Friday, 6 February 2009

More snow: Maidstone 1968

Well I think this snow was turning to slush but who cares when here are two of Maidstone and District finest buses from the fifties. Firstly one of a batch of thirty-six vehicles delivered in 1951 this Leyland PD2/12 carried a Farrington body and some of these survived till 1970. Slightly newer but looking rather more modern was this even more elegant Park Royal AEC Regent V of 1956, one of fourteen similar buses in the fleet. These older buses were preferred on M & D's longer country routes like the 5 Service from Maidstone to Hastings which took almost two and a half-hours. The rear-engined Atlanteans and Fleetlines on the other hand tended to be found working on more urban routes such as as around Tonbridge and Tunbridge Wells and particularly Hastings and the Medway Towns. It was not until 1957 that this operator made an effort start matching registrations with fleet numbers and as the AEC's numbers ran from DH 476 to 489 carrying registrations VKR 468-481. It was easy to confused forgetting as to which was which especially in the following years when some sort coordination became the general rule.

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