please empty your brain below
I love your bus blogs, and can't wait for the next part of the around London thing. The Ladies Who Bus are interesting. Female friends of mine have always said that completism is a very male thing, so it's good to see that some intelligent and amusing women are also bitten by the bug sometimes.

Baldassaro | 14.02.14 - 8:45 a.m. | #

The ladies who bus were interviewed on the London TV news yesterday.

John | 14.02.14 - 8:51 a.m. | #

Gosh, I'd almost forgotten that the 25 used to be a bendy one. Maybe they'll introduce the new Boris buses on the route some day.

Still pisses me off when they stop to change drivers at Mile End - only ever seems to happen when I'm in a hurry to get somewhere, and it takes forever.

David | 14.02.14 - 9:37 a.m. | #

Well, thank you DG. Praise from the master London Blogger is praise indeed, as Thomas Morton nearly said of Sir Hubert Stanley. Whatever we decide to do next, reading the Geezer's blog every day will remain essential.

Jo Hunt | Homepage | 14.02.14 - 10:07 a.m. | #

In a moment of madness I have worked through the list of bus routes and identified those I've ridden in whole, in part or have not used. The list includes schools and night buses so the grand total across the 3 categories exceeds the Ladies Who Bus's total. I've done 126 in full, 227 in part and 389 I've not used at all.

I suspect some of the 389 will never be used as it's near impossible to board school services and probably not advisable for your sanity!

PC | 14.02.14 - 10:22 a.m. | #

Could this be the first time that Thomas Morton and Sir Hubert Stanley have appeared in the DG blog? The Ladies Who Bus are great, and I enjoyed the video on the Londonist site. The fact that it was shot by the mighty Geofftech gives it added gravitas.

Charles | 14.02.14 - 10:50 a.m. | #

"ten more to go".
That's a very interesting nugget. I'm usually on a hiding to nothing trying to second-guess DG, but I had worked out two possible itineraries as to how the circuit might be completed, one involving six buses and one involving - yes! - ten. Doubtless DG's ten is not the same as mine though.
TfL's Journey Planner says if you had stayed on the 142 a bit longer you can do it in four more, (C11, 168, 53, 96; or 113, 436, 89, 96) but both routes go via the Elephant, which doesn't really comly with the rules!)

Is the 38 your favourite route, or is it just that that route seems to attract whatever is the latest fad in the bus world - be it bendies, not bendies, or Borismasters?

Shouldn't the 331 also appear in your list twice? (and arguably the 64 three times)

.....and I see another duplicate is looming next month

timbo | 14.02.14 - 11:14 a.m. | #

My comment seems to have disappeared. Did you delete it?

dg writes: the Dropbox link is awaiting moderation.

Jarle | 14.02.14 - 1:43 p.m. | #

..looking back at the 'old' buses, i.e the Routemasters what i lack understanding of is that on those buses 'conductors' as they were called then (now customer assistants?) would check tickets, help people who required help get on and off (guess the 'low-floor' buses do away with that?) take cash fares (soon to be done away with?) and give info. Now, the fare collecting/ticket checking involved on many a time being top deck, leaving platform "unsupervised" yet people could still be "trusted" to hop-on and hop-off. What changed? Are the current 'Heritage Routemasters' operating against the 'rules'. Are the 'customer assistants' on the NB4L's really there as a way to make people think twice about boarding and 'not paying'? ...am i seeing too much into the matter? I know that drivers are not allowed to let 'customers' on or off other than at 'bus stops' though bet many of us have once in a while been 'allowed' to get off when a grid-lock has formed and the bus seems unlikely to move for a long time (bus driver probably feeling 'the heat building-up' of passengers getting fed-up).

E | 14.02.14 - 2:39 p.m. | #

This is how a link to this article is displayed on Facebook:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/o3vaa5lnwn6e0dj/Capture.PNG

Not very useful. I think you should consider adding Facebook meta tags to your template.

Jarle | 14.02.14 - 5:40 p.m. | #

Hi Jarle

No, that doesn't look very useful at all. It seems Facebook selects a bank of text from my sidebar rather than anything that might actually be useful.

As I'm not actually on Facebook, sorry, I wouldn't expect any change any time soon.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 14.02.14 - 5:48 p.m. | #

Facebook is so 2000s.

john | 15.02.14 - 12:39 p.m. | #

..guess Twitter will one day be oh so 20-teens?

Ed | 15.02.14 - 4:09 p.m. | #

Dear DG,

Thanks you so much for your kind comments and frequent links. We find it difficult enough to be vaguely original once a week let alone 7 x times a week.

Our followers seem to span both bus users and loyal if not always resident Londoners.

PS Geoff was great and we were thrilled to know he had actually met you!

LWB | 15.02.14 - 4:34 p.m. | #

It seems another person interested in London buses is Andrew Adonis, formerly transport secretary and now shadow infrastructure minister, who’s going to be spending this week travelling on as many as he can:
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/andrew-adonis-london-by-bus-9132106.html

Simon W | 17.02.14 - 11:36 a.m. | #

DG, keep the bus posts coming! I only comment occasionally, but read the articles with a keen interest. I'm enthused to see others write about their experiences on the buses. I find the people watching element and observation of what's going on at the time particularly interesting - the background narrative on fellow passengers always keeps me reading to the end. My favourite to day was the write up on the 607.

I've had the dubious pleasure of riding every N-prefixed route in London end to end over the last few years, as well as drive a couple - the N3 and N35! I've never been bold enough to write my own blog, though I often shared my stories on "The Bus Forum."

I await the developments with your orbital trip with anticipation!

The Urbanite | 17.02.14 - 2:13 p.m. | #

Very late to comment on this but, judging by the healthy number of comments, I'm not the only one who's been enjoying the orbital bus blogs. It's always fascinating to be reminded quite how big London is and that there are still plenty of places I've never heard of let alone visited. What I've particularly liked about this series, though, is discovering the eccentric nature of London's border and the history behind it.

Whiff | 18.02.14 - 1:50 a.m. | #











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