On my Swiss holiday in early 1998 instead of long train journeys chasing post buses I was in Switzerland's Rhineland and had a nice easy unhurried day with time to spare and I remembered that down at the bottom end of the medieval town in Basel glorious noisy FBW buses had been operating in 1990. So once more as usual armed with my hand held tape recorder I thought I would see if my luck was in and check to see if some were still going strong on the 37 Service. The previous ones I had encountered with fleet numbers like 61-64 had all gone but the last survivors of the type were miraculously still hard at work and I got a chance to travel on Nos 82-84. As I boarded No.83 I mentioned to the driver that I had come to enjoy the music. He said in reply there was no music on his bus and so I made a FBW bus sound and he retorted "You mean din!" Well I got my recordings and as the buses were almost empty inside they made a nice deep hollow rumbling sound that seemed to echo through the bus as they ambled slowly from bus stop to bus stop.
Yes, I remember them well. Beautiful buses with a special sound.
ReplyDeleteBasel will be drawing its final curtian on trolleybus operation on Monday 30th June. That is this coming Monday. The last trolleybus will come out of service at Rank garage at 20:00. In addition to the trolleybusesd working the 31 on the last day, suitably decorated with wreaths, the old route 34 will be back for the day with two trolleybuses giving last rides.
Maybe you could commemorate the occasion with some suitable picture from your collection?
Thank you and all the best
Andrew
Hi Andrew,yes I knew it was coming to an end and it is rather sad too. I like you idea though.
ReplyDeleteone of these busses still exists at Roman Wegmüller, Bern. It was in use until May 2000!
ReplyDeletewww.rwb.bash.ch (Site is in German and French)