BUSWORLD PHOTOGRAPHY

I AM CHRISTOPHER LEACH THE ARTIST. I started this blog so that I can share with everyone my vast collection of transport photographs showing a personal and nostalgic view of the industry with images that span some 45 years taking in the U.K and some of Europe. I have no darkroom and so rather than being the perfectionist after tidying them up I upload the images warts and all, and even those that won't scan squarely or are scratched. In a way it adds age and character. You are all free to download these for your personal use but please remember I still own them and you are not just free to use them without prior permission for any knd of publishing. Click on images to enlarge them and if you want to see more leave your comments or visit my website for the mother-site with galleries including those Buses & Girls: PICTUREWORLD

Monday 14 July 2008

Midland Red: The Stratford Blues


One of the saddest things about the new National Bus Company in 1969 was that it did away with all those characterful small company units that made the BET Group so interesting. It was said one reason for retaining them was that it found them useful for management training. For a short while though the Leyland Titan PD3's inherited from it's small forty-bus satellite Stratford Blue did add a bit of variety to the Midland Red fleet that had not too long ago withdrawn the last of it's 100 LD8 Leyland PD2/20's of 1952-3. However buses like the former No.6 now 2006 seen in Birmingham did not stay long as these Willowbrook double-deckers were quickly sold off to the Isle of Man. But the Titan was again to return to Midland Red when Harper Brothers of Heath Hayes sold out to the NBC.

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