Centenary of London General
Page 70
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By John C. Gillham
0 N January 7, 1856, the first General buses appeared in London. From then until July I, 1933, when the London Passenger Transport Board took over, about threequarters of the buses belonged to the London General Omnibus Co., Ltd. This proportion was lower during 1881908, and higher during 1919-1924, as other operators came and went.
London's first bus was introduced by George ShiMbar on July 4, 1829, between Marylebone and the Bank. This route passed through only one tollgate, so by 1831 some 90 vehicles, owned by many competitors, were working on it. Shillibeer was soon squeezed out, so he started an Islington-Woolwich route, from which the opening of a railway in 1836 squeezed him out again, so he became an undertaker at Walworth.
Early buses carried six to 10 people each side on longitudinal seats, with two more alongside the driver. Seats gradually appeared on the roof, until by 1851 the knifeboard was usual. Associations soon emerged, in which the proprietors on any one route organized the service jointly.
The largest fleet was the Favorite. . owned by a Mr. Wilson. on routes serv ing Holloway. His 27 buses were the fleet with which the L.G.O.C. started business exactly 100 years ago. The new company was formed on December 4, 1855, by three Frenchmen (MM. Orsi, Foucard and Carteret), the registered office being in Paris until January 1, 1859.
• Wilson became the managing director. Together with three other I,ondon bus proprietors (McNamara, Willing and Hartley) he acted as the General's agent in buying up times and vehicles.
Within a year, 600 of the 810 buses in London were taken over. The General co-operated with the owners of the other 210, and became a member of each Association. These survived until the motorbus era.
Latterly there were 10, of which the chief were the Atlas and Waterloo, Camden Town, Victoria, and Barnsbury and King's Cross. Their names, and also those of businesses purchased outright, such as the Favorite, City Atlas, Bayswater, and Chelsea. were retained as fleet names on individual routes for 50 years.
As soon as it was formed, the General company held a compztition for an improved, design of bus. This, and the £100 prize, were won by a Mr. Miller, of Hammersmith, and by June, 1858.
D24 400 buses were built or rebuilt to his design.
The General worked chiefly north of a line from Putney to Old Ford. South of this line the main operator was Thomas Tilling, with (after 1870) various horsed tramway companies.
The London Road Car Co., Ltd., was formed in 1881, and soon became a more formidable competitor than the north London tramways or the subur
ban railways. Even worse was the opening in 1900 of the Central London Railway, with a tube train every five minutes beneath the General's main route, and the electrification in 1903-09 of most of the tramways.
Motorbuses were introduced by several independents from 1897 onwards, though none lasted long. The General ran a Clarkson steam bus between Piccadilly and Hammersmith in 1904-05; followed by 12 larger Clarksons between Oxford Circus and Canning Town in 1906-07. In 1905 the company ordered 50 Btissing and 54 de Dion chassis.
On July 1, 1908, the General amalgamated with its two chief competitors— the Road Car and the Vanguard. Each had more motorbuses than the General. This hastened the departure of the General's horsed buses, the last of which ran on October 25, 1911.
The Great Eastern Omnibus Company was taken over on January I, 1911. The enlarged General fleet was mostly of Straker-Squire, Milnes-Daimler, de Dion and Wolseley makes, with 61 of the X type. This was built in the ex-Vanguard works at Walthamstow, after experience with 32 other types, and from it was evolved the highly successful B type, for which mileage lost in 1913 because of mechanical breakdown was only 0.02 per cent. The General route guide published in November, 1910, shows 23 motorbus routes (Nos. 1-25) and 32 horsed routes (Nos. 31-92). By August, 1914. there were 125 routes, going much farther out into the suburbs.
On January 1, 1912, the L.G.O.C. became a subsidiary of the Underground Railway. So many buses were sent overseas during the war that it borrowed 180 ex-army lorries for use as buses during the second half of 1919.
In August came the K type, with forward control and transverse seating, followed 16 months later by the similar, but larger, S type.
. Chocolate Express buses started running on route 11 'on August 5, 1922. Other independents rapidly sprang up. and 31 years later there were 197 firms with 556 buses.
Most of them were taken over by the
General in 1926727, or combined among themselves to form the London Public Omnibus Co., Ltd., which the General acquired on December 11, 1929. Only 53 survived to be taken over by the I..P.T.B., with 290 buses, but these included several of the largest.
To fight the independents the General fleet also grew, and the LOndon Traffic Act, 1924, was passed. This restricted the number of buses on main streets, and resulted in new routes being developed. The General's fainous NS type, of which 2,356 were built; first appeared on May 10, 1923.
• The solid tyres and open top. Of the earlier models gave way to pneumatics and a roof on the later ones. The last 59 were 7 ft. 6 in. Wide, instead Of 7 ft. 2 in., the police having hitherto restricted the width.
Twelve LS six-wheelers seating 66-72 passengers were built in 1927-28, but proved to be too big. The first 150 of the standard LT six-wheelers seated only 60, the next 799 seated 56, and the last 273 went back to.60.
Meanwhile, 814 four-wheeled 49seaters appeared for use on the lightertrafficked routes, but after 1932 all new double-deckers had 56 seats. The General was also a pioneer in the use of fluid couplings and oil engines.