Gone for a song LT Merlins
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AFTER two years of being stored in the open, most of the London Transport AEC Merlin buses have now been sold.
Some of these buses only entered service in 1970 but LT has been plagued with troubles with them ever since.
About 50 Merlins have been retained to work the flat-fare Red Arrow bus services in Central London.
London Transport also wants to withdraw all its 700 AEC Swift buses, some of which have only been in service for four years, and replace these with a mixture of double-deckers and Leyland Nationals.
One worry of the GLC is that not space was available to store these vehicles, but now that so many Merlins, stored at Radlett aerodrome, have been sold the space is now available.
However, the GLC is likely to be unhappy with the low prices at which the Merlins were finally disposed of, reported unofficially at around ELM each, compared with LT's asking price of £6,000.
This seems likely to give the GLC second thoughts about allowing LT to proceed with the withdrawal and replacement of the Swifts.