Search results for ""Author Gavin Booth""

Bus and coach manufacturers advertised in the trade magazines for various reasons it was to sell their products, of course, but also to keep their names in front of the people who made the decisions, to keep their shareholders happy, to boast about their successes and to support the trade press. Over the years, the number of manufacturers promoting their wares has fluctuated from several dozen bus builders competing for orders in the years following World War Two, to the late 1960s, when British Leyland had acquired much of the competition and was starting to abandon popular brands as it moved to rationalise its product range. This impacted the monthly trade magazines as the number of advertisers dwindled, and this led to the closure of the market-leading magazine Bus & Coach in 1970. The book uses trade adverts that appeared in the years between 1945 and 1970 to illustrate the development of new bus and coach chassis and bodies, and the constantly changing visual styles used by advertisers to catch the eye of potential customers.

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In just under 25 years, double-deck buses in the UK have undergone a transformation. Every double-decker in normal service in the UK today is a low-floor bus offering easy access to everyone. This book traces the story of the UK's low-floor double-deckers, from the first tentative steps to the widespread adoption of this layout and the moves from diesel buses to diesel-electric hybrids, to gas, electric and even hydrogen buses built for bus companies of all sizes. It covers the London operators that initially drove the low-floor revolution, along with the major groups, the remaining local authority fleets and a range of enterprising independents that operate them. Where once every double-decker for service in the UK was built in the UK, today many chassis come from mainland Europe and, increasingly, from manufacturers based in other and more distant parts of the world - and UK builders have gained an important foothold in Europe, North America, and the Far East as well. The story is told for the first time, on a model-by-model basis, supported by many unseen colour images, which show the buses in use throughout the UK.

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Although to many enthusiasts, municipal vehicles never extended beyond the trams, trolleybuses and buses that were required to provide the basic public service, behind them were a range of vehicles that were required to enable operations to proceed smoothly. These vehicles – tower wagons, tree-loppers, towing vehicles, training vehicles, mobile canteens and numerous others – are vehicles that, historically, have tended to be ignored when writing the history of municipal operators but without which operation would have been impossible. Some of these vehicles were often elderly buses converted for new duties, others were specially constructed for their somewhat specialised tasks; all, however, are fascinating examples of historic municipal vehicles. Gavin Booth, one of the country’s leading experts on the subject of public transport history, has delved deep into the archives of many of the country’s leading transport photographers to produce a fascinating survey of these often ignored vehicles. Dividing the subject into each of the specialised tasks, he shows how the various types of vehicle evolved during the twentieth century. Alongside the excellent photographs, the author’s well-researched text and detailed captions make the book an essential work of reference for all those interested in the history of Britain’s municipal bus operations.

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