SCT'61
Life on the Buses

This is the second of a series of articles we are planning to add to the site with reminiscences about "Life on the Buses".
If you would like to add your own reminiscences (or someone else's with their permission), please get in touch via the usual email address.
Click here for the first article by Gareth Morgan or here for some reminiscences about working on the X1 to London in the 1980s.

Driving buses in Southend
by Ian Banks
Badge number FF20374


Regent 261 taken out by
Ian on a schools trip
It all started in 1966 when I applied to become a bus driver with Southend Corporation Transport. I was taken on a test run in AEC Regent 261 down to the Seafront near the Kursaal, the Driving instructor got out and said "Have you ever driven a crash box before?", my reply was "No". So I jumped in and tried to master the gears but made a hash of it. After a time it became easier until I mastered it and went on to love these two remaining AEC’s 258 & 261, always asking for them on overtime. The training bus was a Leyland PD2 which I also passed my test in.

SCT had a special route for teaching drivers and it went as follows (I must say at this point we were learning in the old Southend set up before the town was altered). We left the garage in London Road and proceeded down London Road to the Victoria Circus roundabout and then along Southchurch Road turning right into Porters Grange Road (now Queensway), left into Hill Crest where we did a hill start, we then turned right into Southchurch Avenue that led to the Kursaal. As we approached the Seafront we had to change down gears into first which was a crash gear (the others were syncromesh), then turn right onto the seafront as far as Pier Hill another hill start, where we did a sharp right turn just missing the wall with the front mudguard by inches. The secret was to turn when you saw the small white mark on the wall put there by the Instructors. Then left by the Ritz Cinema turning right into the High Street to Victoria Circus and up to the garage. The reversing movements were done in the garage using cones as the kerb stones.


Bull nose PD2 280 on route 6
in Southchurch Road
After passing my test I went on "bus types", driving each model around the town to get the feel of the different types, having air or vacuum brakes which were different on each bus. My next task was to learn all the routes which I did riding around on the service buses. My first driving job was on Route Six from Newington Avenue to Kent Elm Corner in a PD2 (bull nose) as they were called.

One of the heaviest journeys was on Route Three from Shoeburyness to Canvey Island, which covered the London Road, Benfleet Station and if you were unlucky catching three separate schools on Canvey. The early morning duties for the Canvey run consisted of bus from garage down to Victoria Circus then Shoeburyness-Canvey back to Shoeburyness-Canvey-Shoeburyness then back to Victoria Circus. On early turn it was common practice for bus crews to be as quick as they could getting their buses from the garage to go to the Bluebird Café in Broadway Market for tea and toast. It was quite a sight seeing a line of buses (not all should be at that location) with their crews in the café. We then went our separate ways to start our journeys.

Some of the things that went on would make your hair stand on end. Ashingdon Hill, Rochford used to be very narrow and it was the policy for the bus at the top of the hill to flash his headlights to allow the bus at the bottom to proceed but there were a few drivers that waited until the bus was halfway up the hill and then roar down passing you by inches with a big grin on their face.

One of the funniest things to happen to my conductor on the Canvey run was a little old lady gave him twenty two halfpennies (remember we were using pounds, shillings and pence). Being a six footer with a broad Irish accent he looked into his hand, looked down at the old lady, opened the bus window and threw the coins out issuing the correct ticket to the lady - he thought this was quite a cheek giving him all that change. This conductor was very fast issuing tickets and was proud of the fact he could clear the bus with a full load before he reached the Blue Boar pub from Southend Victoria. Another time we were running dead to the garage and I went around the Victoria Circus roundabout a bit fast and his ticket machine box and money flew out of the bus and burst open sending the money all over the road. Bells ringing in my ear, I stopped to help pick it all up.


Bridgemaster 319 at Victoria Circus on
route 5A which had been joined to
the Benfleet and Canvey route 3
by the time Ian was driving
I enjoyed driving the different types of buses. The AEC Bridgemasters were very bouncy on the suspension and all the school children used to bounce up the stairs causing the bus the move up and down, much to their delight. They were strange to drive as they had a high rev engine, no good on top speed but fast pulling away. The gear stick came out of the floor vertically behind you for about six inches then sloped at 45 degrees towards the front so when changing gear the movement was either up or down.


Open top Daimler 245
The Daimler seafront pre-select buses were a bit of a pig to drive as if you did not press the pre-select pedal down properly it would jump out of the floor and trap your knee under the steering wheel. The only way to push it back into the floor was to hold the steering wheel and jump up and down on it. The front entrance Leyland Lowlanders were quite nice to drive except that as I have long legs there was not much room under the steering wheel.


Aberdonian 205
One of my most frightening experiences was when another bus ran into the back of mine in the Fairway, Eastwood. In those days, routes 23 & 29 used to terminate at Eastwood Belgrave Road and as always crews left late so as not to hang about at bus stops. On this occasion I was on the 23 PD2 and left first with the 29 PD3 Highbridge following. I stopped at the Fairway School and heard the sound of skidding tyres and the crash of the bus hitting mine, pushing my staircase almost into the lower saloon. No injuries on either bus, thank goodness. The other driver was suspended for a time as punishment but it was later found that road surface had just been re-laid and something was wrong with the surface so he resumed driving after a shortened punishment.

The Albion Aberdonian single deckers had a gearbox that was like stirring soup even when in gear. These were used mainly on the Wakering OMO (one man operated) routes. I went onto the OMO roster after a time on the crew buses. The people in Wakering always gave you gifts at Christmas and apples in the summer - imagine that now.


Homemade jigsaw of Southend Regent 237
given to Ian by his father

Ian's father Cyril Banks
in front of SCT Regal 203
Looking back I enjoyed my time with SCT having followed in the footsteps of my Father who drove for Westcliff Motor Services and SCT. I can remember as a child walking through the SCT trolleybus depot, oh for a camera then.

I left the buses and went back to my old job but in the early seventies I joined Eastern National at Southend as a driver but that’s another story.

Ian Banks
Southend
Essex.
December 2006

Ian has been a great supporter of the SCT'61 site - a lot of his photos are on the site and you can see even more on his Fotopic site.


 

Page last updated Wednesday 27 December 2006