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Imagine if FACCo had a facility like this!
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Fri Dec 17, 2021 1:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

W.B.:

Agreed; too, we can certainly all be thankful that New York did not suffer the tremendous amount of heavy bomb damage that London endured; entire neighborhoods and business districts were totally and entirely decimated.

Between 1940 and 1941 nearly 40,000 high-explosive bombs and millions of incendiaries fell on London; even more serious raids occurred between 1944 and 1945.

LT, during the duration of the war, suffered the loss of 166 buses and coaches, 69 trams, 15 trolleybuses, and 19 tube cars, with thousands more damaged.

During bombing raids, many buses were blown apart, crushed, and mangled; others were catapulted into the air, and came to rest against gutted buildings.

Photos of such horrendous destruction are still sobering today.

In some areas, the bombs penetrated the mezzanine levels of Tube stations, resulting in not only many human casualties, but also, buses that fell into the huge craters from the bomb blasts.

Driving at night (or, for that matter, walking) was a great hazard, with all street lighting and electric store signage switched off, and even traffic signals were wearing lens "hoods".

Kerbs (curbs) were also outlined in white paint, as were tree trunks and lampposts/signposts, for better nighttime visibility, barely noticeable as it was.

Even bus signage was affected; many buses now displayed "restricted" roller curtains, often with blanked-out destinations or route numbers.

The long-etablished use of wooden destination boards, used in conjunction with roller sign boxes on the older double-deckers, disappeared, resulting in large blank areas beneath the remaining roller curtain boxes......

"NYO"


Last edited by NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629 on Fri Dec 17, 2021 2:17 pm; edited 8 times in total
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Fri Dec 17, 2021 1:32 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

From Mr. Ogden's book on FACCo:......

"......along with most other bus companies, FACCo was ordered by the Office of Defense Transportation to reduce tire mileage and gas consumption with the onset of WW2......"

"......on December 6, 1942, Route #9 was discontinued (again), Route #19 became rush-hours only, and Route #20 was cut back to 55th St. and 12th Avenue......."

"............the Convent Avenue branch of Route #3, together with Routes #'s 6, 16, and 20 were abandoned altogether in June, 1943, and resumed in August, except that Route #16 was not re-instated until November, 1945.........."

Minimal "fallout" of the War, indeed, when compared to London.......

"NYO"


Last edited by NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629 on Fri Dec 17, 2021 5:12 pm; edited 1 time in total
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Fri Dec 17, 2021 5:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

London, 1946........

During 1946, LT was concentrating on restoring Central-area routes to prewar frequencies during the evenings and weekends, as well as doing some route expansion in the Country area.

Not only was GREEN LINE coach service restored (after being cancelled for the duration), but also, some expansion into areas not previously served.

LT's massive Chiswick Works also reverted back to peacetime bus work (during the War, parts for Halifax bombers were being manufactured at this location)

Fleet-wise, 140 new buses were delivered; these included both double-deckers and single-deck coaches.

The delivery of new postwar "RT"-types, however, would not begin until 1947......

"NYO"
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Fri Dec 17, 2021 8:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

In one respect, FACCo was far ahead of London when it came to the introduction of roller curtain sign boxes.

Such signs, innovations in their day, were used on FACCo's earliest buses; it would not be until well into the 1920's when roller sign boxes began to appear on London's buses.

These were found on both the new buses then entering service, as well as some of the newer of the oldest buses, when it came time for them to be upgraded with pneumatic tyres and enclosed tops.

FACCo also, I had mentioned earlier in this topic, began operating modern, rear-engined double-deckers at least 25 years before they first began to appear in London.......

"NYO"
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Sat Dec 18, 2021 12:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Compare a mid-1930's FACCo "Queen Mary" with the (LT) Daimler "FLEETLINE"; the latter bus was the first rear-engine double-decker to enter service in London, in the 1960's.

Interestingly, the FLEETLINE was also the first British double-decker to dispense with the traditional open rear platform, replacing it with rear (center) folding doors.

These were also the first double-deckers in London not to be operated with a two-man crew........

https://www.nycsubway.org/perl/show?156381

(courtesy: nycsubway.org)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daimler_Fleetline

"NYO"
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W.B. Fishbowl



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PostPosted: Sat Dec 18, 2021 2:23 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629 wrote:
From Mr. Ogden's book on FACCo:......

"......along with most other bus companies, FACCo was ordered by the Office of Defense Transportation to reduce tire mileage and gas consumption with the onset of WW2......"

"......on December 6, 1942, Route #9 was discontinued (again), Route #19 became rush-hours only, and Route #20 was cut back to 55th St. and 12th Avenue......."

"............the Convent Avenue branch of Route #3, together with Routes #'s 6, 16, and 20 were abandoned altogether in June, 1943, and resumed in August, except that Route #16 was not re-instated until November, 1945.........."

Minimal "fallout" of the War, indeed, when compared to London.......

"NYO"

And again - NYCO also felt the pinch of ODT regulations (which saw the #9 Seventh Avenue-8th Street and #22 Pitt and Ridge Streets lines discontinued "for the duration," and after the war made into rush-hours only, or made branches of other routes, or reduced to one franchise trip per day); as did the other private companies (and, in the outer boroughs, Green Bus, Jamaica Bus, Manhattan & Queens Transit, Queens Transit [or whoever preceded them], Surface, and the Board of Transportation itself). In the case of these buses, they had their headlights "blacked out" for the rest of the war.
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Sat Dec 18, 2021 3:29 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

W.B.:

Always appreciate your historical input..

I'm also wondering how FACCo dealt with the manpower shortage, during the War.

In London, over 22,000 drivers, conductors, guards, and motormen left for the armed services; also, mechanics, electricians, and machinists.

Also, the War halted the production and delivery of the new "RT" buses; deliveries would not begin again until 1947.

In New York, as I've said elsewhere in our discussions, that FACCo would have retired the older, open-top buses much earlier than they were (1946) had the War not intervened; also, it might well have been that, had there been no overseas conflicts, that new single-deck buses would have continued to be purchased, and, perhaps, leading to the retirement of ALL double-deckers, in the postwar years prior to 1953.

Perhaps, also, had the War not happened, FACCo might have seen delivery of a fleet of new YELLOW TD-5501's, instead of the lone "demo" (This demo was, of course, #2500, which, at the time, was thought to have been the model to replace double-deckers in both New York and Chicago)

I can easily see this new fleet of 5501's sending the open-toppers into retirement sometime in the early 1940's, several years prior to the actual year of retirement, 1946........

"NYO"
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Sat Dec 18, 2021 11:51 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

A further comparison between FACCo and LT, in the postwar years......

Unlike FACCo/NYO/"Tee-Yay", LT was experiencing a serious manpower shortage by the later 1950's.

Prior to the Second World War, LT had a long, and seemingly endless, line of "high calibre" people who wished to join the (then highly-respected) ranks of LT employees.

After the War, the flood of new applicants had dropped off sharply, so sharply, in fact, that LT recruitment had to look elsewhere for new employees.

Other, more distant, areas of Great Britain were tapped for new LT employees; also, Scotland and Ireland.

When these areas had been "mined" for new recruits, LT looked overseas, to Barbados, Jamaica, and Trinidad.

Hundreds of men from these tropical areas came to work for LT (at the onset, mostly as bus conductors and Tube guards); in later years, these immigrant men rose through the ranks, and became bus and Tube drivers themselves.

Many stayed with LT for several decades, prior to retirement.

So, it would seem that FACCo, thankfully, did not to endure such a serious manpower shortage.

Of course, by the time that LT was going overseas to recruit new employees, FACCo itself would soon vanish, and the MaBSTOA era was waiting in the wings.

The "Tee-Yay", of course, was New York's equivalent of LT, operating the vast majority of the buses in the City, as well as the subways, indeed the dominant player in New York's ever-changing transit game.....

"NYO"
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 19, 2021 12:08 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

When America entered the First World War, FACCo's fleet remained at home; it was, indeed, "business as usual".

Not so in London; well over 1,000 buses were shipped overseas to France and Belgium, to be used as troop transports, ambulances, and "staff cars".

The buses had their windows boarded up, and were painted army drab, and wrapped in barbed wire (the majority of buses from London were GENERAL's "B"-types)

A number of DE DION's from Paris also went into the battlefields; some of these buses were converted into makeshift food transports, serving the troops.

Though many of these buses survived to come back home and re-enter service on a civilian level, many were either destroyed or simply abandoned.

Again, thankfully, FACCo did not have its buses "called up" by the Government, for services overseas, during the First World War......

"NYO"
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W.B. Fishbowl



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PostPosted: Sun Dec 19, 2021 4:16 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629 wrote:
When America entered the First World War, FACCo's fleet remained at home; it was, indeed, "business as usual".

Not so in London; well over 1,000 buses were shipped overseas to France and Belgium, to be used as troop transports, ambulances, and "staff cars".

The buses had their windows boarded up, and were painted army drab, and wrapped in barbed wire (the majority of buses from London were GENERAL's "B"-types)

A number of DE DION's from Paris also went into the battlefields; some of these buses were converted into makeshift food transports, serving the troops.

Though many of these buses survived to come back home and re-enter service on a civilian level, many were either destroyed or simply abandoned.

Again, thankfully, FACCo did not have its buses "called up" by the Government, for services overseas, during the First World War......

"NYO"

However, I seem to remember reading a few of Surface Transportation's fleet was requisitioned for wartime travel use for our troops a la some of LT's buses "over there" . . .
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 19, 2021 11:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

W.B.:

Thanks for this info; I did not know this.

When bus production was halted due to WW2, bus companies indeed had to "make do" with what they had; PSNJ, as an example, continued to use a number of 1920's YELLOWS until after the War (by this time, new GMC's were replacing these older buses, the ASV's, and the last HUDSON Division streetcars (1949)

Earlier, I'd mentioned the manpower shortage during the War, when thousands of transit employees went into the service; how did FACCo fare (pun not intended) during the War, in that respect?

"NYO"
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 04, 2022 8:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Any discussion of London's bus operations of decades ago must include at least a brief mention of the 1926 "General Strike" (scroll down page for a photo of a "SOUTHERN" double-decker with police escort)

This massive, nationwide job action, as you might expect, crippled public transport in Great Britain, not only in London.

In the Capital, less than 100 buses were running, operated by strikebreakers and "volunteers".

Not surprisingly, each bus had its own police escort.....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1926_United_Kingdom_general_strike
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 04, 2022 8:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Sidenote:

Despite each bus having its own police escort (and being adorned by barbed wire), a number of buses during the 1926 "General Strike" were attacked; some were torched, while others were tipped over.

Thankfully, the Strike was not a lengthy one......

"NYO"
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 04, 2022 9:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Here are a number of rare photos taken in London during the 1926 "General Strike"; several of these photos show the buses* that operated during the strike, including one bus which had been bombed.........

www.gagdaily.com/educative/1180-the-1926-general-strike.html

*Buses that did operate during the 1926 Strike were known as "volunteer buses".......
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W.B. Fishbowl



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PostPosted: Tue Jan 04, 2022 10:49 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Over the years there were strikes against FACCo (and New York City Omnibus), but unless there's something I missed, there wasn't the kind of violence against buses that there were during the 1926 "General Strike" in the UK.

One of the TWU strikes, in 1941, involved the status of African-Americans in terms of the positions they held in bus companies at the time.
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