August's. There are three Maxicabs as well, one in September, another either in April or non-existent, while the final one is yesterday.

Patrickov | 04.10.19 - 11:39 a.m. | #

For many years, living on Sylvan Road, we would use the 410 and its previous incarnation the 352 to take us up the hill to the drinking an eating haunts of the 'Palace' at the w/e.

Unless she wore her high heels we always walked back, as it was all downhill and saved two fares.
And dead handy when once a year the local Camra branch held their beer festival at the Wallington Halls. Door-to-door service, but as you say a somewhat long winded route and usually much in need of the loo by the time I got off!

Not long after we chose to move away from the area, they went and opened an Everyman cinema at the Palace; damn, could have done with that 25 years earlier!

Dave | 04.10.19 - 12:20 p.m. | #

I lived in Wallington for a short time in the early 1980's and found it an amenable and convenient place to be . Maybe it's changed ? I recall an interesting artifact near the library: A section of track from the Surrey Iron Railway. Did you see it, DG ? - if not you'll have to go back !

Tony (Somerset) | 04.10.19 - 2:22 p.m. | #

The 6th June is my everyday route

PVR | 04.10.19 - 2:29 p.m. | #

Happily I wouldn't need to travel very far to get my birthday bus, 24th April

H SE18 | 04.10.19 - 2:38 p.m. | #

There are two 1990s estates off Davidson Road that are served by the 410.One of them is Towpath Way,the other features names of British Athletes.(Linford)Christie Drive,(Todd & Ainsley)Bennett Close,(Sally)Gunnell Close,& Ron Pickering Way.

What will it next month?
The 111 (Kingston-Heathrow) or the 211 (Waterloo-Hammersmith) or the 411 (Kingston - West Molesey)?

Kevin Lucioni. | 04.10.19 - 3:00 p.m. | #

Apart from routes ending in zero, every London bus route from 11 to 299 can be a Bus Route of the Day.

But there are only eleven BROTD in the 300s, and just three in the 400s.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 04.10.19 - 3:13 p.m. | #

Davidson Road’s claim to fame is that DH Lawrence taught there, I think in the early 29th century. Apparently he enjoyed his time there.

Robert Butlin | 04.10.19 - 3:22 p.m. | #

That lollipop manoeuvre means that buses go along the road twice as often as the frequency of the route...

Andrew S | 04.10.19 - 5:13 p.m. | #

"All bus drivers check the road ahead". As distinct from what, I wonder. Proceeding with eyes wide shut?

Malcolm | 04.10.19 - 5:34 p.m. | #

There are a number of routes that went near to where I used to live: 24th January, 26th February, 11th May, 27th June, 14th July and 5 other routes that unfortunately don't translate into dates. As for where I currently live there's just a 3rd July and a 9th April. Incidentally, I actually used my birthday bus (the 19th February) just a few weeks ago.

X-Plaistow | 04.10.19 - 5:50 p.m. | #

Some memories of Davidson Road School are here.

John Simmons | 04.10.19 - 8:41 p.m. | #

Cornish Cockney - If you fancy a trip to Germany... 2510.

Man of Kent | 04.10.19 - 11:16 p.m. | #

Sorry, but for me the number 410 will forever be associated with the green buses that linked Bromley with distant Reigate, by way of Biggin Hill, Westerham, Oxted, Godstone and Redhill.

I know it's an age thing, but in the days when route numbers remained constant for decades, they became important building blocks in your life. Now, bus numbers are so transient.

Sad.

Petras409 | 05.10.19 - 8:39 a.m. | #











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