MIKE'S BUS PAGES

I grew up in Stanmore very close to routes 142,186,286 on the estate that runs between Canons Park and Stanmore Jubilee.

My earliest memories of buses are putting out my arm to hail a Routemaster on the 18 at Honeypot Lane heading towards Belmont Circle.

My Grandmother lived in Kenmore Avenue (very close to Mike´s grandmother I see from the commentary!) and when she took me to the local park we crossed route 230 very close to the low bridge that put RLHs on the route, and I have hazy memories of double deckers coming up from under that bridge.But I have mostly much more vivid memories of Edgware and Harrow Weald SMS Swifts running around my local streets June 1970- December 1980.

Some of those same Swifts including ex-EW SMS60 are celebrating 40 years in service where they still perform frontline route work in sunny Malta until the end of December 2010  when new contracts come into force.To celebrate the 37 SMs and SMSs still in service in Malta today I do hope you will add a few shots of some of those survivors if you captured them when in London .Or perhapsan early 1970s shot of one of the Swifts currently preserved in the UK (1,30,88,91,97,106,114,369,678,753) or one that very rarely if ever photographed in service as they were scrapped being withdrawn in 1973-74 like SMS738