Magnus Mills - The Maintenance of Headway

“Blimey.”

“Couldn’t do that these days, of course. They’re all equipped with walkie-talkies and you never know where they’re going to pop up.”

“They have a roving commission,” said Jeff.

“Very true,” I agreed. “Especially Breslin.”

I checked my watch. Fifteen minutes remaining. Just time for another tea.

“What was it like driving a VPB?” Jeff enquired. “I’ve heard they were a bit sluggish.”

“Yes, very sluggish,” I said. “Unless you happened to get hold of one of the fast ones, but they were few and far between. Anyway, you didn’t want to be going too fast. The brakes weren’t as good as on modern buses.”

“Handled alright, did they?”

“Oh yes, but to tell the truth the actual bus itself wasn’t particularly important. History paints a very romantic picture of the VPB, yet you have to remember the driver was completely at the mercy of the conductor.”

“Yes, I suppose so,” said Jeff. “I never thought of that.”

“If you had a good conductor, the VPB was fine, but some of them could be very difficult. Notorious even. Basically, you could only go as fast as your conductor allowed because they had control of the bell. You really thought some of them must have gone to sleep in between stops, they were so slow ringing it. Others rang the bell while there were still people getting on and off. Then there were those who behaved like martinets, forever marching round the front of the bus, giving orders. You couldn’t get away from them, perched up there in the cab. It was like being stuck in a goldfish bowl.”

“So were you glad to see the back of them?”

“I’ve got mixed feelings,” I said. “My last conductor was marvellous. Jumo, his name was, and a real treat to work with. Before him there was Stanley, who fancied himself as a disciplinarian but who was a real nightmare with the bell. Then there was Maisie, very nice but rather lazy. They’ve all gone now, of course. It’s almost a year since they were paid off.”

While we’d been talking Davy had joined us at the table. “Is it a year already?” he asked.

“Yep,” I replied. “A year next Friday, to be exact, since the last VPB came rolling into the shed.”

“Well, progress is on the march,” he said with triumph. “I’ve just seen the future.”

“You mean the articulated bus?”

“Yes.” Davy glared at me. “How did you know about that?”

“It’s been around for weeks,” I shrugged. “The engineers have been carrying out trials up and down the old coach road. Where did you see it?”

“Spanish Infanta.”

“There you are then. They must have extended the run to see how it negotiates the double roundabout. We’ll probably start spotting it all over the place soon, while they put it through its paces.”

“It makes the VPB look very old-fashioned,” said Davy. “I bet it holds loads more people.”

“Yes, it does,” I said. “Trouble is, most of them have to stand.”

“Won’t it put some of us out of a job?” said Jeff. “After all, if it takes more people they’ll need fewer buses.”

“It doesn’t work like that,” I rejoined. “If it’s a success they’ll put more on the road, not less. Edward told me there were similar concerns when one-man buses first appeared on the streets. Everyone assumed the VPB would be phased out immediately because it required a crew of two, but actually it continued running for another thirty years. The only reason they finally got rid of it was because people kept falling off the back.”

“‘Safety first’,” said Davy.

“Correct,” I said. “A modern bus requires doors, not only to prevent accidents, but also to stop too many people coming on board.”

“Seems a shame to me,” remarked Jeff. “The VPB had much more character than these new vehicles.”

“I agree with you,” said Davy. “All the same, progress is progress, and in the final analysis the VPB had to go. Keeping it would have been like retaining an air force of legendary wooden monoplanes.”

“And you certainly needn’t worry about your job,” I added. “There’s no such thing as an unemployed bus driver.”

“Right,” said Greeves. “I’m going to adjust you and I’ll tell you why.”

Greeves was a completely different kettle of fish to most of the other officials. Apart from his custom of giving detailed explanations to every driver he encountered, he also had a very affable manner, which made him relatively popular. He operated in the area immediately around the cross, but his prime concern seemed to be with what was going on in the furthest reaches of the route. Therefore, it came as no surprise when he proceeded to issue identical directions to those he’d given Jeff the previous week.

“I’ve got too many buses up this end and not enough down that end,” he said. “You’ll be pleased to know you’re part of the remedy.”

As Greeves spoke I glanced down at my dashboard, where somebody had written the words I’LL TELL YOU WHY with a felt-tip pen.

This strategy of sending us on excursions was not new, but lately the officials were resorting to it much more often. It meant the bus avoided the bejewelled thoroughfare, which could take up to thirty minutes to traverse, and instead ‘went out-of-service’ via the ring road. Personally I found this a bit of a disappointment, because the bejewelled thoroughfare was my favourite section of the route. There were plenty of drivers who thought the opposite, of course. They found it tedious and frustrating, especially the twenty-three sets of traffic lights which stood all in a row, and which were all out of sequence with one another. These could be a great hindrance, as could the hordes of pedestrians wandering into the road (including the foreign tourists who invariably looked the wrong way before crossing). Nonetheless, there was something about driving down the bejewelled thoroughfare that appealed to me. It was a great canyon of flagship stores stretching side by side for nearly a mile. Most of these stores were floodlit at night and many were bedecked with fluttering pennants. Around Yuletide, masses of fairy lights augmented the already vast array of street lamps, illuminated windows and flashing beacons. Congestion was endemic. There were countless motorbikes, cycle-rickshaws and taxis. All the cab ranks faced east, while the type of people who used them generally lived in the west. Accordingly, there was a continual swirl of taxis performing U-turns. More often than not, they did this without signalling; nor did they signal when executing their other less orthodox manoeuvres. (Such were the inalienable rights of cabbies.) Early on summer mornings the household cavalry led strings of horses down the bejewelled thoroughfare as a test of their sobriety (the horses not the men), before treating them to a well-earned gallop in the park. Twice daily a water tanker sprayed the kerbs and pavements to keep the dust at bay; and well before noon obstructive geezers in vans began delivering the evening newspapers. Through the midst of this tumult moved endless columns of buses, sometimes streaming along, sometimes reduced to a crawl, and often accompanied by the plaintive drone of a lone piper standing immobile amongst the thronging crowd. The bejewelled thoroughfare could be hectic at times, but never was it dull.

Today, though, my instructions were to miss it out altogether. Greeves duly signed my log card and sent me on my way.

I’d been half full of people when he’d stopped me, and when I arrived at the underpass I had to kick them all off again. As usual they didn’t want to go, but after some gentle persuasion they reluctantly complied. I must admit I felt sorry for them sometimes, constantly being shifted from pillar to post like this, but unfortunately there was nothing I could do about it. Orders were orders. After they’d gone I sped merrily along the ring road, arriving at the arch some fifteen minutes later. Then I resumed normal service, picking up people who were completely oblivious to the adjustment Greeves had made on their behalf. There weren’t many of them, to tell the truth, and it wasn’t long before I saw the reason why. Just in front of me, at a distance of less than a quarter of a mile, was another bus!

Despite his best intentions, Greeves had seriously miscalculated, and I was now faced with a number of choices. Officially, if one bus caught up with another the second bus was supposed to hold back and give the leading bus a chance to get clear ahead. Another option was for the follower quickly to catch up and overtake the leader, and then play a game of leapfrog in which both buses travelled in tandem working alternate stops. This required the cooperation of the other driver, of course, and was usually reserved for when both buses were late and trying to make up lost time. A third approach was for one bus simply to follow the other at close quarters, nose to tail, and make absolutely no effort to separate. Understandably, the Board of Transport took a very dim view of this last practice; and the leapfrogging was hardly less frowned upon. In the opinion of the Board, two buses running together only counted as one bus. The infringement was considered even worse when there were three or more buses in the equation. Few of us were innocent. I once participated in a convoy of nine vehicles, all bound for the same destination. Such a sight could turn the officials quite apoplectic because it ran counter to their guiding principle. The maintenance of headway was sacrosanct. Any violation threatened to undermine an entire ideology. Hence, they feared if all the buses came at once, the walls of their citadel would tumble.

For these reasons I decided not to get involved with the bus in front, and instead kept my distance. I could just make out its upper deck disappearing gradually over the horizon, and it struck me, not for the first time, that the distinctive red paintwork had been selected especially for this purpose. The subject had been under debate for years. Some experts claimed buses were painted red in order to make them look bigger than they actually were. Others said it was to prevent them from clashing with the telephone boxes. Yet again, there was a widely held opinion that the man who ordered the original batch of paint was a communist trying to make a particular point. Whatever the explanation, the fact that the bus ahead of me was a conspicuous red made it very easy to keep track of.

Carefully I followed it southward, over the bridge, stopping and picking up the few stragglers who had somehow managed to miss it. By the time I reached the common I had half a dozen people on board, most of them fairly content because they’d only had to wait about a minute before I came along. Drawing near the underground station I saw Breslin standing at the side of the road. Unusually, he didn’t glance at his watch as I approached, but merely gazed in my direction. He gave me a satisfactory nod when I passed by, and I concluded Greeves must have been in touch with him. All was as it should be, apparently, so I continued my journey. When I neared the garage some fifteen minutes later, however, I was in for a surprise. There on the pavement stood Mick Wilson, and he was wearing the smart black uniform of a fully-fledged inspector of buses. The moment he saw me he looked at his watch, then instantly began flagging me down. At first I pretended not to notice him, and rolled on for another thirty yards before finally coming to a halt. When he got to me his feathers were all ruffled. Obviously he had not seen the funny side of my ‘jape’.