New York photos now on this site

I have now been able to upload photographs to the blog so see the two previous instalments!

MTA5261 passes LT1 on W 15th Street New York

Two iconic vehicles in Manhattan

More from New York

At 1300 separate helicopters brought HRH Prince Harry and David Cameron to the west side heliport in New York.  There they were whisked aboard LT1 - the very first New Bus for London - for a short drive through Manhattan traffic to the Milk Studio in the Meatpacking District.

After photographs from the platform, they joined a busy reception where British technology and innovation was being showcased. 

Prince Harry was amazed we had managed to bring the bus across the Atlantic. The Prime Minister acknowledged the huge help we had received from the NY authorities in order to allow the bus to move around the city.

Afterwards, the parked bus outside remained a huge attraction for the media and visitors. Eventually it was time to proceed under escort back to the bus' parking location. It has several more guest appearances to do over the next couple of weeks, promoting tourism and everything British.

Central to this of course is the showcasing of tremendous British technology and innovation. There was also huge interest at the prospect of export business for not only the bus but what makes it special inside and underneath.  Wrights' top team was on hand to demonstrate this and explain to an eager audience.

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New Bus for London in America!

 A red London bus is again gracing the streets of New York.

A New Bus for London is today travelling along the streets of Manhattan as it undertakes a special assignment conveying HRH Prince Harry and Prime Minister David Cameron to a major event promoting British innovation and technology.

LT1 was already back in the factory at Ballymena for upgrading to prototype standard when the assignment to send a bus to the USA arose. It was therefore further prepared with special vinyls and taken amidst great secrecy to Southampton for shipment to New York.

It was unloaded on Friday 9th May where a team was ready to receive it. Thanks to extensive co-operation by the City and State authorities, this vehicle (which is overheight, and out of compliance for operation here) then began a series of test runs and driver training. (One stipulation of the insurance is that a US licensed driver is at the wheel).

Later today our VVIPs will arrive aboard the bus and visit the GREAT Britain event here in the Meatpacking district of Manhattan.

Right now the final polishing and cleaning is taking place and the guests are assembling.

More later!

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Boris in Ballymena

The Mayor Boris Johnson returned to Northern Ireland today. During his previous visit, he personally drove the first New Bus for London off the production line. Today he opened the brand new chassis plant where all the chassis for these vehicles and the single-decker Streetlite are now being assembled. The new site is in Antrim, some 15 miles from Wrights’ HQ in Ballymena.

The Mayor, accompanied by Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Teresa Villiers, toured the facility. Walking around he spoke to numerous Wrights employees involved in the building of the New Bus for London fleet before making a spectacular speech from the platform. This wasn’t any platform, of course, it was the open platform of LT17 which was positioned in the factory for the occasion. Afterwards he unveiled a plaque commemorating the occasion. 

The entourage then boarded a brand new vehicle and we all headed to the main Wrights facility. On arrival the Mayor walked the production line and gave numerous media interviews. 

Our next stop was at a local country house hotel where 200 members of the Northern Ireland Chamber of Commerce had assembled together with numerous members of the NI Assembly and other dignitaries. 

Once again the Mayor’s speech made some hard-hitting remarks including forceful commentary on local, national and international issues whilst simultaneously charming and entertaining the audience.

In particular he reminded the audience that investment in London ripples through the economy of the whole country bringing jobs, investment and confidence. Whilst much of the NBfL is built in Northern Ireland, the engines are made in Darlington, the flooring in Cornwall, the destination equipment in Manchester and so on.

Production of the New Bus for London is now in full swing with two lines producing vehicles. The vehicles for route 24 – due to be converted on 22 June – are now all complete and the batch for the second route is well underway.

It can now be revealed that the buses will be registered in Northern Ireland and carry consecutive registrations in a special series granted to us by the authorities. They will all be registered in a series commencing LTZ1001 which includes the reregistering of all of those which have previously been registered with UK marks for testing and training purposes.

The allocation of these marks – some 20-30 years ahead of when they might have appeared naturally in the system – is thanks to the co-operation of the DVLA in both Swansea and in Northern Ireland.

Tunnelling under London

London is full of tunnels. The latest additions are for Crossrail and I was really pleased to be invited to see them for myself. We walked from Limmo Penninsula to the Tunnel Boring Machine ("Elizabeth") headed west. 

Crossrail is Europe's biggest construction project right now. It will be a 73 mile long railway linking Essex with Berkshire with 24 trains an hour running underneath central London in 26 miles of newly dug tunnel. Different to our current infrastructure, these deep level tunnels are much larger than on the Underground’s tube lines, for example they are some 60% larger than the Victoria line. 

Crossrail’s long history can be traced back to a stillborn project in the 1880s. The idea re-emerged towards the end of World War II. After that it was very much "off" and "on" from mid-1970s. It features in the 1974 Rail Study, and again in a British Rail discussion paper in 1980. A Bill to build Crossrail was rejected in 1994. Subsequent studies and reviews continued to outline the benefits which would accrue to London if it were to be built. 

The London East-West Study by the SRA in 2000 reconfirmed the need for an East-West cross-London railway. After much discussion over the funding model, the current Crossrail project emerged. Finally after all these years, trains will be running through the new tunnels in 2018. 

The scale of the Crossrail works is incredible. Eight tunnel boring machines are working their way under London. These 1000 ton machines are at work day and night - indeed you can see their progress at http://www.crossrail.co.uk/route/near-you# 

After our safety briefing we were taken down in a lift at the vertical shaft and then walked some considerable distance to where TBM 'Elizabeth' was working. As the TBMs tunnel further their power supply is lengthened and their spoil extraction arrangements increased. It is warm and dry underground. But the progress is fast: 100m a week. 

I stood in a mostly finished 7.1m wide tunnel, some 40m deep underground which for the last billion years or so has been solid earth. As I reflected on this with a construction worker I asked him how long ago this particular place was solid London clay. 

"Tuesday" he said...... 

Back on the surface we saw the consequences of the work. Spoil from the tunnels is removed and shipped away by rail or water for re-use. A new nature reserve at Wallasea Island in Essex in a joint RSPB project is the main beneficiary. 

And no matter how glossy the brochures or snazzy the videos are about Crossrail in the near future - the current reality is that heavy industrial machines and serious labour are digging under London and shifting the spoil onto trains and into ships. 

Digging will be complete in 2014 and then follows the complex task of fitting out, laying the tracks and building a railway...... 

Spring Gathering

British technical genius - pre-war RT113 passes Concorde 202

The first ever Spring Gathering at the Brooklands Museum was held last Sunday and I was delighted to be asked to preside over proceedings. For many, it was the first visit to the London Bus Museum in its new home.

My first role was to host a reception for our sponsors and for those who we hope might become so. Becoming a sponsor entitles you to access a unique facility for conferences, training, and events. Large organisations normally spend considerable sums on ordinary hotel and conference facilities anyway. A small proportion of their budget for this generates significant funds for the Museum. We are especially grateful for the existing sponsors and those who signed up on the day.

I acknowledge the support already received from:
Alexander Dennis
Arriva London
CBS Outdoor
London United
Epsom Coaches
Metroline
Oracle Creative
Wrightbus

We then moved outdoors and I was delighted to again meet Denise Morgan, sister to the late Colin Curtis OBE, our former President, who was for some 36 years at the heart of technical developments at London Transport.

Denise expressed to all assembled, how she had no real idea how her brother had been such an important person to this industry, and how many friends he had. I presented her with a signed painting depicting Colin's favourite vehicles posing outside the original Museum building, now demolished.

Next we welcomed into the Museum's stewardship and thanked their owners: RT2657 from the Paris Transport Museum, RML2760 from Stagecoach, and RW3 from Chris Stanley and friends. On behalf of the Museum, I can promise that the hard work to date will be rewarded by making these vehicles available for the outside world to see. 

Finally I was joined by Mark Threapleton, MD Stagecoach London, and George Psaradakis who was the driver of the bus on route 30 destroyed in the terrorist attack of 7th July 2005. A brand new ADL Enviro 400 bus was built to replace it and poignantly named 'Spirit of London'. Shockingly, vandals set fire to it last year causing huge damage. It was unthinkable that this bus - a testimony to the strength of feeling of Londoners to 'carry on' despite the tragedy of 7/7 - would be scrapped. It has therefore been completely rebuilt and here at Brooklands was unveiled again, once more as the Spirit of London, demonstrating Londoner's absolute determination not to be put down by cowardly acts.

So on this beautiful sunny spring day there was plenty for all to see; a collection which is now properly exhibited in the context of other pioneering forms of transport. The museum lies in the shadow of the famous Brooklands racing circuit, and the various exhibits are intermingled with such notables as the ubiquitous Vickers Vanguard and pre-production prototype Concorde.

The original founders of this enterprise would be amazed at the progress made.

True Blue

For some years there has been a plan - codenamed Operation True Blue - which set out in some detail the arrangements for Baroness Thatcher's funeral. As is the way of these things the plan is robust enough to make sure that it can swing into action at a moment's notice but leaves some details to be progressed at a later date.

It might seem a little morbid to be discussing these arrangements whilst the person is still alive, however there is so much to do in the 10 days or so from death to funeral that this advance planning is essential.

Therefore, minutes after 1128 on 8th April, Operation True Blue swung into action with the funeral service on the following Wednesday a little over a week later. For us that means road closures, street furniture removal, bus service diversions, and a thousand other issues all to be done jointly with all the agencies each having their own long list of things to do. In the middle of this mix are the niceties of protocol and overseas diplomacy (so for example the Argentinian President was not invited but his Ambassador to London was).

The risk of protest, disruption, and terrorism was always present and a quite separate plan to deal with those issues was also devised. Thankfully wet weather helped dampen the Saturday protests down and gave us a clue as to what we might expect on the day of the funeral.

The funeral of course is only part of the story - there are many other movements to arrange. The body itself had to leave the Ritz Hotel with the undertakers and return to the Palace of Westminster later. A full rehearsal of the funeral procession had to take place at 0300 a couple of days before the actual event.

A hierarchy of daily meetings sorts out the issues and enables information to be exchanged. Best of all, it provides an excellent forum for problems to be solved by inter-agency co-operation.

A fairly recent addition to the plan was the introduction of receptions at Mansion House and Guildhall for the significant number of important guests especially from overseas. This enlarged the closure area affecting a larger chunk of the City of London and guests from St Paul's Cathedral were faced with a walk along closed streets to those venues. Not all are able to walk so far or fast enough. Three single-decker buses were laid on for those who couldn't.

DMLs 44264, 44266 and 44267 were provided from First's Lea Interchange depot. They were chosen as the buses had to have enough seats, the facility for one wheelchair user, and be small enough to turn around in the streets involved and make return journeys. They were very well used and guests were delighted they were available. It isn't very often so many high-ranking overseas officials travel together on a London bus! 

After the funeral there were movements to the Royal Hospital Chelsea and Mortlake Crematorium before finally London returned to normal and the period of undoing all of the changes got underway.

Naturally, by Thursday morning, London was back to its old self again. It would be tempting to say that all those involved breathed a huge sigh of relief but of course over the next three days the London Marathon has to be delivered..........

The team in action and under escort!

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