Copyright Keith A Jenkinson

York – West Yorkshire
1937
Bristol GO5G
ECW H54R

It was John Whitaker’s amusing recollection, (posting of East Yorkshire Leyland PD1), of his agonising journey from York to Leeds on a 1935 York-West Yorkshire GO5G that prompted this submission. It is taken from Keith A Jenkinson’s excellent book ‘York City Buses’, (my grateful thanks to the author for his kind permission to use it). It is actually from the 1937 batch of 4 vehicles, but apart from small differences to the window corners, it’s external appearance is virtually identical to the 1935 batch. The picture shows the vehicle at ECW before it entered service, in the pre-WW II livery and is, no doubt, rather smarter than the bus on which John had his small adventure, but I thought he – and hopefully others -  might be interested to see how it would have looked in its prime. Even ECW were capable of small mistakes, however; the registration number is wrong!

Photograph and Copy contributed by Roy Burke

Copyright Ian Wild

Potteries Motor Traction
1957
Leyland Titan PD2/20
Willowbrook L27/28R

This bus was new to Baxters of Hanley as their fleet number 11 in March 1957 and was acquired by PMT when they bought out the Baxter business in December 1958. It was somewhat different from the contemporary PMT purchased Leylands having a concealed radiator and rear entrance and by 1968 was one of only three double deckers in the fleet without platform doors. A similar but slightly older bus from the Baxter fleet became PMT L510 which was rebuilt with a MCW style top deck after an altercation with the notorious Glebe Street railway bridge adjacent to Stoke Station. L679 was allocated to Stoke Garage and is seen in Woodhouse Street outside its home depot on 10th October 1970. By this time it was normally only used for a morning and afternoon peak hour working on the Longton to Newcastle Estates group of services (numbers 98-103) where it was odd man out amongst the Atlanteans and Fleetlines. By the date of this photo was used in between peaks for driver training – note the slot for an L plate above the radiator grille. It became a permanent driver training vehicle in December 1972 and was withdrawn for disposal in 1976.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Ian Wild

A full list of Titan codes can be seen here.

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06/04/11 – 05:00

Would I be correct in thinking that these ex Baxters vehicles were the only PD2’s ever bodied by Willowbrook in this style? By 1957, Willowbrook had changed their design for deckers to the more rounded style, as on the Barton PS1 rebuilds and several deliveries to that design actually pre-date the vehicle shown. I believe the very last one to this ‘old’ design was a Daimler CVG6 supplied to Blue Bus Services in 1960.

Chris Barker

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08/04/11 – 05:00

Yes I did a bit of driver training in this vehicle but I must admit I liked my normal training bus better which was LEH 745 L337 NCME body.

Michael Crofts

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28/04/11 – 06:36

I passed my PSV test in 1968 on L337, I preferred my training turns on L466 (now preserved) as it had a sliding cab door which I was able to leave open. I remember struggling with hill starts on Penkhull New Road!!
The Chief Instructor / Examiner was George Clews but I don’t remember the names of the other two Instructors. Rather unusually the Driving School reported to the Chief Engineer rather than the Traffic Manager.

Ian Wild

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06/05/11 – 06:46

Hi ian, Yes my instructor was George Clews but my examiner was from the D.O.T he took me into a cul-de-sac by mistake and I had a devil of a job doing a shunt to turn around with 337. Yes those were the days on Penkhull bank….

Michael Crofts

Copyright Bob Gell

South Wales Transport
1960
AEC Bridgemaster 2B3RA
Park Royal H43/29F

Now here is a shot of a bus somewhat out of its area, the photo of this South Wales Bridgemaster was taken in July 1969, in Dewsbury Bus Station. At the time it was working on Yorkshire Woolen district routes you can see the top blind displaying ‘Yorkshire’. I am not sure why YWD would need to hire/buy something so non-standard as the above for their fleet – shortage of vehicles for some reason perhaps or late delivery of new ones?
I would be interested to know the answer – no doubt someone will know and let me know.
Also in view is a 1967 West Riding Marshall B51F bodied Leyland Panther PSUR1/1 registration LHL 171F fleet number 171.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Bob Gell

04/04/11 – 07:04

At the time Yorkshire Woollen had a severe vehicle crisis. In addition to the Bridgemasters from South Wale some vintage Bristol Ks from West Yorkshire were also acquired. In addition a number of former Sheffield C fleet buses also entered service these were PD2s with Roe and ECW bodywork and some early Atlanteans all tended to be used on local area routes in Dewsbury

Chris Hough

04/04/11 – 07:07

The reason why Yorkshire Woollen had these Bridgemasters was due to a severe shortage of buses.Later Bristol K double deckers were acquired from West Yorkshire and United Auto.

Philip Carlton

05/04/11 – 05:30

Thanks, Chris and Philip, for confirming that YWD needed to buy additional vehicles because of a shortage of buses. I think most enthusiasts know they had those problems, but how and why did they occur? Every operator’s fleet needs eventually to be replaced, and YWD would, (or certainly should), have had a well-established renewal programme, as did all BET companies. That was standard policy throughout the group. So what caused the ‘severe crisis’?

Roy Burke

08/04/11 – 05:00

Chris and Philip Thanks for the answer to my query – as you probably guessed, this was taken at the same time as the West Yorkshire K5G already posted.

Bob Gell

24/11/15 – 06:08

With regard to Roy Burke’s comment, the reason these things occur is generally twofold firstly manufacturers delivering buses late; secondly and particularly when the old CoF system was in operation a larger number of buses than that planned for could need replacing.
Of course the third reason is rarer but most to be feared: prohibitions on running vehicles by the Traffic Commissioner.
Some fleets seem more prone to vehicle shortage than others. at SMT/SOL/Eastern Scottish it seemed to be endemic.
Here we are talking about Yorkshire Woollen and I have a captcha ending in HD.

Stephen Allcroft

17/02/16 – 05:53

I am of an age that remembers the South Wales Bridgemasters coming to Yorkshire Woollen. The first one I saw was on the B&C services to Ossett from Fir Cottage and as someone who loves AEC buses and (Regent Vs) and still does it was hard to work out what was going until a really nice conductor told me saying "E lad we getting assorts coming, God knows what next" at this time various buses turned up on these routes ex Sheffield Atleanteans with I think regarding plates that began with BWB and buses from West Yorkshire which seemed to stay on the Thornhill Bristall A route but really at that time I think there was quite a shortage of new buses coming into service and as long as a bus turned up you didn’t bother where it came from but as a bus enthusiast it was paradise goodness knows how Central Works at Dewsbury knew where to find spares for them.

Dave Parkin