West Riding Automobile
1954
Leyland Titan PD2/22
Roe L24/26R

During the mid 1950s West Riding favoured the Leyland PD2 for its double deck requirements, taking 12 in 1953 with Roe L27/26R bodywork, and a further 10 in 1954, also with Roe lowbridge bodies, but in these the upper deck capacity was reduced to 24. The tin fronted PD2/22 was 7ft 6ins wide and had vacuum brakes. From 1955 West Riding turned to the Guy Arab with Roe bodywork and maintained its allegiance with Guy into the ill fated Wulfrunian saga. GHL 302 was delivered in November 1954 with fleet number 753, but that does not appear to be the number being carried when it was photographed in Leeds in April 1970, which looks something like 833 or 853, originally Guy Arab numbers, though the first digit is partially missing. Can anyone explain, please?

Photograph and Copy contributed by Roger Cox

20/01/22 – 06:48

A couple of points I’m unsure of:
1) Didn’t West Riding co-operate with Guy in the Wulfrunian project?
2) I seem to recall seeing pictures of West Riding buses in red, or was this my wild imaginings?

Chris Hebbron

21/01/22 – 06:15

West Riding had its origins in the Wakefield and District Light Railway Company formed in 1903 to build tramways centred on that town. Two years later this company was taken over by the Yorkshire (West Riding) Electric Tramways Company, itself a subsidiary of the Yorkshire Electric Tramways Construction Syndicate Ltd, which had ambitious plans, authorised in the West Riding Tramways Act of 1904, to construct an additional fifty miles of tramways. In practice most was not built and the initial Wakefield and District network formed the core of the tramway operations authorised by statute. In became apparent by the 1920s that the future of road public transport lay in the increasingly sophisticated motor bus rather than the tram, and the Yorkshire (West Riding) Electric Tramways Company formed a subsidiary, the West Riding Automobile Company to operate its bus fleet. The tram network was finally abandoned in 1932, to be taken over by buses, and accordingly the Yorkshire (West Riding) Electric Tramways Company was renamed the West Riding Automobile Company in 1935, with the subsidiary company of that name being wound up. All this forms the basis of the West Riding company’s colour schemes. The former statutory tramway services were operated by buses in the red livery, whilst the rest of the network, including the former Bullock operations purchased in 1950, ran buses in the green colour scheme. This continued up to the sale of the business to the Transport Holding Company in 1967 which then passed to the National Bus Company in 1969 and on into the aesthetically uninspiring era of Freddie Wood’s poppy red. The full history of the West Riding company’s tramway forebears may be found on the Local Transport History Library website.

Roger Cox

14/06/22 – 06:29

One of this batch of PD2/22s spent some time with Bannister T/A Isle Coaches of Owston Ferry, I believe they may have bought it via Dennis Higgs (Dealer). Can anybody tell me when it retired from West Riding and if it actually was bought by Dennis Higgs

Chris Proctor

17/06/22 – 06:10

(i) In answer to Roger’s query about the fleet number, I think the problem is simply that the camera does not take kindly to the flowery script. I have looked at a number of photos of this batch. In no case is there any mention in the text of any fleet number other than the original, and in no case can I read the fleet number on the bus unless I know what it’s supposed to be – and often not even then. This 1969 photo of GHL302 in the Transport Library (with typically wayward caption) shows it more clearly: https://thetransportlibrary.co.uk/
(ii) The same photo also shows an interesting feature of the bodywork. Normally Roe lowbridge bodies were built with equal depth windows all round on both decks. But here, and on the subsequent Guy Arabs, the lower-deck windows were deeper on the nearside than on the offside. This is quite a logical thing to do with the lowbridge layout, because of the intrusion of the sunken offside gangway into the lower saloon. But as far as I’m aware, Roe only did it for West Riding.
(iii) Chris asked about the Wulfrunian. The answer is that West Riding not only collaborated on the project, they inspired it. The Wulfrunian was developed at West Riding’s request.

Peter Williamson

Portsmouth Corporation
1952
Leyland Titan PD2/10
Leyland H30/26R

Seen on 13 August 1967 beside the superb gardens at Southsea seafront is Portsmouth Corporation No.59, GTP 976, one of a batch of twenty five Leyland PD2/10 buses with Leyland H30/26R bodywork delivered in 1952. No.59 was withdrawn in 1969, and the last of this batch went in 1971. My childhood trips to Southsea in the late 1940s/early 1950s were always undertaken by trolleybus, a memory to savour, and it is a matter of personal regret that I didn’t manage to capture a picture of one of the trolleys before the system closed in July 1963.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Roger Cox

17/10/18 – 07:58

International Progressive Coachline bought some of these for use on contract work in the early 70’s . Their yard was at Waterbeach near Cambridge. There are a few photos of their buses and coaches on this web site already.
The owner was ‘Paddy’Harris, and the manager was Barry Parsisson. I worked for them briefly in 1972, but after a few months went back to ECOC for an easier life, and less stress !

Norman Long

18/10/18 – 07:35

After many years, the sole survivor of this batch, GTP 975, has turned up safe and reasonable well.
As a schoolboy it was always nice to have one of these beauties turn up as a school relief.

Dave French

19/10/18 – 07:18

As this is a warm sunny day, without a need for a covered-top bus, I imagine that it was an extra covering the busiest part of the route between Clarence Pier and South Parade Pier, rather that going on to Hayling Ferry. The Farington body was very handsome and looked good in Portsmouth’s livery, especially with the white rather than the earlier grey roof. You may have missed snapping a Pompey trolleybus, Roger, but at least you can console yourself with the colour one I posted on this website, long ago.

Chris Hebbron

06/09/20 – 17:09

These were really attractive buses- the windows were opened with a lever- as were later Portsmouth Titans up to those last 1959 PD3s with the sliding windows. The internal panels were covered in some kind of hard-wearing cloth material and not just painted and there was a big plate where the conductor stood with Leyland on it. I am pleased to here that one of these buses still exists. Portsmouth seemed to like to keep one of its older bus types for training but that never happened with these.

Nick Ratnieks

08/09/20 – 06:25

Actually, Nick, two of this batch did become trainers for the Corporation. These were Nos 58-59, transferred to these duties in August / September 1969. They lasted until January 1973, and were sold to Amos (dealer), of Ludlow in October 1973, with no further mention, so presumably scrapped afterwards. [Details from PSV Circle fleet history, though I do remember these two becoming trainers].

Michael Hampton

Manchester Corporation
1951
Leyland Titan PD2/3
Metro-Cammell H32/26R

Seen in Piccadilly in August 1969 in the final months of Manchester Corporation ownership is No 3218, JND 619, one of a batch of Leyland PD2/3 buses purchased in 1951. Despite appearances, the bodywork is not by Crossley, being instead of the then standard Manchester design built by Metro-Cammell. Having given some eighteen years of service to Manchester, this bus survived to pass into the SELNEC era, though not, I suspect, for long.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Roger Cox

23/07/18 – 06:58

This would be on a rush hour full service length extra on which these and the similar looking PD1/3s, which were withdrawn between 1967 and 1968, were regular performers. According to the official SELNEC fleet allocation these PD2/3s were not taken into stock, although Eyre and Heaps in the Manchester Bus have all but 3224, withdrawn in April 1969, transferred to SELNEC. What I suspect happened was that the vehicles were deemed withdrawn at midnight, MCTD having ceased at 23.59 on October 31 1969, SELNEC coming into being at 00.01 on November 1 – such are the legal niceties!

Further to my previous comments, the SELNEC operational fleet allocation on formation has 300 PD2s from Manchester and 103 from Salford in the Central Area fleet listing. No Manchester and Salford PD2s were allocated to other divisions on formation. The SELNEC stock allocation i.e vehicle assets taken over in whatever state, lists 501 PD2s in the Central area. Taking Eyre and Heaps listings in the Manchester Bus and in the Salford lists available, the number of PD2s owned by those undertakings on October 31 1969 was 387 in Manchester and 103 in Salford giving a total of 490. The situation would seem to have been that 67 PD2s from the MCW and Leyland bodied JND registered batch in the sequence 3200-3299 were transferred as assets but immediately deleted from the available fleet along with 1 from the Northern Counties batch 3300-3329 and 19 from the Leyland bodied batch 3330-3369. There is photographic evidence of one or more of these batches pressed into SELNEC service. There is however a discrepancy of 11 PD2s between the 501 listed as assets and the total of 403 operational and 87 midnight withdrawals. If anyone can find the missing 11, given that as far as I can ascertain, the assets of the Central division did not include any transfers in from elsewhere at the time of formation on November 1 1969 I would be grateful.

Phil Blinkhorn

24/07/18 – 07:25

I regularly travelled to and from school on these buses between 1964 and 1967. I understand that the shallower windows on each side at the rear were to support the platform which was not supported underneath as on most buses. I have read that Metro Cammell came up with this design, although Crossley adopted it as standard for a while.

Don McKeown

25/07/18 – 06:11

Manchester certainly got its moneys worth out of these buses and although quite elderly they were used on many lengthy prestige routes until the end of MCTD. They regularly appeared on the 17, 24 and 90 in Rochdale by which time the joint operating partners, Rochdale and Oldham on the 24 and 90 were using more modern stock. I always found them rather drab buses to travel in with lots of dark woodwork and a fairly depressing moquete pattern for the seats. And of course like most buses of that time the upper deck reeked of stale tobacco smoke. I think the experience of 1950’s upper deck travel so Mum could have a fag made me a life-long non-smoker!

Philip Halstead

26/07/18 – 06:45

I was living on Barlow Moor Road in Didsbury in 1969 and 1970, and I remember 3218 as being the only one of these at Parrs Wood garage – very much the odd one out; always slightly surprised when it turned up, which it often did on rush hour extras.

Steve Owen

27/07/18 – 06:45

I have slides of 3237, 3246 and 3255 taken in Manchester on October 29 1970. They did not sport the green SELNEC Central S.
They were showing the following route numbers 64X, 63X, and 62X respectively.

Stephen Bloomfield

29/07/18 – 07:36

Stephen, the Central flash was Blue.
Green was for the Southern Division, Magenta was the Northern Division, and the Orange was for the Coaches, Parcels, and Central activities. Brown was later used for the Cheshire Division, the ex North Western Road Car Company.

Stephen Howarth

05/08/18 – 07:52

I was using rush-hour limited-stop services along the Hyde Road corridorout of Chorlton Street bus station for a time between 1970 and ’71 and several of these "32xx" PD2s turned up regularly on routes such as the "124" and "207/208/209". The buses were run-down inside (torn-rexine) and were probably living outside the Hyde Road depot in the yard,awaiting the chop.

John Hardman

05/08/18 – 09:41

John, you are most likely correct in your assumption as to the source of the rush hour extras. SELNEC would have preferred not to have taken any vehicle assets over fifteen years old but the legislation demanded that the undertakings absorbed were absorbed lock, stock and barrel. The distinction that was made between the operational fleet and the total vehicle assets was quickly blurred due to the need to move vehicles around the divisions to introduce OMO and the need for extra vehicles caused by delays in deliveries. It would seem that the best runners from the withdrawn stock that still had valid certificates of fitness were temporarily relicensed to fill rush hour gaps. It was estimated that in 1965 one third of the Manchester fleet was retained for rush hour duties, generally vehicles over fifteen years old and apart from the 1953/1954 Daimlers which SELNEC took into the operational fleet, all those older vehicles in the Manchester fleet in 1969 were originally listed as non-operational. In passing it is worth commenting that the MCW PD2s outlived the newer Northern Counties bodied batch from 1953.

Phil Blinkhorn

07/08/18 – 06:06

I moved to Manchester to become a student in October 1970 and I am absolutely certain that MCTD 32xx series buses were in service then and at least for a few months afterwards. I do not recall seeing any 33xx series fleet numbers and I assumed that they had been withdrawn previously although at that stage of my university career I admit that I did not go far off the Oxford Road/Wilmslow Road axis.

Peter Cook

08/08/18 – 06:06

I became a Manchester student a year after Peter, and didn’t move far off the Oxford Road/Wilmslow Road axis either. My abiding memory is of the 1953/4 Daimlers on the 44/46. I do not remember the PD2s at all.

David Oldfield

09/08/18 – 07:21

Regarding Phil’s comment about a third of the Manchester fleet, I must admit I’ve always understood it to be the other way round – i.e. that Manchester’s peak problem was so severe that only one third of the fleet was out all day, with the majority being confined to rush-hour extras, rush-hour services, works services, works variants and works contracts. But I’ve believed that for so long now that I’ve no idea where I got it from.

Peter Williamson

10/08/18 – 07:12

Regarding Peter Williamson’s comments on the proportions of the Manchester fleet, the situation as he has it was certainly the case up until the late 1950s. From then things started to change. Rapidly increasing car ownership was the main factor but there were others. New vehicles delivered from 1957 had around 17% more seats than those they replaced and the eventual inclusion of reasonable numbers of Fleetlines and Atlanteans saw this figure rise to over a third more seats per bus. Diesel trains replacing steam on commuter lines and the electrification of lines to Crewe saw faster, cleaner and competitively cheap trains and the decimation of the Crossley fleet ahead of normal life expectancy were all factors which changed the the fleet use proportions. By 1969 the use of private cars had massively increased over that of 1960 and with far further large capacity vehicles in service, including the Mancunians, the need for a large rush hour fleet had diminished further.

Phil Blinkhorn

12/08/18 – 07:18

I’ve spent some time trying to reconcile the number of PD2s the SELNEC Central Division inherited and operated given the confusing numbers published in Eyre and Heaps The Manchester Bus, Manchester and Salford – One Hundred Years of Municipal Transport, Stewart Brown’s Greater Manchester Buses and my own sources from MCTD, Salford and SELNEC from 1968 through 1970. My own notes show that SELNEC intended to reduce its fleet of traditional front engined vehicles in short order and introduce OMO as soon as possible – an aspiration repeatedly delayed by late deliveries, the need to write down assets and union negotiations. It is a fact backed by written information from SELNEC, that SELNEC Central Division required an Operational Fleet for daytime running of 400 PD2s to cover services, maintenance, reserve vehicles for breakdowns and education departments’ needs. The Operational Fleet as far as PD2s were concerned was restricted to vehicles of less than 15 years old, in fact the oldest vehicles were the 1956 3400 series PND registered ex Manchester PD2s. Manchester contributed 300 PD2s, Salford 103. No vehicles to the best of my knowledge were imported to Central from other divisions. In addition to the Operational Fleet it appears Central had a fleet of licenced, driver training and withdrawn PD2s, all transferred from MCTD. The Manchester Bus in its vehicle listings at the back of the book infers the PD2s older than 15 years old that were transferred to SELNEC were fully licenced vehicles. Manchester and Salford a Century of Municipal Transport breaks down the transfer into driving school and withdrawn vehicles, as can be found on page 301 of The Manchester Bus, leading to the conclusion that the withdrawn vehicles were delicenced at midnight on 31 October/1 November 1969. However, the Eyre and Heaps publications disagree with each other in terms of numbers and because Manchester and Salford a Century of Municipal Transport was published much later than the last edition of The Manchester Bus, I have taken the latter’s figures. Central still required a reasonable number of rush hour extras and the older PD2s that were licenced, were thus employed. Most were withdrawn during 1970, the last of the pre 1956 PD2s in early 1971. The next discrepancy is that Greater Manchester Buses states that 501 PD2s were inherited in total and does not break down the numbers.
MCW Manchester Standard bodied PD2s 3200-3223 and 3225-3264 were transferred as licenced – total 64.
Leyland bodied PD2s 3287/94/99 transferred as licenced – total 3
3266/71/75/78/88/90 transferred as driving school – total 6
3265/67/69/70/72/77-79/82/89/92-95/97 transferred as withdrawn assets – total 15
Northern Counties bodied PD2s 3323 transferred as licenced – total 1
3324/25 transferred as driving school – total 2
Leyland bodied PD2s 3331/32/34/37/39/40/42/45-47/50-52/54/56-60/64 transferred as licenced – total 20
The overall PD2 assets transferred, if the later figures compared to the previous figures I had are to be believed number 514, now 13 more than noted in Greater Manchester Buses. Anyone else want to have a shot at sorting this?

Phil Blinkhorn

13/08/18 – 05:57

I’m surprised to read that there was a requirement specifically for 400 PD2s. What about the contemporary Daimler CVG6s (and CCG6s? Surely there would be some overlap between these two types?

Don McKeown

14/08/18 – 06:00

Unlike the situation with the PD2s, there was no cut off for Daimlers older than 15 years as the total of front engined Daimlers required for the Operational Fleet was 368 vehicles and to achieve this 48 CVG6s from Salford dating from between 1950 and 1952, 67 CVG6s from Manchester dating from 1950-1951 and all 110 of the 4400 batch of CVG6s and CVG5s from 1953 to 1955 were taken into all day service, though almost all of the 1950-1952 CVG6s from both city’s fleets had gone by the end of 1970, penny numbers of the Salford examples provided rush hour extras in early 1971. Again there are discrepancies in the published information. Greater Manchester Buses has it that 368 CVGs in total were taken by the Central Division but adding the requirement of 368 vehicles to the withdrawn and driving school assets taken over, the total is 407. the breakdown is as follows:-
Salford CVG6 415/16/18/25/28/29/33/39/57/61/63/65/70/73/78/83/84/85/88/98/506/07/11/21/22/24/25/27-29/31/33/35-41/43-45/47/48/52-54/60 Total 48 to Operational Fleet.
419/22/58/64/66/67/69/77/502/08-10/12/13/15/26/49/50 Total 18 taken over as withdrawn
Manchester CVG6/CVG5 4111/18/22-37/39-48/50-74/76-89/4400-4509 Total 177 to Operational Fleet
4101 Total 1 to driving school
4106-4108/4112-4116/19/21 Total 20 to driving school.
Post 1955 Daimlers CVG5 and CVG6s taken over were:
ex Salford 111-146/189-190 Total 38
ex Manchester 4510-4654 Total 105
It would seem the Greater Manchester Bus, unlike with the PD2s, only listed the number of CVGs in the Operational Fleet

Phil Blinkhorn